Ace of Spades HQ

January 31, 2005

New York Magazine Doing Rathergate Postmortem
— Ace

Ratherbiased.com has a tease from an upcoming LLM piece on Rathergate, including these tidbits:

* Dan Rather has been observed wandering the hallways of CBS News muttering "elections have consequences," referring to Bush-Kerry presidential race.
* Many within CBS News believe Rather and CBS News president Andrew Heyward should quit out of honor. Says one executive of Rather: "Should Dan resign for his part in this story? Yes. Will he? No. Its just not his style." As for Heyward, Blum points out that in the seven years that Betsy West, Heyward's assistant vice president, worked for him, she never did anything that Heyward didn't require her to do. "The fish stinks from the head," he concludes.
Don Hewitt, the founder of "60 Minutes," on the scandal: "This is the worst thing Ive ever seen in 55 years of working for CBS News."
* "Much has been made of Rather's failure to see the piece before it aired, but that fact isn't very meaningful; he'd read multiple drafts of the script for the story (written by producer Mapes), done most of the interviews, and had a thorough knowledge of the story's content and point of view. He was hardly the uninformed mouthpiece portrayed in the media."
* Rather seems to have been responsible for the disastrous 12-day denial strategy following the initial questioning of the Burkett documents:
"Rather has remained intensely loyal to his disgraced producer Mary Mapes, but those around him feel his loyalties should have been to the truth. 'The producer lied,' one longtime Rather producer told me in an unsolicited, not-for-attribution e-mail, angry that other innocent people had been wrongly punished for Mapes's transgressions. But the commission's report showed that it was the considerable power of Ratherin addition to Mapesthat helped lead Howard, West, and others to trust the reporting on the National Guard story in ways they now must deeply regret."

There's more at the link, of course.

I'm always amused by the comparisons between this story and Watergate. Dan Rather, muttering to himself as he wanders the halls aimlessly -- perhaps speaking to a portrait of Edward R. Murrow? -- is just another example that history repeats itself, especially if you're a retard.

Posted by: Ace at 04:47 PM | Comments (15)
Post contains 379 words, total size 2 kb.

1 Your text size is way too small to read, view your page with a modern vid card please. I can hardly read it with great efort. Said by someone who wants to read and comment here.

Posted by: Doug_s at January 31, 2005 05:02 PM (w8uDc)

2 I'm glad you're back. I enjoyed the guest posters, but you've got your own special sort of oopmh, that Emerilish BAM, when you put it over the top.

That last line, "...especially if you're a retard", was devastating. It was even more powerful coming as the last five words of a very mellow, more informational than humorous, post. Very nicely done.

Posted by: Lord Floppington at January 31, 2005 05:06 PM (fLlQ8)

3 Yo Ace. Completely OT, but here's Bush in his own words explaining the inaugaral address. (Via Judith Weiss, whom I know you've met.) It might answer some of those questions you had:I think you can be an idealist and a realist at the same time. And we have a war to fight and win. It's a very different kind of war. [...] And in that war, we have to work with all kinds of countries. So that's the realistic part of my job, how do we work with a country that may not honor women's rights like they should.
On the other hand, as a result of engaging that war, it does give me a chance to speak candidly with leaders just like Ronald Reagan did, in terms of, as I said in my speech -- you free people -- you'll have a partner to walk with, and remind them that we're very serious about this. Now I'm mindful that societies don't change on a dime. And there's resistance, obviously -- if you're in power, you're not going to be interested in giving up power. [...] But the American President can help by fashioning policy that constantly speaks to the reformers and those who want to be free, and constantly reminding leaders about the importance of the relationship.It's a direction, not a prescription.

Posted by: at January 31, 2005 05:26 PM (S22v9)

4 Last comment by me.

Posted by: someone at January 31, 2005 05:28 PM (S22v9)

5 I don't have time to read the story you linked from NY Magazine right now, but I did read a piece from them that Jim Treacher linked earlier (note the typo in the title of the article, still unchanged as of the time that I write this), and if the one you're linking to is anything like the other, I'll be sick.

The article Treacher linked tries to suggest that it wasn't necessarily anti-Bush zeal that drove Mapes--instead, it was a pattern that developed over the course of three stories about privelige in the military. I think the author, Mark Gimein, is actually trying to get Mapes off the hook.

The last paragraph of the piece is the worst. It tries to paint the Memo story as a simple "mistake." Read it for yourself, and cringe.

Posted by: Sean M. at January 31, 2005 11:40 PM (F168B)

6 Spot on inre the NY Mag piece, Sean M.

No surprise the NY media is circling the wagons, even as their reputation is circling the bowl.

Posted by: barbula at February 01, 2005 02:28 AM (eGw+M)

7 http://www.startribune.com/stories/562/5211218.html

-this is priceless

Posted by: bsp at February 01, 2005 03:43 AM (EPdmO)

8 Rathergate roport lies. As of 2/1/05 all 3 mid level execs still on payroll.

Posted by: at February 01, 2005 04:59 AM (gVJtb)

9 "Rather seems to have been responsible for the disastrous 12-day denial strategy ... " In all the years of Rather going after people and watching them flail around and stonewall, you'd think this guy would've learned something about stonewalling. How could he not have? Oh, yeah, he's a Liberal and therefore totally disrespectful of the American people. But GUNGA DAN found out that Lincoln was right:
you cant't fool all of the peole all of the time!

Posted by: 72VIRGINS at February 01, 2005 06:54 AM (dhRpo)

10 It's funny you should mention "Dan Rather, muttering to himself as he wanders the halls aimlessly -- perhaps speaking to a portrait of Edward R. Murrow."

That is exactly what the security cameras captured for posterity. But unexpectedly, they also recorded something... ghastly: the portraits MUTTERED BACK!

See the shocking video here.

Be warned: not for men with weak hearts, children or pregnant women.

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