Rathergate Report

The long-delayed report on the CBS hit piece on President Bush was released today. Powerline has a response here:

Finally, on August 31, only eight days before the 60 Minutes show aired, at a time when Smith and Mapes were desperately trying to persuade Bill Burkett to give them the anti-Bush documents that they had heard he possessed, Smith sent an email to Mapes proposing that they set up a book deal for Burkett so that he could be paid in exchange for turning over the documents:
Today I am going to send the following hypothetical scenario to a reliable, trustable editor friend of mine...
What if there was a person who might have some information that could possibly change the momentum of an election but we needed to get an ASAP book deal to help get us the information? What kinds of turnaround payment schedules are possible, keeping in mind that the book probably could not make it out until after the election.
Mapes replied: "that looks good, hypothetically speaking, of course."
It's also worth noting that both Mapes and Dan Rather continue to defend the 60 Minutes report, and to claim that the documents are authentic. Rather says he believes in the documents because "the facts are right on the money." Given what we now know, this statement is delusional. The Thornburgh report does an excellent job of analyzing the content of the fake documents, and showing that they are, in many respects, at odds with reality as we know it from other sources. And the report discloses for the first time that, during the course of her "investigation," Mary Mapes was told that no influence was used to get President Bush into the National Guard, that there was no waiting list for pilots, and that Bush actually volunteered to go to Vietnam. So one can only wonder in what respect Rather thinks "the facts are right on the money."

Hindrocket also discusses the important issues that were not thoroughly investigated, especially the link between the Kerry campaign and 60 Minutes 2. That is as blatant as the Armstrong Williams affair and potentially much more damaging to the idea of a free and unbiased press.

Unfortunately Charles at LGF has been knocked out by a DDOS attack. He is posting at Discarded Lies for the time being.