Say goodnight, Dan.Who says Dan is just another pretty face?
The bureaucratic axiom that, when there's a screwup, little heads will roll was proven true again yesterday at CBS News. With the ax falling only on people you or I couldn't pick out of a lineup, Dan Rather lives to spread his fictions yet another day.
Life sure ain't fair, at least life at CBS.
"Misleading," "false" and "inaccurate" are a few of the choice words the report uses to describe Rather's public statements. After detailing his flawed role in the original broadcast on President Bush's National Guard service, the report lays out how Rather repeatedly misled viewers and other journalists during 12 days of defending the doomed show.
Most shocking, it paints him as privately disavowing his public apology for the initial report and even says he still believes the initial story is "right on the money."
What's the frequency, Kenneth? It's certainly not one Earthlings will recognize.
The Bush story was Amateur Hour at CBS, but it was not harmless. Versions of it were picked up by more than 50 newspapers across the country, including this one. As one producer wrote in selling the idea to higher-ups, the story could "possibly change the momentum of the election."
That should have been a warning to everyone, especially Rather. But instead of reporters and producers double- and triple-checking everything, just the opposite happened. Charges became facts. Source became sources. And bizarre, unproven theories became the driving narrative.
The Dan Rather revealed at the center of this disaster is not a journalist who is guided by facts. The picture that emerges is of a bunko artist, a man who cooks the books to get the conclusion he wants.
Update: As for the now jobless partisan hack, Mary Mapes, who did Dan's scut work, predictably she's got a big whine going:
"I am shocked by the vitriolic scapegoating in Les Moonves' statement," she said.Mary wouldn't know journalism if it bit her on the butt, but this has possibilities:
"I am very concerned that his actions are motivated by corporate and political considerations — ratings rather than journalism," she said in a statement.
Mapes said the decision to air the story was made by her superiors, not by her.C'mon, Mary! Drop a dime on Captain Dan!
"If there was a journalistic crime committed here, it was not by me," she said.
