NO PENALTY FOR RATHER: CBS Thornburgh Report a Whitewash
My first question regards Dan Rather's "memogate" punishment: Where is it? He was due to retire from the nightly news this year anyway, and he still is on the show that he committed his journalistic sin on in the first place! I want to compare a line from my piece "the Bush Haters" with a report on the review.
I wrote on 9/17/04: "Will he last until his scheduled retirement next year? Has he succeeded, where Nixon failed, at 'circling the wagons?'".
From the AP 01/10/05: "The review said CBS compounded the damage with a circle-the-wagons mentality once the report came under fire. The independent investigators added, however, that they found no evidence of a political bias against Bush".
It's a pretty obvious whitewash for Rather. This brings into question the overall integrity of the review. I hate to question Mr. Thornburgh, but to see this story as anything other than a political hit piece timed to influence the election involves delusion of a higher order, or outside influence. He may have rolled over because of a lack of hard evidence, but I understand that CBS STILL will not confirm that the memos are forgeries, saying it's not determined one way or another. I'd like to see what the review says about this, if it's true. Expect some stronger attemts to get Rather off of 60 minutes by bloggers and talk radio, of course. I'm pissed at the lack of response to the show the offending report aired on, and so are alot of others!
I wrote on 9/17/04: "Will he last until his scheduled retirement next year? Has he succeeded, where Nixon failed, at 'circling the wagons?'".
From the AP 01/10/05: "The review said CBS compounded the damage with a circle-the-wagons mentality once the report came under fire. The independent investigators added, however, that they found no evidence of a political bias against Bush".
It's a pretty obvious whitewash for Rather. This brings into question the overall integrity of the review. I hate to question Mr. Thornburgh, but to see this story as anything other than a political hit piece timed to influence the election involves delusion of a higher order, or outside influence. He may have rolled over because of a lack of hard evidence, but I understand that CBS STILL will not confirm that the memos are forgeries, saying it's not determined one way or another. I'd like to see what the review says about this, if it's true. Expect some stronger attemts to get Rather off of 60 minutes by bloggers and talk radio, of course. I'm pissed at the lack of response to the show the offending report aired on, and so are alot of others!
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