Ex-CBS News producer Mary Mapes still thinks we are interested in what she has to say about the infamous CBS forged-memos episode. And we are, in the sense that we like to watch people make fools of themselves in public. Mark Finkelstein has rounded up some of the best quotes from her latest vacation from reality. Here are some of my favorites:
When our story aired on September 8, 2004, it was savaged in an unprecedented outpouring of political vitriol. The Bush administration was then at the height of its ability to summon a terrifying whirlwind of criticism from right wing bloggers, hate talk radio yackers, FOX News “reporters,” conservative columnists, and those hollering people whose heads always appear in little boxes on cable discussion shows. None of these critics cared anything about the facts of the story, only about their politics.
Beware! The terrifying whirlwind!
They claimed that CBS used forged documents and they repeated that lie so often that it stuck. The mainstream media picked it up, repeating bloggers’ criticisms without making any serious effort to investigate the story. But then that would have required real legwork, something that very few were willing to do on this subject. […]
The laundry list of problems that critics claimed they saw in the memos has turned out to be bunk. There never has been any definitive proof that they were forged or falsified in any way, despite a multi-million dollar investigation into the story by Viacom. The reasons we put them on the air remain valid: the content of the memos was corroborated by people familiar with Bush, his unit and his commander; the dates, times and details intricately matched what we know of the record; and two experienced and respected document analysts, who examined copies that had not been faxed or digitally recreated, concluded that the papers showed every indication of being real.
To say that Mapes has failed to address any of the problematic aspects of the memos is to assume that they are even disputable. Mapes, perhaps knowing they are not, is content to shift the burden of “definitive proof” to someone else. But here’s the kicker:
I don’t believe we will know the truth about the memos until after the Bush team is out of office and people with information are no longer afraid to come forward.
Keep watching the skies, Mary. The truth is out there.