WND
Exposed: 'c
New documentary recalls CBS story debunked by bloggers
Art Moore, co-author of the best-selling book "See Something, Say Nothing," entered the media world as a PR assistant for the Seattle Mariners and a correspondent covering pro and college sports for Associated Press Radio. He reported for a Chicago-area daily newspaper and was senior news writer for Christianity Today magazine and an editor for Worldwide Newsroom before joining WND shortly after 9/11. He earned a master's degree in communications from Wheaton College.
Long before “f**e news” became an issue on Capitol Hill, a news story that threatened to derail George W. Bush’s re-e******n was debunked by bloggers, launching a new era of citizen journalism challenging the establishment-media gatekeepers.
The September 2004 report that led to Dan Rather’s resignation as the anchor of CBS News is spotlighted in a new documentary, “Black Eye: Dan Rather and the Birth of F**e News.”
It will air for the first time Friday on Fox Nation, Fox News Channel’s new subscription-based, on-demand streaming service.
Rather and his team presented purported memos from 1973 indicating Bush had received special treatment during his time in the Texas Air National Guard that prevented him from be deployed in Vietnam.
But bloggers who examined the documents posted on the CBS News website found they had been produced by a Microsoft Word processor that didn’t exist in 1973.
CBS initially defended the documents, but after two weeks of further scrutiny concluded their authenticity could not be proved and called its reporting a “mistake.”
The network fired producer Mary Mapes, and a little more than two months later Rather resigned. CBS commissioned an independent panel that found serious defects in the reporting and production of the Sept. 8, 2004, segment on “60 Minutes Wednesday.”
In a 2006 radio interview, however, Rather defended his reporting and rejected the CBS panel’s findings. The network stood by the panel’s findings.
The following year, Rather filed a lawsuit against CBS and its former corporate parent, Viacom, claiming he had been made a “scapegoat. The suit was dismissed in 2009 by the New York State Appeals Court.
‘A lot of questions about these documents’
The new documentary, narrated by actor and writer Marc Menchaca, features interviews with figures close to the story, including Emily Will, a forensic document examiner hired by CBS reports BizPacReview.com.
“I told Mary [Mapes] that if you run this story on Wednesday, on Thursday morning you’re going to have every document examiner in the country jumping down your throat because they’re going to have a lot of questions about these documents,” she said.
Among the bloggers who questioned the documents was Powerline’s Scott Johnson, who recounts in the documentary how his post was linked by the Drudge Report.
“Put a title on it: ‘The 61st Minute,’ suggesting that there might be something more to this story. Hit the publish button at 7:51 am and left for work,” Johnson recalled
“Well, around noon or one o’clock our time … the Drudge Report had put an upside down red siren on it, screaming ’60 Minutes fraud’ or something like that. And if you clicked on it, it linked to Powerline,” he said.
“All of a sudden, as opposed to the five or six thousand readers a day that we had at the time, we had 500,000.”
Actually, f**e news began with “Mike Wallace” who helped to cover up the homicide of Vince Foster to take the eyes off the Clinton’s as “suspects” in the case and release the duo from further investigations so Bill could continue his campaign unfettered for the Presidency. It led to the beginning of “F**e News” and virtual end of “fair and balanced” journalism!
tbutkovich wrote:
Actually, f**e news began with “Mike Wallace” who helped to cover up the homicide of Vince Foster to take the eyes off the Clinton’s as cospiritors in the case and release the duo from further investigations so Bill could continue his campaign unfettered for the Presidency. It led to the beginning of “F**e News” and virtual end of “fair and balanced” journalism!
Actually, if you want to take it back to its roots, f**e news is a product of the DISINFORMATION campaign of the Soviet Union. Read up on the technique and you will understand what I mean. Disinformation by LT Gen. Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest ranking Soviet bloc intelligence oficer ever to defect to the West. It is an important book and a mandatory read.
Yes, it’s roots go way back in history to Karl Marx and its implementation in Russia before and after the Bolshevik Revolution.
In this country, the Democrats have used “disinformation” to garner support from their “ignorant base” to achieve power and control over the masses and enrich themselves in the process!
If you want to reply, then
register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.