Andy Rooney regrets that the big ones always get away

Murrell emailed me about story, CBS firings should go higher up, he found that quoted Andy Rooney, a 60 Minutes commentator and notorious curmudgeon, where Andy sourly complained:

"The people on the front lines got fired while the people most instrumental in getting the broadcast on escaped,' Rooney said He was referring to the firing of producer Mary Mapes and the requested resignations of a senior vice president and two 60 Minutes producers while anchor Dan Rather and CBS News chief Andrew Heyward kept their jobs."

The reason why Ra^ther and Heyward dodged the bullet is because the Thornburgh report—an investigation of Ra^therBogusGate that was ordered by CBS’ owners—held both Dan Ra^ther and Andrew Heyward blameless on the grounds that Ra^ther was just an innocent newsreader and because Heyward issued a directive—after the program was aired—ordering “a careful re-examination of the September 8 Segment to make certain that the 60 Minutes Wednesday reporting was sound in all respects.”

Rooney thinks the house cleaning is incomplete.

I guess Rooney is annoyed because the Thornburgh report gave sufficient political cover to justify inaction on Rather and Heyward. In my view, I’m most annoyed because this report concluded a lack of political bias at CBS. Kevin Craver, of Ra^thergate, speaks for me when he blogged:

The right lobe of the blogosphere today is picking apart the e-mail correspondence between former CBS Producer Mary Mapes and freelance journalist Michael Smith. I believe, like many, that the e-mails are a prima facie case of political bias that Dick Thornburgh and Lou Boccardi overlooked.

But one e-mail in particular, which has been quoted extensively in the blogosphere, stands out in my eyes, but not for the reasons cited on other blogs.

I am talking about this Aug. 31 e-mail from Smith to Mapes (page 62 of the report). I bold-face two passages for emphasis:

Today I am going to send the following hypothetical scenario to a reliable,trustable editor friend of mine . . .

What if there was a person who might have some information that couldpossibly change the momentum of an election but we needed to get anASAP book deal to help get us the information? What kinds of turnaroundpayment schedules are possible, keeping in mind the book probably couldnot make it out until after the election . . . . What I am asking is in this bestcase hypothetical scenario, can we get a decent sized advance payment,and get it turned around quickly.

The fact that Smith desires to “change the momentum of an election” is telling in and of itself. But what is more telling to me – what hints that the crew was desperate for a hit, any hit to the incumbent president – is the dull blade of the weapon CBS was trying to fashion.
Previous presidential embarassments that changed politics – Watergate, Teapot Dome, etc. – did so because the sitting president was connected to criminal activity. I am not defending anyone who willingly shirks military duty, but in this case, CBS hoped to prove President Bush did something that many sons of privilege from all political stripes (including the last commander in chief, if my memory serves me correctly) attempted during the Vietnam War.

I agree. The real outrage was CBS’ attempted intervention in the election’s outcome. This memo makes it evident that the players at CBS were committing politics and not journalism. Any investigator who was given this email, read it, and concluded that CBS was bias-free anyway is too naïve to conduct an investigation.

Ann Coulter, snickering at the one of the report’s authors, said:

Proving once again how useless "moderate Republicans" are, The CBS Report -- co-authored by moderate Republican Dick Thornburgh -- found no evidence of political bias at CBS.

Well, of course CBS would only accept Republicans who didn’t have a pair; that how Thornburgh got the job.

On top of everything else, Little Green Footballs noted that CBS had altered some of the Thornburgh report’s document attributes. CBS had originally posted the the Thornburgh report’s such that viewers could copy and past text. Subsequently, CBS had altered the document’s pdf attributes to prevent bloggers from using copy and paste when composing postings on this report.

Here is a link to a version of the the Thornburgh report’s with the copy and paste attribute enabled. Hat tip to LGF.

I will give Scott Ott, the satirist, the last, scathing, word:

CBS News Switches to Reality Gameshow Format

(2005-01-11) -- When life hands you a lemon, the old saying goes, make lemonade. CBS News President Andrew Heyward is doing just that, announcing today that the CBS Evening News with Dan Rather will be re-launched on March 10 as Myopic Zeal: The CBS Evening News Gameshow.

"It's edgy, it's hip and it capitalizes on our key asset -- intermittent credibility," said Mr. Heyward, who survived a recent epidemic of myopic zeal which proved terminal for four of his staff. "Since the internal investigation report, viewers have wondered if we could ever be trusted again. Instead of trying to rebuild that shattered credibility, which would take years and millions of dollars, we're going to roll with the punches."

The new show will feature the same set, the same reporters and the same style as Evening News Classic, but during each segment viewers can go to a website and vote on which elements of each story may be false, or at least lacking adequate authentication. Prizes will include cash and a chance to become a 'Myopic Zeal' correspondent for a day, which includes the full training course in ethics which 'big-time journalists' now receive.

"It gets the viewers involved in the story in a way that was possible before only on a blog," said Mr. Heyward. "We've taken a hard look at the blogosphere and decided, if you can't beat them, join them. We'll even let the viewers vote on why the errors were made, whether by myopic zeal, political subterfuge or gross incompetence."

The embattled news czar said production costs for the new show would be the same as the old, "since the reporters and producers won't have to do anything differently."

The network has begun talks with Mr. Rather's talent agent in hopes of pulling him out of semi-retirement to sign him as 'anchor' for the new show.

"For decades, Dan Rather has been our face and voice of intermittent credibility and myopic zeal," said Mr. Heyward. "Sure, there are others in this industry who are as zealous and as credible but he's the Tiffany anchor, having done for this network what anchors do best."

I'm awed at the way Scott Ott can cranks out such brilliance every day.