CBS: Petition to the FEC

[JIHADTHIS]

http://www.boycottcbs.com/

 

[Merlin1047]

Signed up.

Going to send it around to my friends.

Would be nice to let some of the hot air out of Dan R.

 

[insein]

Its just so retarded that they are sticking by their story when there is no story to stick by.

 

[Annie]

http://www.boycottcbs.com/

Here is a good argument that it is CBS, not just Rather, though he plays a strong role:

http://www.americandigest.org/mt-archives/002156.php

EXCERPT:

The Grinding of Dull Old Axes: CBS, General Westmoreland, and President George Bush

What's the fun of an unelected position and unscrutinized power if you can't use it every now and then to push history your way? No fun at all.

It's not news that Dan Rather, CBS News and 60 Minutes have trouble exercising reasonable news judgment. Small and medium-sized lies and conscious slanting of facts and stories are served up almost daily on the CBS network's news buffet. Every so often, though, when the institutional memory of CBS suffers a stroke, CBS cooks up a piping hot lasagna of a lie so big it occupies its own blooper reel.

The Bush Guard fiasco of the last week is only the latest super-sized order of lies served up with Dan Rather's standard Happy Meal. But we shouldn't be just blaming the hapless Texan. He's just following a long tradition at CBS, and it is not the one associated with Edward R. Murrow.

Looking back along the spotty history of CBS, Dan Rather and 60 Minutes, you can find other epics of dubious veracity now rendered even more dubious in the wake of the unfolding Rathergate Scandal. Seen in the light of history, Rathergate isn't a case of "mistakes were made" but an extension of a decades old dedication towards slanting the news in an attempt to influence elections and drive national policy. In short, things like Rathergate are not an anomalies, but policies written with a nudge and a wink in the upper echelons of the major media.

After all, what's the fun of an unelected position and unscrutinized power if you can't use it every now and then to push history your way? No fun at all. What's great about media positions of weight, from the point of view of institutions such as CBS and people like Dan Rather, is that you can diddle about with the Republic without the bother of being elected. You only need to be self-selected and internally protective. This is why the wagons circle so quickly. An autocratic duchy within a democracy that enjoys a Constitutional exemption from the elected government, doesn't take to attack easily, and, like autocratic powers everywhere, is not likely to admit error; even an error it knows to be true. Too much is at stake. Perhaps even, at the extreme, the exemption itself.

Three blasts from the CBS past are worth recalling at this juncture:
1) "The Selling of the Pentagon," 1971
2) "The Defense of the United States," 1981
3) "The Uncounted Enemy: A Vietnam Deception," 1982

Although all three efforts, two of which bore the heavy hand of Dan Rather, the third was the most memorable and most deeply embarrassing for CBS.

The Unanticipated Costs of "The Uncounted Enemy"

Although most will have forgotten the title "The Uncounted Enemy," many will recall the lawsuit brought by General William Westmoreland in response to CBS' methods that were used in that production. Many will also recall the recantation, retraction, and apology the network was forced into in order to end a lawsuit that was obviously going very poorly for them.

An interesting article from that era which looks at all three episodes in CBS New's career is CBS News, General Westmoreland, and the Pathology of Information by Lt Col Evan H. Parrott, Jr., USAF. It was published in 1982 in The Air University Review,and written from a career military officer's point of view.

Parrott's observations are, deservedly, less than flattering, but the parallels to the CBS of today are fascinating. [Emphasis mine]MEANING THE AUTHOR OF THE POST

 

[Annie]

Looks like there's more to investigate at CBS:

http://www.mudvillegazette.com/archives/001346.html

Check out this site, he's leaving for Iraq-but wait to you see what he has on CBS. Anyone say Iraq prison scandal?