CBS and Dan Rather.....disgusting!

[Keith]

Well, it looks like the liberal media was at work again. Anti-Bush reporter Dan Rather, along with CBS, have made a horrendous mistake when it comes to professional journalism. You never, ever, report on something that can damage a persons reputation or career unless you know without a doubt that the information that you have obtained is correct.

If I was in the White House, I would NOT accept the apology from CBS or Dan Rather. All they have done is try to damage the reputation and life of President Bush, and now they have stepped over the line. It was not a "mistake of judgement," as CBS worded it......it was pure stupidity on the networks part, and pure stupidity on Dan Rathers part.

The sources for CBS were not credible, however, they reported the false information about the President anyway. I, myself, will no longer watch CBS news, nor will I ever watch Dan Rather again. Dan is 72 years old, and it's time for him to take his out of date views, and his liberal newscasting, and retire!!


CBS News apologizes over Bush Guard story

By DAVID BAUDER
AP Television Writer





NEW YORK (AP) -- CBS News apologized Monday for a "mistake in judgment" in its story questioning President Bush's National Guard service, claiming it was misled by the source of documents that several experts have dismissed as fakes.

The network said it would appoint an independent panel to look at its reporting about the memos. The story has mushroomed into a major media scandal, threatening the reputations of CBS News and chief anchor Dan Rather.

It also has become an issue in the presidential campaign. The White House said the affair raises questions about the connections between CBS's source, retired Texas National Guard officer Bill Burkett, and Democrat John Kerry's campaign. A Kerry adviser also said he had called Burkett at the request of a CBS producer.

Rather joined CBS News President Andrew Heyward in issuing an apology Monday.

"We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry," Rather said. "It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism."

Almost immediately after the story aired Sept. 8, document experts questioned memos purportedly written by Bush's late squadron leader, Lt. Col. Jerry B. Killian, saying they appeared to have been created on a computer and not on the kind of typewriter in use during the 1970s.

CBS strongly defended its story. It wasn't until a week later - after Killian's former secretary said she believed the memos were fake - that the news division admitted they were questionable.

Burkett admitted this weekend to CBS that he lied about obtaining the documents from another former National Guard member, the network said. CBS hasn't been able to conclusively tell how he got them, or even definitely tell whether they're fakes or not. But the network has given up trying to defend them.

"Based on what we now know, CBS News cannot prove that the documents are authentic, which is the only acceptable journalistic standard to justify using them in the report," Heyward said. "We should not have used them."

CBS said it approached Burkett initially about the documents. Rather said Burkett was well known in National Guard circles for several years for trying to discredit Bush's military record.

Burkett, in an interview with Rather aired on the "CBS Evening News," said he was pressured by CBS to reveal his source for the documents, and "I simply threw out a name that was basically, I guess, to get a little pressure off for the moment."

He said he didn't fake or forge any documents.

"I didn't totally mislead you," he said. "I did mislead you about one individual."

Burkett said he also insisted that CBS authenticate the documents on its own. Two document experts consulted by CBS later said they raised red flags that network officials apparently disregarded. Rather acknowledged CBS failed to properly determine whether the documents were genuine.

Burkett did not immediately return a phone call from The Associated Press seeking comment.

Besides tainting the network's flagship broadcast, "60 Minutes," the report was a damaging blow to Rather, 72. Some have suggested the scandal, along with the low ratings of the "CBS Evening News," could hasten Rather's retirement.

"Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully," Rather said.

Alex Jones, director of Harvard University's Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, said it appeared to be an honest mistake by CBS, not a willful attempt to deceive. But he said the network was too slow to respond.

"I think that their delaying and obvious resistance to acknowledge the evident realities has kept the story alive a lot longer than it needed to be and was a lot more damaging to CBS than it needed to be," he said.

For "60 Minutes," it's the biggest ethical mess since the 1995 incident captured in the movie "The Insider," which depicted the newsmagazine caving to pressure from CBS lawyers and not airing a whistleblowing report from an ex-tobacco executive.

Jones said questions will probably center on the story's producer, Mary Mapes. She's one of the network's top investigators and broke the story of the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal photos.

White House press secretary Scott McClellan said the White House appreciated CBS's expression of regret but that there were still serious questions about Burkett, a Democrat.

"Bill Burkett is a source who has been discredited and so this raises a lot of questions," McClellan said. "There were media reports about Mr. Burkett having senior level contacts with the Kerry campaign."

The Kerry campaign has said it had nothing to do with the story.

A Kerry adviser, Joe Lockhart, said he had called Burkett at the suggestion of Mapes shortly before the documents were released. Lockhart said he listened to some campaign advice from Burkett for a few minutes and does not recall talking about Bush's guard records. Burkett told USA Today in a story for Tuesday's editions that his interest in contacting the campaign had nothing to do with the documents.

Asked about Mapes' involvement in the call, CBS spokeswoman Kelli Edwards said, "This is an example of the kind of thing that the independent panel that will be named in a few days will look into. When that review is complete, we will comment."

She said Mapes is not commenting on the story.

Heyward told The AP he has "no reason to believe either the Kerry campaign or the Bush campaign was involved in this."

The call for an independent review was reminiscent of CNN's "Tailwind" scandal in 1998. The cable network retracted a story that the U.S. military had used nerve gas in Laos during the Vietnam war.

CNN appointed independent panels to look into the "Tailwind" story and the missed election calls of 2000. Both panels helped to restore trust in the network and resulted in real changes to the networks' operation, said Tom Johnson, CNN's chief executive at the time.

"As with all professions, we screw up at times," Johnson said. "We need to admit it when we do."

The so-called Killian documents indicated he was being pressured to "sugarcoat" the performance ratings of a young Bush, then the son of a former Texas congressman, and that Bush failed to follow orders to take a physical. Killian died in 1984.

© 2004 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[Dad]

Come now...

Rather made a major, stupid mistake. But these silly claims of "liberal media" or Rather being "anti-Bush" are way over the top. This wasn't just to get Bush, it was to get a big story.

[mranderson]

The source had been reliable in the past. So, why not believe him now. That was the feeling of the producers (Rather is executive Producer).

Do they owe anyone an apology? Not as far as I am concerned.

Do I think Bush failed to serve properly? No.

However, a news report was filed based on reliability. Therefore should have been reported. When it was discovered the facts had been in error, then a retraction should have followed, but not neccessarily with an apology.

I really do not watch CBS much for news, however, this event will not stop me from watching it if there is a report I want to see.

I rarely boycott. If I did, on occasion I would lose some good things in life. An example is Disney with the boycott a few years ago concerning homosexuals.
I did not boycott them because I enjoy the time I spend at Disney.

Why should I change now?

[Joe Schmoe]

So, the swift boat boys have nothing to appoligize for, & maybe this fight has gotten so bloody because it would not be too hard to imagine that a tit for tat would be expected?

I think you would be hard pressed to find anyone without bias. Reporters are no different. I don't think that CBS went looking for a fraud to perpitrate on the unsuspecting silent majority. I think that they were sloppy, & I thnk that the desire to have an exclusive scoop blinded them.

A fraud was peritrated on them, & like a lot of frauds, it depended on the greed of the victim.

But to go painting with that old broad brush of "the LIBERAL MEDIA," is not of service to the questions.

The "librul media" is a myth spun up by people who profit from division. Media outlets are so into narrowcasting that every view has a venue. I always love how Pat Robertson & Rush use the media to address their many thousands of listeners to complain about the media... Like they are somehow not a part of it...

With CBN, FOX & Rush, I'm sure you won't miss Dan Rather, & you'll get the news you want to believe. Plenty of media to reinforce any view that you want to hold.

[Patrick]

I agree with Joe Schmoe...this mistake is no different from the lies that the Swift Boat group used to ruin Kerry's lead in the polls. In reality though, the Swift Boat Veteran's claim was far worse. Why? Because they were outright lies. Truth has been shown that Kerry did serve his country honorably and earned every medal he awarded. But you know what? The Swift Boat veterans never apologized for all of the lies they told. And by all means, those lies probably cost Kerry the election.

Now, the paperwork that Dan Rather was working with might not have been real, but the story they told was factual. The gaps in his Guard service found in other documents have proven that. Bush did skip out on some Guard duty. And I don't have a doubt in my mind that strings were pulled to get Bush in the Guard to keep him from going to Vietnam. I mean, come on......Bush's dad was a congressman at the time. And the defense attorney in charge of all that at the time stated that he pulled special strings for Bush.

I think there's two obvious issues here: Kerry served his country honorably by volunteering to go to Vietnam. Bush got out of going to Vietnam by going to the Guard (where he served his country honerably as well), but then, he didn't complete his service. But, as I said before, I don't know why these new documents make any difference. We all knew before that there were gaps in his military service.

Dan Rather apologized for CBS news. At least he had the respect to do that. The Swift Boat Veterans don't even have the respect to apologize for their lies. And Bush still refuses to denounce their lies. In my opinion, that shows you the true character of George W. Bush.

Dan Rather's bias (or mistake) is no worse than the very right-winged reporting of Pat Robertson- CBN, Fox News, etc. In fact, Pat Robertson is one of the worst.
Our local media isn't much better......KWTV-New 9 sends Kelly Ogle to the Republican National Convention for the time of his life, but they don't send anyone to cover the DNC. You call that non-biased? Kelly Ogle is about as biased as they come for the right-winged party.

Anyways, I think we need to stop focusing on something that happened 30 years ago. I want to hear about what these candidates are going to do over the next 4 years.

[Midtowner]

I wrote an excellent paper on a phenomenon in the media known as agenda setting while in college (yes, my ego is huge).

Agenda setting is where the media doesn't tell you what to think about certain topics (because they really don't), but rather, what it is you should be thinking about. My paper was a study of "YM" magazine (whose target audience is teenage girls) and how it influences them in their consumer behaviors.

Anyhow, ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX all are guilty of this. They do essentially cover the same news stories: Hurricanes, sports, flip-flops and fumbles by both presidential candidates. Where we can start to see a HUGE difference in reporting in my opinion comes when we have authors come on and talk about their books.

I think the most egregious example of this would be found on NBC. NBC gave 3 days to an author by the name of Kitty Kelly whose book amongst other things accused the President and first lady of using cocaine, murder, etc. The best part about her book was that it only named ONE source that was willing to self-identify. The rest of it, for all we know (and in my opinion, in all likelihood) was a work of fiction. The first 2 days for Kitty were absolute cake walks where Katy just set her up to talk about the ills of the Bush family and how it was the evil empire, etc. On the final day, after the public became skeptical, Matt Lauer gave her a semi-tough interview to try and retain some degree of credibility. It was quite a display of bias. Recently, there have been several pro-Bush books out there, in fact, one written by a higher-up in the Iraq operation that cites credibile intelligence stating that Iraq in fact did have WMD. He apparently makes an excellent case for the WMD being moved to Syria, Iran and Jordan. I frankly think this would be bigger news than some gossip columnist without sources claiming that the President did illegal acts before he was involved in public office. Somehow, we haven't heard a peep about it on our major national networks.

That, my friends is agenda setting. When we hear about the liberal media, these kinds of behavior provide pretty concrete proof of it.

I'm just amazed how unapologetic they are.

[Patrick]

Very true. I think the bias in the media groups is obvious.

[Midtowner]

An educated/smart person should know how to recognize and filter bias. It's not complicated. It's definitely not worth yelling at your TV.

It is definitely good for a few chuckles though.

[Joe Schmoe]

Newspeople are not automatons. It would be impossible to NOT have a POV. It is the job of the public to understand the biases. Sounding like a wronged virgin when you find out that the media have points of view is either naive, or disingenuous.

The problem lies in people looking for views that merely reinforce their own & then acting like that is the only truth.

Life is not like football. Trashtalk & wanting to smash your opponent is not a way to run a country. Acknowledge that others can have divergent views without it being some kind of conspiracy. People don't have to be stupid or evil to disagree with your world view.

[Midtowner]

My sole complaint is that when called on their biases, they deny them. It seems that they are almost trying to convince people that their view is right and any other is abnormal (not necessarily wrong). The National News people are looked at by many as unbiased and representative of what's really going on. Would it be so bad for a news media person to acknowledge that they're voting for Kerry?

The only legitimate complaint is that media types do not acknowledge their own biases to the public.

Yeah, they're going to cover what they think is important. That's their right, they earned their job and the right to be where they are.

[Patrick]

I think some of these people in the media may be so brain zapped in their political beliefs, they may not really think they're being biased. They may just thing they're telling the truth. In a sense, a lot of people believe that their opinions are true. This is very easy to do in politics.