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« Dodged A Bullet, Again | Main | Finally »

The Story Continues To Evolve

At least for me.

It started on Friday as a story about whether or not the memos were forged. That part didn't last very long, as it quickly became clear to all but the koolaid drinkers that they were. Ignoring the next question of whodunnit, it has now evolved into something much more fascinating--just how far in the tank will some people (particularly some people who are long-time anchors for a major network news organization) go to continue, absurdly, to defend the authenticity of the documents?

Dan, of course, now has two motives to try to defend his story--to continue his original goal of damaging (hopefully fatally) the president's chances for reelection, but now also to maintain whatever vestiges of respect for him exist among the American public, too many of whom have taken him too seriously for too long. As others have pointed out, the demographic that pays any attention to him is dying off, and younger people are getting their news from cable and the net, so perhaps he feels he has little to lose at this point, and still hopes to convince enough simpletons that there really is substance to his new take on the "Bush AWOL" story.

"Hindrocket" over at Powerline makes an interesting, and dismaying analogy of CBS and other partisan news organizations as suicide bombers. There used to be a time when, regardless of how clearly biased people like Dan Rather were, we could count on some sense of self-preservation on their part to keep them ultimately in line. This episode makes him (and me) wonder if that is no longer the case, with a number of disturbing implications.

Just as our newfound knowledge that some people were willing to kill themselves in order to kill us led us to have to change our tactics in airport and other security, the thought that some news organizations are willing to destroy their credibility in pursuit of their political objectives should cause us to rethink our relationship with them as well.

Posted by Rand Simberg at September 12, 2004 09:55 AM

Comments

Listening to the leftist/liberal/progressive talk radio shows at the end of the week, and some of the talking heads this weekend, it seems a new take on the whole thing is emerging: it doesn't matter that the documents were forged, if they were, what matters is that the allegations in the documents were themselves believable and credible.

It's a variation on the old "not the strength of the evidence but the seriousness of the charge" canard, and reeks of desperation.

Posted by T.L. James at September 12, 2004 11:02 AM

Dan-O has another reason. Right now, he's in line to be The Man Who Lost the Election. There's a reason why no one has taken credit for putting Michael Dukakis in that tank.

Dan Rather doesn't have the option of anonymity. His only way out is to make this story too small to serve as the scapegoat.

Posted by Bob Hawkins at September 12, 2004 11:08 AM

the thought that some news organizations are willing to destroy their credibility in pursuit of their political objectives should cause us to rethink our relationship with them as well.

No rethinking necessary in my case. I haven't trusted CBS in over 30 years (since a university communications dept. - Vanderbilt? - proved they were managing the news from Vietnam, and their only response was to sue to get the tapes of their news shows back).

Haven't completely trusted the rest of them either, since Reagan ran for office and I saw how they acted about that. Reagan once said, "Trust, but verify." I do half of that with the MSM (bet you can guess which half, too).

And I will never trust CNN again after Jordan's admission about covering up Saddam's torture and murder so they could have "access."

On another note, Mazel Tov on getting full power back, Rand! Hope Ivan stays west.

Posted by Barbara Skolaut at September 12, 2004 01:24 PM

Peter Wallsten has a piece about bloggers as major players posted in the LA Times online. Of course it is written with the usual Times spin but is interesting. It is not favorable to Rather and CBS either.
p.s.
Barbara, those of us on the coast west of Rand would like to see Ivan just disappear lol.

Posted by Bill Maron at September 12, 2004 01:39 PM

Sorry, I just can't accept that they would deliberately go this far to push a political agenda. After all, at this point the memos are badly tainted, so they aren't convincing to anyone except those who have already made their minds up.

I think it is more like this: They got some juicy memos, and nobody there noticed that they looked a lot like print from Microsoft Word. They had what they thought was confirmation and ran with it. Rather and others at CBS have convinced themselves that these things are genuine, because it would be so hard to accept that they were taken in. Now, they just hope it will blow over.

I just hope they are forced to answer the many questions that have been raised or retract the memos.

Posted by VR at September 12, 2004 04:34 PM

Intentional "suicide bomber"? Probably not. Hubris? Definitely so. Still, if Danny boy wants to frag his market share then I'm all for it. Its just too bad that he can come back the next night and do it again. At least real suicide bombers remove themselves from the gene pool.

Posted by Jeff Arnall at September 12, 2004 08:40 PM

Bill Maron: I meant way west. ;-p

Posted by Barbara Skolaut at September 12, 2004 09:10 PM

I find the suicide bomber analogy applied to Rather and CBS News interesting but not really to the point. Consider the credibility of those who defended Clinton's lies and who were used by him to save his Presidency. Neither were these people upset that Clinton had deceived even his friends who were defending him, but they, even still, continued to defend him. Yet today they are working for Kerry and creating these tasteless efforts to give Bush the knockout punch by any means necessary and they are still picked up by the Rathers of this world and reported on as if credible. Consider that they defended Clinton's draft dodging and then dreamed up Bush's alleged Guard scandal calling it immoral and of monumental importance, signifying a serious moral flaw in Bush. Get serious. They clearly prove that you can lie any time and still be given a podium from which to lie again.

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