The McLaughlin Joke

I watched The McLaughlin Group on PBS tonight. Make that last night. I wanted to hear they might say about CBS's forgeries. Stunning would be a good way to describe the show. In the tank might be another. Not something I need to waste time watching any more. But I digress. There was one mention of the CBS forgeries. It was in the context of whether these "new revelations" would damage the President's prospects in November. McLaughlin threw the question to Tony Blankley who began by raising the question of the authenticity of the documents. He was immediately shushed by McLaughlin, "I've already heard about that, I've heard about that." It's old news already. On to the next topic. You have to see these shows to get the full effect. It's a real shouting match with the panelists having to out shout McLaughlin to make their points.

But I think we get the picture on this one. McLaughlin shows us the way of Mainstream Media. Stonewall. Dan Rather admits nothing. He stands by the story.

Dan Rather vigorously defended his "60 Minutes" story on President Bush's National Guard service yesterday, saying the 30-year-old memos he disclosed on the show this week "were and remain authentic," despite questions raised by some handwriting and document experts.

"Until someone shows me definitive proof that they are not, I don't see any reason to carry on a conversation with the professional rumor mill," the CBS anchor said. "My colleagues and I at '60 Minutes' made great efforts to authenticate these documents and to corroborate the story as best we could. . . . I think the public is smart enough to see from whom some of this criticism is coming and draw judgments about what the motivations are."

I suppose he has no choice. The stakes are pretty high according to some. But, I have a hard time imagining anybody clinging to a lie, and that's what he's doing. Well, maybe not. I could be wrong. Maybe he can show us all a typewriter. In fact, I think he should. We're talking about the resources of CBS News! These people are crack journalists! Well, maybe not. If they were, wouldn't we already know how many 1973 vintage typewriter models had proportional font Times New Roman super script capabilities? And how much each one cost? And how many Air National Guard units were using them in 1973? These people who call themselves reporters?

Comments

[Warren]

Reading the comments of other bloggers and posters on this CBS memos thing, one comment sticks out in my mind.

To paraphrase, it reminds me of a child that dropped an openfaced peanut butter sandwich in the cat litter box. He picks it up and starts picking out pieces of litter, hair and cat crap while loudly exclaiming, "It's still good, see!".

I'm sorry, you can eat the cat crap if you want, I will not be having any myself.

[Tom Bowler]

I think there will be no correction or retraction. That's their story and they're sticking to it. I think the left and the Democrats take a huge hit to their credibility on this one.