How Long Does It Take To Transmit A Message To Planet CBS?

Apparently, twelve days.

Story broke on Sept. 8, and today we get this on Drudge:

EXCLUSIVE // Mon Sep 20 2004 11:58:02 ET

STATEMENT FROM DAN RATHER:

Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a 60 MINUTES WEDNESDAY story about President Bush’s time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question—and their source—vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome.

Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically. I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers. That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where—if I knew then what I know now—I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.

But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.

Please know that nothing is more important to us than people’s trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.

Glad that earth has finally managed to make contact with CBS. Now if we can just figure out how to get our linguacode to match up with theirs. Anybody have a Universal Translator?

Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."

9 thoughts on “How Long Does It Take To Transmit A Message To Planet CBS?”

  1. This was translated first into Narn, so it may be a bit off:
    “I regret that I am unable to use the MS Word forgeries in assisting the election of John Kerry, due to the public outcry, and wide dissemination by the pajamahadeen and Fox News. I will continue to find other ways to attack President Bush and assist in his removal from office.
    For the Revolution,
    Dan Rather”

  2. Using my babel fish, the statement sounded like this —
    “Curses! Foiled again! But don’t think it’s over yet. You may have won the battle, but you haven’t won the war! Mwe he he ha ha ha ha!”
    It was kind of an old fish … The word ‘curses’ actually sounded like coises. I don’t think it knew words like pajamahadeen and such.

  3. “It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.
    Please know that nothing is more important to us than people’s trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.”
    Who are they trying to kid?

  4. What about an apology to George W. Bush?
    The entire thing is pathetic. Didn’t they at first boast about how credible there source was; but now they appear to admit that the source got it from someone else, and did CBS interview that person?

  5. Notice that he is trying to appear as if he got duped when in fact CBS ignored people they interviewed as well as their own document experts who also warned them. The link between the source, CBS, and the DNC and CBS’s coordination with the DNC is also unapologized for. CBS’s apology is a deception in and of itself.
    They need to apologize for being blatently partisan and make sure it does not happen again. Rather’s ratings have always been a dismal 3rd place except the period where he had a boss with a clue who ended up being booted at Rather’s request. That resulted in a slide into 3rd (and now 4th place behind Fox) finish.

  6. So, (1) President Bush’s National Guard service is no longer in question and (2) Rather is not a serious candidate for the Presidency.
    Glad that’s over.

  7. What is really incredible about this whole mess is that so much time and effort has been spent in this campaign researching the actions and inactions of two men who were but boys back then, perhaps neither of them very mature.

  8. I’m sure glad I’m not one of those two ‘experts’ who appeared on the 9/13/04 CBS Evening News. Despite the controversy, they were still confidently proclaiming that the docs were authentic!

  9. As long as news is reported by human beings, there will be some bias in it. Hopefully less than more, but surely some. CBS has the right to be liberally baised. But in Memogate, they IGNORED credible evidence that ran counter to their bias, and that makes them not biased (let alone “duped”), but active PARTISANS.
    I stopped watching CBS/NBC/ABC news years ago, and I mean, years ago. I see I’ve missed nothing since. Regards, edp.

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