The Chicago Tribune is a terrible newspaper that was driven into bankruptcy by timid bureaucrats posing as editors. So who is the New York Times hiring to launch its new Chicago edition? The same people that ruined the Trib.
gee, and here I thought he was a passionate, intelligent man who has served his country and done honorable work attempting to expose the machinations of things (as in this case. talk about minutiae all you want, but the man had a valuable point, albeit poorly executed, and calculatedly subverted by who knows who) and keep people honest. now I learn he's a loser. kinda arbitrary, dontcha think, John? how do you justify that kind of pronouncement? and what do you hope to accomplish in doing so?
@TheologicalSong: Not crazy about the gleeful tone either. A massive corporation wins over a guy telling the truth and fighting for it.
"Disgraced" newsman? Hey John Cook, please tell us why Rather being fired under political pressure from the Bush White House means he was "disgraced'.
Someone fed him faked documents-hm, I wonder whom?- but the fact remains: not one single soul anywhere recalls Bush performing his required service. No one. Because he didn't. Bush lied about serving, he skipped out, and that has never been disproved.
So yeah, ha-ha, Rather's illustrious career was destroyed. Why are you cackling about it? Who wins here? Surely not the truth. The only disgrace is on CBS buckling to support Bush's lying about his non-existent service in the Vietnam era, when so many other less privileged men were drafted to their deaths.
@Baroness: Agreed. Dan Rather took one for the team. He got careless, sure, and those docs were fakes, but his premise was correct. Let's not forget that. W never served his full term in the National Guard, and everyone knows it. I'm sure he and Rove watched Rather's downfall (and the rise of Katie Couric) and laughed their asses off.
@TheologicalSong: I guess I was hoping this post was sarcastic? Because who celebrates W winning over the guy who said about him, "Keep in mind they are teetotally meetmortally convinced they have Ohio won."?
And I'm on Team Rather here, too. Well, I think CBS is legally correct in their argument. But I'm not getting what Rather did that makes him a "loser" in some broader sense.
Good. Because that fake-Texan fucker didn't serve more than a day of his alleged service. Someone slipped fake documents to discredit Rather, but the essence is true. Not a goddamn soul remembers W serving with them, when tons of boys who didn't have his connections were sent to their misery and death in Vietnam. Rove and Cheney similarly avoided the draft. And oh, the bullshit excuses later.
Team Rather on this one. He's a very odd man, but his reporting was correct and he was viciously destroyed by the Bush cabal at the height of Iraq warmongering.
Rather was right- Bush ditched his service obligations. Not one fucking person can remember him serving. Or even showing up. Go, Dan.
@Baroness: ..and the real shit deal was that the whole document fuckup was for a story on not CBS Evening News but the all-but-forgotten 60 MINUTES II. You'd think, though, CBS would have plenty of staffers to vet info like this, so it was kind of stupid to can him specifically. Shot the messenger...
How many years ago was that 60 Minutes report? And he's got nothing else? No other 'liberal media' outrage to flog? No more, shall we say, recent grievances? No, heaven forbid, more relevant outrage?
Pretty soon his website will have nothing but KIDS, GET OFF MY LAWN scrolling across a black, black screen of fail.
Flogging your own website like some infomercial salesman isn't exactly the best way to establish credibility.
Bush could've volunteered to go to Vietnam knowing for certain that he would be turned down, therefore fronting an appearance o dutiful and brave sacrifice while in reality risking nothing. But on the other hand, I'm not sure he's smart enough to have figured that move out.
Rather screwed up for some reason- I have no idea why...but the evidence against Bush's National Guard record was sitting right on the internet at the Boston Globe website. I can't believe Rather never heard about these docs. But that's besides the point. This guy Goldberg conveniently attacks Rather and Mapes, while Moonves is facing a $70 million lawsuit on Rather's termination.
@Motoko Kusanagi:
I doubt that CBS did the forgery. It was given forgeries that were probably made from real documents.
The question to ask is did the forger deliberately use some superscript font to later"catch" CBS or did the forger just do it without that knowledge & CBS still fell for it.
And I still think Karl Rove will be found out as behind it.
@Motoko Kusanagi: Actually- the documents were hanging out on the net for awhile, with many other docs. CBS didn't forge them-the source Bill whathisname did.
But- I was interpreting the point (the video wouldn't play for me so...) Gawker made on this being-Bush wanted to go to Vietnam.
I suppose then, we are to believe that Bush broke all the rules so that he might have the opportunity to go to war in Vietnam.
I know Bush isn't the brightest, but someone could have explained that all he had to do was enlist for a tour of duty. If he wanted to fly while in service, then he might have a problem, because he conveniently went missing many times for those training hours.
Bush was to have signed in with the Guard when he arrived at Harvard. He didn't. Most normal recruits would have been sent off to Vietnam at that point.
Something prevented Bush doing a tour in Vietnam and it wasn't the fact that he didn't have enough flight training.
I was pretty pissed that Rather ignored this information. It is bad journalism to rely on a single source for the story.
@lil red: The whole episode was some of the most criminally inept journalism ever. The first thing I said when I heard that the supposed documents had come to light was, "They'd better check the typeface." I've never been an investigator, a journalist, nothing, I'm just an ordinary citizen with a functioning frontal lobe. However, the beauty here is it's being responded to with more of the same.
I think there may of been a simpler way for Bush to of gone to Vietnam. Like by applying to the Air Force instead of using his parents connections to go to the National Guard.
@cockfightbarmitzvah: Exactly. There is nothing so ironic or despicable that some of the biggest war mongerers shirked their duties when it came to actual war. I have yet to meet a veteran who wasn't profoundly affected by their experience, leading them to approach war as the grave, terrible force it is.
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
"Disgraced" newsman? Hey John Cook, please tell us why Rather being fired under political pressure from the Bush White House means he was "disgraced'.
Someone fed him faked documents-hm, I wonder whom?- but the fact remains: not one single soul anywhere recalls Bush performing his required service. No one. Because he didn't. Bush lied about serving, he skipped out, and that has never been disproved.
So yeah, ha-ha, Rather's illustrious career was destroyed. Why are you cackling about it? Who wins here? Surely not the truth. The only disgrace is on CBS buckling to support Bush's lying about his non-existent service in the Vietnam era, when so many other less privileged men were drafted to their deaths.
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
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09/29/09
And I'm on Team Rather here, too. Well, I think CBS is legally correct in their argument. But I'm not getting what Rather did that makes him a "loser" in some broader sense.
09/29/09
09/29/09
09/29/09
In all seriousness, I'm sad to hear this -- Rather may always have been a publicity hound, but he's a good fella, too.
Team Dan.
09/29/09
09/21/09
Team Rather on this one. He's a very odd man, but his reporting was correct and he was viciously destroyed by the Bush cabal at the height of Iraq warmongering.
Rather was right- Bush ditched his service obligations. Not one fucking person can remember him serving. Or even showing up. Go, Dan.
09/22/09
08/26/09
Pretty soon his website will have nothing but KIDS, GET OFF MY LAWN scrolling across a black, black screen of fail.
08/26/09
Bush could've volunteered to go to Vietnam knowing for certain that he would be turned down, therefore fronting an appearance o dutiful and brave sacrifice while in reality risking nothing. But on the other hand, I'm not sure he's smart enough to have figured that move out.
08/25/09
Rather screwed up for some reason- I have no idea why...but the evidence against Bush's National Guard record was sitting right on the internet at the Boston Globe website. I can't believe Rather never heard about these docs. But that's besides the point. This guy Goldberg conveniently attacks Rather and Mapes, while Moonves is facing a $70 million lawsuit on Rather's termination.
Why do we even listen to these idiots?
[www.boston.com]
08/26/09
08/26/09
08/26/09
I doubt that CBS did the forgery. It was given forgeries that were probably made from real documents.
The question to ask is did the forger deliberately use some superscript font to later"catch" CBS or did the forger just do it without that knowledge & CBS still fell for it.
And I still think Karl Rove will be found out as behind it.
08/26/09
But- I was interpreting the point (the video wouldn't play for me so...) Gawker made on this being-Bush wanted to go to Vietnam.
I suppose then, we are to believe that Bush broke all the rules so that he might have the opportunity to go to war in Vietnam.
I know Bush isn't the brightest, but someone could have explained that all he had to do was enlist for a tour of duty. If he wanted to fly while in service, then he might have a problem, because he conveniently went missing many times for those training hours.
Bush was to have signed in with the Guard when he arrived at Harvard. He didn't. Most normal recruits would have been sent off to Vietnam at that point.
Something prevented Bush doing a tour in Vietnam and it wasn't the fact that he didn't have enough flight training.
I was pretty pissed that Rather ignored this information. It is bad journalism to rely on a single source for the story.
08/26/09
08/25/09
08/26/09
08/17/09
08/17/09
08/17/09
08/17/09
08/17/09
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08/17/09