Outrage
In some circles, Dan Rather is public enemy #1. CBS affiliates around the country are receiving thousands of emails and faxes from wingnuts outraged citizens insisting that Rather be canned because of allegedly forged documents.
You’ll notice these same people haven’t mounted an email campaign against the Bush Administration for using forged documents* to gain public support for the invasion of Iraq.
Let’s compare the results, Bush v. Rather, from the use of documents of questionable provenance:
U.S. soldiers killed:
Other military deaths:
Military wounded:
Civilian dead:
Cost to U.S. taxyapers:
Yeah, I wonder how Dan Rather can sleep at night.
____________
*Many on the Right deny that the Rocco Martino forgeries had anything to do with the invasion of Iraq. They point to the fact that in the 2003 State of the Union address, the famous 16 words were “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.”
The wingnuts may or may not tell you that the British government had learned what it learned from forged documents. In effect, the wingnuts are saying that because Bush got the story from the Brits, Bush isn’t responsible if the story was a fib.
Long before the State of the Union there was skepticism among the American intelligence community about the Niger story. The White House received memos from several intelligence sources warning that the story was probably not true. There’s an excellent overview of the Niger yellowcake episode and who knew what, when, at Warblogging.com by George Paine.
Yet the Niger story was presented to the American people as a primary cause for war. Therefore, responsibility for checking out the Niger story ultimately rested with President Bush.
And he failed. End of story.
September 24th, 2004 at 7:20 pm
Why does everyone insist on calling him “president” Bush? He was not elected..he was appointed. Chancellor Bush seems more appropriate considering his methods and tactics.
September 24th, 2004 at 8:22 pm
Liked your sumary but I think you could have gone further.
The wingnut position seems to be something like this;
Dan Rather, CBS News Anchor
- given documents he thought were true
- failed to thoroughly investigate the facts
- reported documents to the American people as true to make his case
- when confronted with the facts, apologized and launched an investigation
- number of Americans dead: 0
- should be fired as CBS News Anchor
George W. Bush, President of the United States
- given documents he thought were true
- failed to thoroughly investigate the facts
- reported documents to the American people as true to make his case
- when confronted with the facts, continued to report untruth and stonewalled an investigation
- number of Americans dead: 1100
- should be given four more years as President of the United States
September 24th, 2004 at 9:47 pm
The only positive I see, Barbara, is their focus on lynching Rather leaves Bush open on Iraq. And, remember, Bush still has a sizeable lead in the polls! …pass it on…
September 24th, 2004 at 11:30 pm
It’s simple, really.
60 Minutes and the Kerry campaign engaged in a criminal attempt to subvert democracy by using false documents in a coordinated smear campaign against the President.
President Bush is presently engaged in protecting democracy against an enemy that is willing to use terrorism and mass murder to destroy our society.
The moral choice is clear.
September 25th, 2004 at 1:30 am
Using Evil Pundit’s logic…
It’s simple really.
Bush, Cheney and neo-Cons, engaged in a deceitful and arrogant campaign to deceive Americans, by using (now proven) false documents that Saddam possessed stockpiles of WMD and nuclear weapons, he was confirmed as already planning to use against us.
Bush has used 23 justifications for the Iraq, and is presently blatantly lying to the American people about the deteriorating situation there. Because, money has been diverted from Homeland Security to Afghanistan and Iraq, our borders, our cities, our ports, our chemical and nuclear sites, are no more secure than before 9/11.
The moral choice for the Republicans? Distribute literature saying the Liberals plan to ban the Bible.
September 25th, 2004 at 5:06 am
President Bush is presently engaged in protecting democracy against an enemy that is willing to use terrorism and mass murder to destroy our society.
There is an enemy that is willing to use terrorism and mass murder to destroy our society. I am an eyewitness to the collapse of the WTC towers and know this is so. However, Bush allowed this enemy to escape because he stupidly went after Iraq, which was not corroborating with our enemy, al Qaeda, and was not a danger to the U.S. And now we are all less safe as a result.
See, especially, the James Fallows article “Bush’s Lost Year” linked above.