Putin confronts Bush about Dan Rather

[quaoar]

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1032354,00.html

Vladimir Putin, CBS News Loyalist

By JOHN F. DICKERSON

George Bush knew Vladimir Putin would be defensive when Bush brought up the pace of democratic reform in Russia in their private meeting at the end of Bush's four-day, three-city tour of Europe. But when Bush talked about the Kremlin's crackdown on the media and explained that democracies require a free press, the Russian leader gave a rebuttal that left the President nonplussed. If the press was so free in the U.S., Putin asked, then why had those reporters at CBS lost their jobs? Bush was openmouthed. "Putin thought we'd fired Dan Rather," says a senior Administration official. "It was like something out of 1984."

The Russians did not let the matter drop. Later, during the leaders' joint press conference, one of the questioners Putin called on asked Bush about the very same firings, a coincidence the White House assumed had been orchestrated. The odd episode reinforced the Administration's view that Putin's impressions of America are often based on urban myths fed to him by ill-informed aides. (At a past summit, according to Administration aides, Putin asked Bush whether it was true that chicken producers split their production into plants that serve the U.S. and lower-quality ones that process substandard chicken for Russia.) U.S. aides say that to help fight against this kind of misinformation, they are struggling to build relationships that go beyond Putin. "We need to go deeper into the well into other levels of government," explains an aide.

[Skittles]

1. Rove was behind the Rather setup

and Putin knows it

[hughee99]

14. I still don't get the whole "Rove F'd Rather" thing...

I mean, I understand how Rove could have set up Rather, but in the end, it seems like if Rather and his producer had done the kind of background checking and research that we would expect, then Rove's deception never would have worked. They would have found the report to be suspect at best, and not put it on the air until they were able to authenticate it. CBS has put unintentionally false reports on before, only later to find out that information was not accurate. Producers and reporters were not usually fired in the past for this. I'm sure that someone in the * administration put pressure on CBS, and certainly they pushed the "scandal", but I think the much of the pressure came internally from those at CBS who felt that Mapes didn't do enough checking on this before airing it, and that it would hurt their reputation as a reliable news organization. Rove may have set them up, but Mapes and Rather are not blameless in this.

[Warren DeMontague]

23. Someone screwed the pooch; doubtless. However, I still think it was a

"Karl Rove Special"

I suspect that, judging by their general behavior in the past few years, the folks at the top of CBS are and have been more than eager to carry water for the GOP, the Administration, and the agenda of the neo-cons.. However, you have institutionally anachronistic entities such as Dan Rather and co. who have (had) enough of a history, reputation and importance that they couldn't be jettisoned all that easily. So, say, here comes Karl Rove and whoever he got, be it Roger Stone or whatever, to provide these bullshit memos while simultaneously alerting the right-wing blogger class of what was coming down the pike.. but if the bigwigs at CBS were eager to ditch Rather and his passe journalistic habits of challenging the administration, what makes you think they wouldn't have allowed this whole thing to go down as planned? Or, to put it another way, why did they let the TANG story air when they pulled all this other crap to appease the right-wingers? They not only yanked "The Reagans", just a couple weeks or a month or so after the TANG story they pulled the piece regarding the Uranium Yellowcake because it was "too political".

I suspect the powers that be had it in for Rather, but some of those powers were at CBS themselves.

[hughee99]

28. I suspect that there's much truth to what you say, but...

All of this is just sounds like Rove and the "powers that be" at CBS providing Rather with the rope to hang himself, not tying the noose themselves. In the end, Rather and Mapes had the responsibility and the ability to find out more information about these documents. The story had been around, so the point of airing this wasn't the allegations, it was the "proof". If the proof is suspect, then you've got nothing. In the end, even the man's secretary said that though these documents were not real, they did accurately reflect the sentiments of the commander. Had they done this interview beforehand, it might have saved Rather and Mapes some embarrassment. If they had all of these forensic document experts on record as saying these docs were authentic (at least a couple of them, just in case) they could always pass the buck. In the end, they left themselves open to this sort of situation by not doing research that is expected from journalists of their caliber. Not to say that Rove was blameless, but if Rather and Mapes had done their job as we expect them to, Rove would not have been able to set them up in this way.

[Igel]

30. Many DUers believe in an omnipotent, omniscient Rove,

or at least one that's nearly so.

When I'm being cynical (and Monday mornings are great for cynicism) I assume it's because when faced with a supremely devious, powerful, and cunning foe, failure is acceptable, and not dishonorable. Up against a mere human, failure would be ... well ... failure, and would be dishonorable.

You're right, the production team didn't do their homework and do the work you'd expect of a journalism student.

They wanted to believe. Whether or not Rove provided the rope, Rather, Mapes, etc. artfully tied a noose, slipped their collective neck into it, and jumped off the horse while shouting, "We're CBS!" Rather did himself no favor when, a week after the RW was noising about the documents' dubious authenticity, he said if they're not authentic he wants to be the one to "break that story."

[Warren DeMontague]

32. I said essentially the same thing.

They (meaning Dan Rather and co.) screwed the pooch; didn't do enough research and in the end they were responsible for running the story.

That said, however, I think the corporate power structure at CBS may have been less than disappointed to get rid of Rather... and it doesn't take belief in an "omnipotent Karl Rove" (looking at his pictures, I would probaly wager impotent more than anything else) to realize that this dealio had all the markings of a "Karl Rove Special": Innoculate the candidate against real legitimate charges (he was awol from his national guard duty) by manufacturing a phony 'event' which, when proven false, will make the candidate look like the victim and the people who float any kind of similar charges look like partisan attack dogs. He did the same thing with the "Dubya dancing naked on a bar" picture flap. Once that was proven to be hokey, stories about Bush's real misbehavior while vacationing in the land of blot were, effectively, neutered.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Effectively, the Bush Regime did fire Dan Rather.

So WeeCowboy's pal Pooty wasn't too far off. No doubt somebody at CBS got leaned on...

[autorank]

11. I'll bet that's what Putin was referring to and caused *'s reaction.

F-head Bush is sitting there thinking, geez, this guy knows we screwed Rather. Hope he doesn't talk about Gannon and Stone. Putin knows we don't have government employees doing CBS News. This is just the type of dumb-shit thing we now expect from Time.

You're right on target.

[Rainscents]

3. Glad to see, Putin giving Bush hell!

[Vickers]

4. "It was like something out of 1984." Well, how about that! I agree with

a senior Administration official.

This whole fucking episode could've been scripted by Orwell.

What a nightmare.

[Cha]

5. I don't have "Happy 1984"..

on my answer machine for nothin'!

[quaoar]

6. And notice how indignant they are

at the idea that there was a planted question in the press conference.

What goes around, comes around.

[John Q. Citizen]

7. Putin and bush are both assholes who could care less about

democracy or freedom of the press.

[Progressive420]

9. Couldn't have said it any better myself

[autorank]

13. Kaine, YES. Good government for Virginia!

[ContraBass Black]

16. Get on the Kaine Train!

Sorry, I just had to. :evilfrown:

[sellitman]

8. Putin zinged bush the lesser...Bwahahahahahahahahahaha

<Regaining my self control>


.....that's rich!!!

:yourock: Putin!!!!

[NVMojo]

10. Unbelievable that we have a Russian leader acting more like a Patriot

Thank you, Mr. Putin!!! You said what most of us knew!!

[Igel]

29. That obviously wasn't the goal.

It's a case of the pot calling the kettle black, hoping that people believe it.

If the reporter is right, then it means we have no business criticizing Putin, unless we don't try to shut up reporters because we don't like their politics.

[Zen]

12. It is VERY interesting that he views things in this way

Bush has to be concerned that even that meat-head Putin can see through his lame act. Putin is like "you're calling ME a threat to democracy" - "HA! - look in the mirror my friend"

Very interesting, very telling...

[Sugarbleus]

15. Rove/Gannon/Rather...gate...I can't WAIT to see how this

evolves....wooooooohoooooooo Go Pooty Poot!

[understandinglife]

17. Recommended. (nt)

"DO YOU ENJOY BEING A CITIZEN OF THE ROGUE SUPER_POWER?"

[nolabels]

18. Well in a real sense bush did have them fired and retired

The language / culture difference is showing I would bet. In Russia deeds probably speak much more louder than words

If the CRM would stop covering for him and he ended up having to tell the truth about his status of service in the U.S Armed Forces.

I am still betting bush's record will eventually get outed permanently on a 24/7 basis. Then us people who served our time honorably won't have the last laugh about it. In the end though it really don't matter to me. I sleep fine at night knowing I did what I promised to do when I signed them enlistment papers.

[saltpoint]

19. With Rather leaving soon, I think CBS should seize the --

-- initiative here and offer the news desk position to two new news anchors -- Vladimir Putin and Jacques Chirac.

They should give the news in their native tongues.

Putin is still a fairly young man and might turn CBS down, even with the improved tax shelters he'd have in the U.S.

But Chirac would be terrific.

[Catherine Vincent]

20. Very interesting....

[Nothing Without Hope]

21. Bush has had his ego buffed to such a glowing sheen by the ass-kissers

he insists on surrounding himself with (and yes, I know where that puts his ego-- his head is basically an ugly vacuum cannister), he is easy game for someone who is intelligent and uncowed. If someone in the US government or press dared to say something like that to his face, Bush's goons would make them instant pariahs. The blivet** is protected from criticism, isolated from reality, kept insulated from unpleasantness and dissent. And increasingly, he appears to be mentally unfit for genuine conversation, let alone affairs of state. No wonder he so rarely speaks in public except with the most rigid scripting and prompting.

What did they expect to happen when this self-important imbecile starts lecturing another head of state in such a condescending way? Putin is a bad man, but he is no dummy, he has his pride, and NO ONE LIKES A HYPOCRITE, much less such a stupidly transparent one.

The corporate media in this country -- with very few brave exceptions like Keith Olbermann's show and a few print reporters like Sy Hersh -- are totally compliant to Bush directives. Even small revolts in the form of independent reporting of facts trigger reprisals. Pressure is applied, access is threatened, any other available screws (including, I believe, blackmail in some instances) are turned. Listening to the supremely obnoxious Bush lecturing on the nonexistent glories of this country's Free Press must have been simply too much for Putin. I'll bet he enjoyed watching the consternation in the Dim Son's little shifty ape eyes after dropping his little bombshell about Rathergate.

I imagine the Russians and the French especially are relishing the whole Gannongate fiasco and are well aware of the amazing silence of the American corporate media about its implications.

[Nothing Without Hope]

22. Editorial cartoon: Putin surely knows this truth about the US Press

(found in the weekend edition of the wonderful AllHatNoCattle.net site)

[dave29]

24. How dare those commies plant a question

I mean really, what is the world coming to.

[orleans]

25. i thought dan rather put in for retirement long before the

story ran on bu$h & the war records. he retired when he said he was going to. but all the little repukes we talk to say rather was fired because of the pressure put on cbs.

they're taking credit for rather being off the air when rather decided to retire & it had nothing to do with their bullshi* pressuring.

[hector459]

26. Putin should have asked, "If the press is so free, why can't they show

dead soldiers coming home and why can't they tell the American public the truth about its current administration?"

[Ashamed_American]

27. Yeah,

it'd be tough even for the man talking into Bush's earpiece to answer that one.


www.BlackEyedSundays.com

[freestyle]

31. As bad as Putin is, he's right about CBS, and the chickens too.

The U.S. is a hollow shell of a country that has been working fitfully towards freedom for over 200 years.