"CBS News Concludes It Was Misled on National Guard Memos, Network Officials Say," reads the headline in today's New York Times. When the stonewall doesn't work, try spin. That's precisely what CBS is now doing. CBS misled the nation on their "scoop" of documents purporting to show pressure brought to bear on George W. Bush's behalf when he served in the Texas Air National Guard. CBS says that it was misled. CBS isn't the victim, they are the perpetrator. Sure, they were misled. But more importantly, they misled the nation. They were used by some liberal crackpot with a vendetta against the president. They employed terrible judgment that was influenced more by ideological solidarity than the facts at hand.

As Machiavelli put it, "One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived." Ain't that the truth.

Note the parallel with Kerry and Bush -- who are both fighting to make sure that people know they were deceived rather than deceivers regarding WMD. Certainly another case of terrible judgment caused by political expediency.

I’m getting very tired of listening to people spout off about this alleged deception perpetrated by the President with regards to WMDs.

If I believe anything about this Iraq fiasco, it is that Bush went in believing there to be a nuclear and/or chemical threat on a large scale and that those types of weapons would eventually be used against the United States. The best intelligence at the time showed this to be true. Couple that with the fact that the U.N. weapon inspection process was continuously being thwarted by Saddam and it all added up.

Bush and his staff believed it; Clinton believed it; Kerry believed it; even lowly Edwards believed it.

So please, let’s move on from this foolishness about Bush deceiving the American people so that he could start a war.

Dan Rather:

Did I say that Bush and Kerry delibrately deceived us? No, I said they showed bad judgment. So who are you "spouting off" at? I know that "everyone believed" that Iraq had WMD. But the fact remains that they were wrong and so we shouldn't have in fact gone to war in Iraq.

Moreover, the *conclusiveness* of the WMD intell was certainly mischaracterized to us and to the world. And that wasn't a mistake. And this is just like Rather -- Rather probably believed that the docs were real and that the story true. That was bad judgment. What was deceitful was the claim that the evidence and source were conclusive and had been checked and thoroughly vetted. That was not a mistake. That was deception.

Have you ever heard about hindsight being 20-20?

If we all knew then what we know now, of course different paths would have been taken.

This is not that difficult a concept to understand.

So, please, don't use that. It sounds stupid.

And, the deception is in your mind.

Don't use what? The line that hindsight is 20-20? It does sound stupid, but I didn't say it. You're comments just seem kind of random. By the way, I was against the war before, during, and after; if *you* can only see in hindsight, fine, but don't "spout off" at people who don't have a similar disability.

The point is that both Rather and Bush allowed themselves to be deceived and exercized bad judgment -- BECAUSE they wanted to believe. How could anyone seriously dispute this claim?

Or rather: how could any SERIOUS person dispute this claim?

TooCool, I don't think you are. And by the logic of your written posts, I would suggest you go back to class.

Yeow.

Ooooooo. Burn.

I think you should wear one of those beanie/propellor hats on the air to promote the book.

This whole Rathergate thing has risen to dangerous proportions for the Left in general and the Dems in particular and deserves some prosecutorial attention from our government.

To find out that this leftist nutbag Burkett has been trying to pass these phony docs off to anybody who would listen and then have 60 Minutes producer Mapes hook him up with Joe Lockhart of Kerry Campaign fame is unbelievable stuff!!

Also very convenient (and coincidental of course) was the the Kerry Campaign releases its ‘Favorite Son’ advert days after the 60 Minutes piece. Remarkably, in that ad, clips of the phony 60 Minutes segment are used.

The evidence for the suspected and likely collusion between the liberal, agenda driven CBS piece and the Democratic campaign for John Kerry is pretty clear and should be thoroughly investigated. Heads should roll!!