Dan Rather and the continuing death saga of the Mainstream Media

This has not been pretty. Dan Rather had to look America in the eye, at least those few who still watch him, and tell another lie. And it was a lie. The only miscalculations or mistakes on the part of Mapes, Rather and Heyward were in the commission of an act of news making rather than news reporting. To imagine that a team with the experience of this troika could have been taken in boggles the mind.

To apply Occam’s Razor leaves only one conclusion. CBS News in the persons of Heyward, Rather and Mapes knowingly decided to publish a story they knew was based on the most flimsy of evidence from people even the O.J. jury wouldn’t believe along with the most transparent of fraudulent documents that they were warned about by their own hired experts.

This troika decided to make news instead of reporting it and was caught in the act by the new media. Their little jaunt into fiction has cost the network dearly in terms of prestige. We have had to watch Dan Rather throw first Ms. Mapes then Mr. Hayward off the back of the sleigh to the wolves in an embarrassing attempt to save his own neck. Instead he has ended up looking much like Captain Queeg without the nifty uniform or Bogart’s acting ability.

Probably the saddest part of this whole fiasco is the absolute inability of Mr. Rather and his political kin to understand just how far out of touch they really are. By comparison, Geraldo is looking more and more mainstream every day.