Let's Talk Plots Shall We?

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There was, and still is, quite a flap about Dan Rather and CBS using "false" documents regarding Bush's "service" records. Personally, I believe that whole thing was a setup, and one has to ask about the pressure to air that story in light of what has happened since. Newsweek ran a story on 9/22 (via MSNBC) - Here's the piece that ‘60 Minutes killed for its report on the Bush Guard documents. The story that got "bumped" was a revealing investigation into the falsified "Niger" documents that the Bush team thrust in front of the world as the proof-positive of Hussein's nuclear program.

According to the Newsweek article:

A team of “60 Minutes” correspondents and consulting reporters spent more than six months investigating the Niger uranium documents fraud, CBS sources tell NEWSWEEK. The group landed the first ever on-camera interview with Elisabetta Burba, the Italian journalist who first obtained the phony documents, as well as her elusive source, Rocco Martino, a mysterious Roman businessman with longstanding ties to European intelligence agencies.

Although the edited piece never ended up identifying Martino by name, the story, narrated by “60 Minutes” correspondent Ed Bradley, asked tough questions about how the White House came to embrace the fraudulent documents and why administration officials chose to include a 16-word reference to the questionable uranium purchase in President Bush’s 2003 State of the Union speech.

But just hours before the piece was set to air on the evening of Sept. 8, the reporters and producers on the CBS team were stunned to learn the story was being scrapped to make room for a seemingly sensational story about new documents showing that Bush ignored a direct order to take a flight physical while serving in the National Guard more than 30 years ago.

I think there is more than smoke here. Those Niger forgeries - or their origins - are much more revealing than the Bush administration (or those behind him) want known. THERE IS SOMETHING BIG. I can smell it.

Let's think about these documents shall we? Who first told us about them? Joseph Wilson. What happened to Joseph Wilson? Well, you may recall that his wife got outed and they tried to totally discredit Wilson, and there is an unfinished DoJ investigation which has landed on the doorstep of "Scooter" Libby and then gone silent. Now we have CBS who apparently got too close to the truth and they get floated a classic bait and switch which leads to their credibility being questioned, and floating a perception they are rabidly biased against Bush.

Now, even if CBS airs their expose, many are going to question its validity. Apparently aware of that, CBS has decided to wait until after the elections to avoid bias. I received the following Moveon Action Alert:

Dear MoveOn member,

President Bush based his famous and false claim that Iraq was seeking
uranium from Niger on a set of crudely forged documents. For the last
two years, no one has uncovered who falsified these documents, which lie
at the heart of Bush's case for war.

Now, CBS' 60 Minutes program has uncovered new and important revelations
about the Bush administration's reliance on the documents. But, in an
unprecedented and astonishing move, CBS bumped the report back until
after the election, saying it would be "inappropriate" to air the piece
when it might interfere with the political season.

It's outrageous that a major TV news outlet would censor an important
piece of news for political reasons. Especially since this report has
met CBS' standards for accuracy -- it's true. One can only assume that
CBS is buckling under pressure from the right -- and that's just plain
wrong.

Call CBS and its parent company, Viacom, now, at:

Sumner Redstone, Chairman, Viacom
(212) 258-6000

Les Moonves, Chairman of CBS; co-President & co-CEO, Viacom
(323) 575-2345

Andrew Heyward, President, CBS News
(212) 975-3247 or
(212) 975-4321

If you don't get through, you can write to CBS at:
http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/feedback/fb_news_form.shtml

You can also contact CBS' local affiliates, which are linked here:
http://newslink.org/cbstele.html

Urge CBS to reverse its decision and air the 60 Minutes piece on Iraq
before the November 2nd election. Let them know how important it is
that they not censor the news.

Please let us know you're calling -- we'd like to keep a count -- at:

http://www.moveon.org/cbscalls.html?id=3836-3239786-.SxuGqafe4eDnQbP1o1z
HQ

Recently, CBS came under heavy criticism for failing to thoroughly
authenticate documents in a story on the President's National Guard
record. Apparently CBS' embarrassment over that flap has made CBS too
timid to run important news critical of President Bush. According to
the New York Times: "a report in the online edition of Newsweek...
described the frustration of CBS News reporters and producers who said
the network had concluded that it could not legitimately criticize the
president because of the questions about the National Guard report." [1]

Still, censorship for partisan purposes is a familiar pattern at CBS.
Last year, CBS refused to air "Child's Pay", the ad that won the "Bush
in 30 Seconds" contest sponsored by MoveOn.org Voter Fund, during the
Super Bowl. Although the ad was well within the bounds of good taste --
it showed children working at menial jobs and asked "Guess who's going
to pay off President Bush's $1 trillion deficit?" -- CBS cited a policy
against running "advocacy" ads.

But then it turned around and aired millions of dollars worth of ads
promoting Bush's new Medicare plan, which wouldn't come online for
years. It also aired controversial White House ads claiming that drug
users supported terrorism.

CBS' censorship decisions make its partisanship obvious. But here's
more: CBS is owned by Viacom, and Viacom's chairman, Sumner Redstone,
endorsed President Bush on Thursday [2], just one day before CBS pulled
the 60 Minutes report on Iraq.

Partisan censorship by CBS betrays our trust on a fundamental level.
All of us own the airwaves CBS broadcasts on. They're a public
resource, licensed to CBS, and in return CBS owes us a balance of
viewpoints on major issues like Iraq.

Especially now, when more than 1,000 Americans have been killed in a war
whose reasons have yet to be honestly explained by the Bush
administration.

And especially just before an election.

Please call CBS and Viacom now.

Thank you, for all you do.

Sincerely,
Peter Schurman
MoveOn.org
Tuesday, September 7th, 2004

I agree that CBS should be pushed to air the expose. However, I'm not sure that I agree that this is a case of CBS engaging in censorship. Their decision to bump the Niger expose for the Bush service record was censorship. I suspect that they were encouraged in a variety of ways to do so. In making that decision and the fall out from it, the power and credibility of this more important issue has been undermined - and perhaps that was the entire strategy. I believe that the argument to CBS to air the document is that the public deserves to have this information before they vote - not after it the votes have been cast.

Once again, I think there is something very dirty in the story of the Niger documents. My guess is that the CBS story does not reveal it (any more than Wilson's whistleblowing did). However, it hits close to uncovering the story and there are those who surely do not want that out there.

Posted by rowan at September 27, 2004 04:28 PM | TrackBack | Printable Version | [eMail this article!] |