Anatomy of a Smear, Part 2

Does this surprise anyone?

from JoeUser Forums
In September, we had Rathergate, forged documents that were proven forged by little old bloggers, not the 'main stream' media with their wealth of resources. We should have learned from that, then and there, that some members of the mainstream media were just not playing with an unbiased book. Indeed, CBS and Dan Rather have never apologized for the smear they tried to perpetrate.

Now we appear to have caught the NY Times, that [sarcasm] bastion of non-partisanship [/sarcasm] with their pants down. They reported a story that was 18 months old as if it happened in the last month. OMG! 380 tons of weapons just up and disappeared on the Bush Watch!

But alas, it was not the blogosphere that outted this as another attempt at a smear. It was NBC News that reported it 18 months ago. Why? Because they were there!

But today, more dirt has surfaced. It appears that CBS also had the false story before the NY Times, and was going to run it on Sunday, October 31st, just 2 days before the election! The reason they did not? They did not think it would hold until then! Not that they wanted to report the truth, for it would only have taken a few hours, not 5 years, to reveal the truth to this lie. No, they wanted to sabotage the Bush campaign again. And behind it all, was none other than……drum roll…….Dan Rather!

These 2 episodes are not isolated incidents; just the most overt examples of what the main stream press, and in particular, the NY Times, CNS and Dan Rather, are really all about. Not the truth, but smear, smear and smear.

Now some on this blog may be liberal, and some are conservatives, but no honest person can argue that the mainstream media is impartial. Not with this deceit and deception and outright lies that they push as news.

The really sad part about this whole sordid affair is that Dan Rather got a second chance to smear the president. That shows that CBS is rotten to the core, and as trustworthy as Saddam Hussein. I wonder when the CBS (VIACOM) stock holders are going to just pull the plug on this sleaze outfit? It is their money that they see spiraling down that toilet bowl.



Addendum - 10/27/2004:

f there was any doubt this was a planned smear, just check out this link:

http://www.johnkerry.com/video/102604_obligation.html

It clearly shows that the day after the story broke, Kerry had an ad out. You cant produce an ad in less than 24 hours, without prior knowledge to the story. Just another example of the biased nature of the mainstream media, and how they have lost all claim to objectivity.
4,878 views 45 replies
Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
Surprised? I think not.

Increased violence in Iraq during the run-up to the election (maybe even here) has been predicted all along, so should not be played in the press as somehow shocking. Blaring old news as if it were new News is one of the few tactics left to them, I guess. Anything they can think of to cast Bush in a negative light, they will do, pure & simple. They are on a jihad, after all.

The increase in mainstream press attacks is just as predictable and expected. There is a difference now, however - the availability of rapid access to alternative sources of information has made the last-minute-unfounded-too-close-to-the-election-to-be-discovered-as-false-attack much more difficult to pull off. I expected nothing less of the NYT or CBS, though. At least CBS pulled the piece when they figured out they had been "scooped," not just by a week but by 18 months. What a joke. They are both rapidly relegating themselves to the ranks of the ignored.

Cheers,
Daiwa
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
Daiwa,

You are correct in not being surprised. However, I was a bit surprised that Dan Rather would try it again so soon. He must be desperate. And a little surprised that ViaCom would let him. Can anyone trust CBS for a credible news source now? I think not.
Sins of a Solar Empire II
Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
Interestingly enough, the "liberal media" plans on OVERRIDING the broadcasting of 62 subsidiaries to air an anti-Kerry movie before the election, and I haven't seen it yet. Still a week remaining, so I'd count on it.(Link Link)

Everything's a liberal conspiracy nowadays, ain't it?
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
Interestingly enough, the "liberal media" plans on OVERRIDING all subsidiary broadcasting to air an anti-Kerry movie before the election, and I haven't seen it yet. (LinkLink)


Not even close! And they have already pulled it. That was Sinclair, and they dont do news, they just own some tv stations (about 60 I think), not even a whole network.

next time you enter a battle with supposed facts, check the validity and pertinence to the debate at hand of them before making a fool of yourself.

And BTW, it is not anti -Kerry. It is Vietnam vets speaking out against his anti-war statements 30 years ago. So you would deny vets their right of free speech?
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
From the Sinclair Broadcasting Group website, they own 62 television stations in 39 markets including ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX affiliates.

As for the documentary, I stand corrected. "Stolen Honor" was not aired, but I did find this on the Sinclair website:

And I really appreciate being called a fool, thanks for that.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
From the Sinclair Broadcasting Group website, they own 62 television stations in 39 markets including ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX affiliates.

As for the documentary, I stand corrected. "Stolen Honor" was not aired, but I did find this on the Sinclair website:

And I really appreciate being called a fool, thanks for that


I did not call you a fool (and your link did not come through, but like I said, about 60). I said you made a fool of yourself. And now that you know the truth, do you not admit that your previous post was 'foolish'? that was all I said.

Dont be so touchy. If I had made a boner like that (and I have), I felt like a fool as well. That does not make me one. i just made sure not to make another one like it.

For the Record, it was only through this controversy that I learned that our Fox affiliate is Sinclair owned. But we are not in a swing state. Still, I would have liked to see it. Now I can. it is available for downloafrom the web!
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
www.sbgi.net

It was foolish. Seem to have to make that statement a lot on JU. Now we can play nice.
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
Reply #7 By: apdelong31 - 10/26/2004 5:02:01 PM

www.sbgi.net

It was foolish. Seem to have to make that statement a lot on JU. Now we can play nice


Most of the time I just hide. It takes a big man to say that. I doff my chapeau to you. And you have my respect.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
As for the documentary, I stand corrected. "Stolen Honor" was not aired, but I did find this on the Sinclair website:


I did see a bootleg copy of this, and quite frankly it was a tenuous stretch to call it anti-Kerry. I am a Bush supporter, but I failed to see where this was going to benefit his campaign or hurt Kerry's. To me it seemed a bit of a "patched together" mess. Old news and old wounds that didn't need to be reopened. I have strong feelings about what he did, and I have infinite respect for what the POWs went through; however it did appear to me that the interviewees (is that a word?) were not directing criticism at Kerry specifically. There were many Americans whom travelled to Hanoi, or spoke out against that war. His tetimony before the House was despicable coming from a man who now claims heroic service for a 4 month period, a full two thirds less of a tour than the average "In Country" vet did. It did serve to emphasize that he really has not changed much from those days. It was obvious he had an agenda then, namely getting a political career started at the expense of the truth. I guess he must have found those medals, or is it ribbons, no it was medals today, maybe ribbons tomorrow, that he threw away in protest. His posturing as a decorated war vet is shameful and disgusting in the face of all those that served in that distant place and time and did so honorably. You can't stand at the foot of a mountain and claim to have conquered Everest. War isn't a ticket punch. If you're going to talk the talk, walk the walk.
Sorry for digressing. I think we're all getting just a little worn around the edges by this campaign. The networks need something else to focus on instead of creating news. The 4th estate has become a real sham. So how about those Red Sox!
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
Reply By: Nadeon Posted: Tuesday, October 26, 2004
As for the documentary, I stand corrected. "Stolen Honor" was not aired, but I did find this on the Sinclair website:


I did see a bootleg copy of this, and quite frankly it was a tenuous stretch to call it anti-Kerry. I am a Bush supporter, but I failed to see where this was going to benefit his campaign or hurt Kerry's. To me it seemed a bit of a "patched together" mess. Old news and old wounds that didn't need to be reopened. I have strong feelings about what he did, and I have infinite respect for what the POWs went through; however it did appear to me that the interviewees (is that a word?) were not directing criticism at Kerry specifically. There were many Americans whom travelled to Hanoi, or spoke out against that war. His tetimony before the House was despicable coming from a man who now claims heroic service for a 4 month period, a full two thirds less of a tour than the average "In Country" vet did. It did serve to emphasize that he really has not changed much from those days. It was obvious he had an agenda then, namely getting a political career started at the expense of the truth. I guess he must have found those medals, or is it ribbons, no it was medals today, maybe ribbons tomorrow, that he threw away in protest. His posturing as a decorated war vet is shameful and disgusting in the face of all those that served in that distant place and time and did so honorably. You can't stand at the foot of a mountain and claim to have conquered Everest. War isn't a ticket punch. If you're going to talk the talk, walk the walk.
Sorry for digressing. I think we're all getting just a little worn around the edges by this campaign. The networks need something else to focus on instead of creating news. The 4th estate has become a real sham. So how about those Red Sox!


I have not seen the download copy, and I really respect your views on it. Not about the Red Sox tho!

But lets end this thread and get back to the subject. The anatomy of a smear, starring Dan Rather.
Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top
Dr. Guy:

So you mean the United States goes into Iraq to look for WMD's and we find a Al Qaaqa that is supposed to have explosives as reported by the IAEA and now, even 18 months later, the White House said Monday they didn't know what the story was in the first place? That isn't a story?
Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
So you mean the United States goes into Iraq to look for WMD's and we find a Al Qaaqa that is supposed to have explosives as reported by the IAEA and now, even 18 months later, the White House said Monday they didn't know what the story was in the first place? That isn't a story?


Wrong story. They did not know what CBS was reporting since CBS did not know what they were reporting!

The story is, CBS and NYT tried an october smear. NBC torpedoed it. The white house did not know WTF CBS was reproting as it was 18 months old.

Get it? Or are yo uso dense as to beleive it? Please defend it more so we can see how moronic you really are!

or are you smarter than that?

Thats the facts jack!
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
For anyone who's interested, the claim of the lead post is really shaky.

The reason this is news now is that people didn't connect the dots until the last few weeks regarding just how many tons of explosives had gone missing. Apparently, the Bush government has known for months, but didn't bother telling anyone. Of course, that's not clear, because the Pentagon has been inconsistent in its responses to reporters' questions, and George Bush wasn't willing to say anything about this yesterday

Meanwhile, Bush supporters are knocking themselves out that the explosives were missing before the troops got to the site. The problem with that is that there's no evidence of this. CNN and Drudge are the main ones hyping that story, except that the supposed source of the story, NBC, pulled the story with that claim because the reporter in question says that the troops didn't do an obvious search of the site, and she wasn't able to say whether or not the explosives were missing. The commander of the first military unit to arrive at the site says that they neither searched the site nor secured it against looting, precisely because they were focused on the invasion fight.

So much for the basis of the claim that the explosives were missing when the American troops first captured the area. The actual reporter involved says there's no reason to think that.

Meanwhile, we know that the explosives were there right before the war, and we know the Bush administration had been warned of the importance of the site.

Anyway, I'm just telling people not to take the parent post's claims at face value. Frankly, the post's claims aren't supported. For a fairly in depth discussion of the missing explosives, go to the Talking Points Memo. That site has a fairly exhaustive discussion of the claims of Bush critics, Bush supporters, the Pentagon, the Bush Administration, Drudge, CNN, NBC, etc., etc., and etc.
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
This is why this became a story now:
International Atomic Energy Agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Tuesday that the Iraqis have not told the IAEA about any other missing materials since their Oct. 10 letter stating that the weapons vanished from Al-Qaqaa as a result of "theft and looting ... due to lack of security" sometime after coalition forces took control of the capital.
So much for conspiracy theories regarding the timing, unless Bush supporters are saying that the Allawi government is trying to bring down Bush. Once again, my advice is to check out http://talkingpointsmemo.com so you don't have to depend on my spin, or the spin of anyone else at JU.
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
I like how the news sources that Democrats support are the same ones pumping out all the dishonest shit.
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
Dr. Guy:

You know, you really need to stop getting all YOUR news at Newsmax, FOX, and Drudge. 377 TONS of explosive WERE there at that site, recorded by the IAEA! Get it! That's tons, dude, not easily movable, not back up the Ford F-150 and cart it down the road. That requires big equipment that should have been EASILY spottable and U.S. troops went by the facility and never checked even though WE KNEW it was an explosive dump.

Now, not securing the site, that was MORONIC!
Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top
That requires big equipment that should have been EASILY spottable and U.S. troops went by the facility and never checked even though WE KNEW it was an explosive dump.


Get it straight pal...it was gone before we got close enough to secure it. The next time we have a situation like that, you're welcome to run into the ammo dump and secure it while another army is trying their ever loving best to keep you away from it. And you're right. It does require big equipment. However that big equipment wasn't moving about freely when we rolled in. You prove your own antheisis. You might also want to consider how unstable that stuff is in a desert environment when it's removed from a controlled environment. Our little buddies with the AKs and RPGs over there seem to like to pry open just about every container to see what's in it. Funny how the press doesn't report how many of the bad guys blow themselves to hell trying to set up a roadside device.
By the way, stop listening to CBS...it'll rot your brain. All the networks need to stop manufacturing news and start reporting it, FOX included. It's more entertainment than serious journalism these days anyway...As The Spin Turns.
Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think the objective of the 101st was to move on Baghdad, not guard an ammo and supply depot.
You need to dig a bit deeper for how many tons of explosives were around before the invasion.
BTW the IAEA knew in may oy 03 that there was all of this explosive material missing.
the point is that CBS, the NYT and the UN want to slam the president. It has been reported that CBS was waiting for Halloween to break the story.
Hmmm, smells a bit like rotten fish to me.
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top
Just for the record, the story broke about 2 weeks ago as I posted an article about it at that time. As for "it was gone before we got close enough to secure it. The next time we have a situation like that, you're welcome to run into the ammo dump and secure it while another army is trying their ever loving best to keep you away from it. And you're right. It does require big equipment. However that big equipment wasn't moving about freely when we rolled in. You prove your own antheisis. You might also want to consider how unstable that stuff is in a desert environment when it's removed from a controlled environment."

This completely misses the point. The U.S. had Iraq under constant satellite and various other intrusive surveillence long before the war started. If this stuff was being moved around, why didn't we DO something about it? It could have been hit with cruise missiles because we had warships in the area. Arguments that we didn't bomb it out of concern for civilian casualties has no merit because the site actually had been PARTIALLY bombed in the past so there was no reason why it couldn't have been bombed in the run up to the war. We could have allowed the IAEA, who had been monitoring this site up until January 2003, to finish their investigation of the site and allowed inspectors to either destroy or remove it . We could have sent more troops into the Iraqi theatre to secure the borders. Your statement that this stuff is unstable is factually incorrect. The reason it's disappearance is so danagerous is that it is VERY stable and can easily be moved around! You need a triggering device to set it off. You could hit this stuff with a hammer and it would not detonate.

blogic is right when he wrote: "International Atomic Energy Agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said Tuesday that the Iraqis have not told the IAEA about any other missing materials since their Oct. 10 letter stating that the weapons vanished from Al-Qaqaa as a result of "theft and looting ... due to lack of security" sometime after coalition forces took control of the capital."

The reason the IAEA didn't make it public sooner, via a report to the security council, is because they wanted to give the U.S. time to try and track these explosives down or explain what happened to them. The media didn't KNOW about this story until it got a copy of the memo. Leaks are an everyday occurrence. This is hardly a case of media conspiracy to get Bush. For God's sake, they gave him such a free ride during the run up to the war, it is inconceivable to think they waited to break the story on purpose because they are "out to get him." It's just nonsense.
Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top
If this was ever news, it was news 18 months ago. The IAEA states only that spot checks were done @ al Qaqaa in the weeks prior to the invasion, so the exact amount of explosive material present just prior to the invasion cannot be known with certainty. NBC reported at the time that none of the IAEA-tagged explosive materials were present when the ammo dump was first inspected - a whole buch of stuff was gone before we got there. So the charge that "Bush has been hiding the theft by insurgents of 380 tons of explosives" is just a crass wishful-thinking fabrication, and just one of things that Kerry is unscrupulously using in his desperate attempt to get something, anything around Bush's neck to weigh him down somehow. He is totally focused on trashing Bush unmercifully, not letting the truth impede him whatsoever, taking a pathetic campaign further & further into the gutter.

BTW, today when we filled out our mail-in ballots, for the first time in our married lives (34 years now) my wife & I failed to cancel out each other's presidential vote. I'll leave it to you to guess who we voted for.

Cheers,
Daiwa
Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
There is a reason i watch the Daily Show on Comedy central for my news. Its just about as good as any other (fake) news around.
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
Daiwa, NBC news WITHDREW it's story! And your argument doesn't change the fact that this material was all accounted for prior to the war in Jan. 2003 except for a small amount that was being investigated by the IAEA until the U.S. FORCED them to leave so they could rush to war. Wouldn't it have been better to allow them to finish the job they had started instead of rusing to war and having this all of these explosives missing? The IAEA warned the U.S. about this site, it was on the CIA's top 500 list of sites to be monitored, checked and secured yet the U.S. failed to do so. That is tantamount to gross negligence. The U.S. had constant surveillence over Iraq in the run up to the war. Yet nothing was done to to secure the site even though the U.S. explicitly had taken responsibility for it, (and they told the IAEA as much) FROM THE MOMENT the IAEA was forced to leave in Jan. 2003. Here's why NBC withdrew its story:

The New York Times
October 27, 2004

"No Check of Bunker, Unit Commander Says"
By JIM DWYER and DAVID E. SANGER


White House officials reasserted yesterday that 380 tons of powerful explosives may have disappeared from a vast Iraqi military complex while Saddam Hussein controlled Iraq, saying a brigade of American soldiers did not find the explosives when they visited the complex on April 10, 2003, the day after Baghdad fell.

But the unit's commander said in an interview yesterday that his troops had not searched the site and had merely stopped there overnight.

The commander, Col. Joseph Anderson, of the Second Brigade of the Army's 101st Airborne Division, said he did not learn until this week that the site, Al Qaqaa, was considered sensitive, or that international inspectors had visited it before the war began in 2003 to inspect explosives that they had tagged during a decade of monitoring.

Colonel Anderson, who is now the chief of staff for the division and who spoke by telephone from Fort Campbell, Ky., said his troops had been driving north toward Baghdad and had paused at Al Qaqaa to make plans for their next push.

"We happened to stumble on it,'' he said. "I didn't know what the place was supposed to be. We did not get involved in any of the bunkers. It was not our mission. It was not our focus. We were just stopping there on our way to Baghdad. The plan was to leave that very same day. The plan was not to go in there and start searching. It looked like all the other ammunition supply points we had seen already."

What had been, for the colonel and his troops, an unremarkable moment during the sweep to Baghdad took on new significance this week, after The New York Times, working with the CBS News program "60 Minutes," reported that the explosives at Al Qaqaa, mainly HMX and RDX, had disappeared since the invasion.

Earlier this month, officials of the interim Iraqi government informed the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency that the explosives disappeared sometime after the fall of Mr. Hussein on April 9, 2003. Al Qaqaa, which has been unguarded since the American invasion, was looted in the spring of 2003, and looters were seen there as recently as Sunday.

President Bush's aides told reporters that because the soldiers had found no trace of the missing explosives on April 10, they could have been removed before the invasion. They based their assertions on a report broadcast by NBC News on Monday night that showed video images of the 101st arriving at Al Qaqaa.

By yesterday afternoon Mr. Bush's aides had moderated their view, saying it was a "mystery" when the explosives disappeared and that Mr. Bush did not want to comment on the matter until the facts were known.

On Sunday, administration officials said that the Iraq Survey Group, the C.I.A. taskforce that hunted for unconventional weapons, had been ordered to look into the disappearance of the explosives. On Tuesday night, CBS News reported that Charles A. Duelfer, the head of the taskforce, denied receiving such an order.

At the Pentagon, a senior official, who asked not to be identified, acknowledged that the timing of the disappearance remained uncertain. "The bottom line is that there is still a lot that is not known," the official said.

The official suggested that the material could have vanished while Mr. Hussein was still in power, sometime between mid-March, when the international inspectors left, and April 3, when members of the Army's Third Infantry Division fought with Iraqis inside Al Qaqaa. At the time, it was reported that those soldiers found a white powder that was tentatively identified as explosives. The site was left unguarded, the official said.

The 101st Airborne Division arrived April 10 and left the next day. The next recorded visit by Americans came on May 27, when Task Force 75 inspected Al Qaqaa, but did not find the large quantities of explosives that had been seen in mid-March by the international inspectors. By then, Al Qaqaa had plainly been looted.

Colonel Anderson said he did not see any obvious signs of damage when he arrived on April 10, but that his focus was strictly on finding a secure place to collect his troops, who were driving and flying north from Karbala.

"There was no sign of looting here," Colonel Anderson said. "Looting was going on in Baghdad, and we were rushing on to Baghdad. We were marshaling in."

A few days earlier, some soldiers from the division thought they had discovered a cache of chemical weapons that turned out to be pesticides. Several of them came down with rashes, and they had to go through a decontamination procedure. Colonel Anderson said he wanted to avoid a repeat of those problems, and because he had already seen stockpiles of weapons in two dozen places, did not care to poke through the stores at Al Qaqaa.

"I had given instructions, 'Don't mess around with those. It looks like they are bunkers; we're not messing around with those things. That's not what we're here for,' " he said. "I thought we would be there for a few hours and move on. We ended up staying overnight."
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top
speaking of timely events:
The new video by mashall mathers aka Eminem makes Bush look like a no-no... surpised he didn't get arrested for the video
Allot of kill bush in there from what I saw.

so, it looks like its going to be a rough last few days in America, especially this weekend.

oh boy.
Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top
joeKnowledge, "speaking of timely events:"

Doesn't the "timing" of the story miss the entire POINT of the real issues here? Who CARES when the story broke? You guys are so caught up in the political spin that you miss the real issue entirely. What matters are the facts and facts are that this adminstration's gross negligence and failed policies have made us LESS safe! It is so ridiculous to keep these conspiracy theories going when there are very real and important issues to be debated and discussed. The "timing" issue is a red hering...a diversion from the facts and the real issues.
Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top
T_Bone -

The reporter in question (Dana Lewis) isn't backing off his story, stating unequivocally that he was familiar with IAEA tags & found no such tags or seals on any of the large number of bunkers he personally observed & filmed, & NBC re-iterated their reporting today. And I've learned that nothing the NYT prints ever turns out to be quite what it purports to be. It will all shake out, but there is a far greater likelihood that the explosives disappeared before the weapons inspectors arrived in May of 2003. What's clearly not true is that these explosives have been systematically squirreled out of the compound by the insurgency. The NYT wants us to buy into that to make it look like Bush has been asleep at the wheel, but it is wrong to imply that when the explosives were gone by May of 2003. How far up on the list of those 500 sites you refer to remains to be seen and whether any explosives are truly missing is yet to be determined, not to mention how much was detonated from bombing. The IAEA reported, and was even quoted in the NYT article to this effect, that there was evidence in satellite surveillance data of massive explosions in the compound and evidence that materiel may have been removed before the US troops arrived. This claim that this materiel disappeared while we should have been standing watch simply has not been proven.

It is also kind of interesting to me, and somewhat ironic, that the NYT is making a big deal about how these explosives could be used to detonate nuclear weapons, never mind that, in their view, we should never have invaded Iraq in the first place because there were no WMD materials.

Cheers,
Daiwa