Rather Meltdown.

Floating eyes, rambling, Nixonian dissertations. “The story is true” (over and over and over …) Sad, yet fitting. And this was on Sept 10!

Rather with Marcia Kramer [you may have to click on "Reporting for Duty?" on the More Video selector on the right and then look for "Rather Defends Memos" in the selections on the left]

What is in this video that I haven’t seen reported on before is Rather essentially connecting his story with the SBVT attacks on Kerry – otherwise the story wouldn’t be important!

Via Allah:

…So far, so good. Clearly, Dobbs thinks Burkett is the forger. But the idea of Burkett being the forger isn’t exactly front page news at this point. Why, oh why, then, does Ace have the siren up?

Here’s why:

In an Aug. 21 posting, Burkett referred to a conversation with former senator Max Cleland (D-Ga.) about the need to counteract Republican tactics: “I asked if they wanted to counterattack or ride this to ground and outlast it, not spending any money. He said counterattack. So I gave them the information to do it with. But none of them have called me back.”

Cleland confirmed that he had a two- or three-minute conversation by cell phone with a Texan named Burkett in mid-August while he was on a car ride. He remembers Burkett saying that he had “valuable” information about Bush, and asking what he should [do] with it. “I told him to contact the [Kerry] campaign,” Cleland said. “You get this information tens of times a day, and you don’t know if it is legit or not.”

August 21st falls within the 12-day window described in this morning’s post, by the way. But I digress. Elsewhere in the article:

In e-mail messages to a Yahoo discussion group for Texas Democrats over the past few months, Burkett laid out a rationale for using what he termed “down and dirty” tactics against Bush. He said he had passed his ideas to the Democratic National Committee but that the DNC seemed “afraid to do what I suggest.”

—

Now how would Burkett get Max’ cell phone #?

DAN YOU IGNORANT SLUT!

Bagged-out, dried-up, slunken meat like you and Howell Raines know the rules. If you want a contract, sign on the dotted line. Oh, but let’s all shed a tear for poor Howell. There was only testimony that he had sexual intercourse over forty times with the DNC while living with the NY Times. But I suppose that sort of fashionable promiscuting means nothing to you, Dan, who hops from candidate to candidate with the frequency of a cheap Wi-Fi Router. But hell hath no fury like a partisan’s scorn, and Howell Raines, like a screeching, squealing, reptatious swamp sow is after Terry McAuliffe’s last three hundred million dollars. I guess what you and Howell are saying is that when you’re on your backs, the meter is running. Well, please spare us, gals, and tell us the rate’s at the top. Then we can choose which two bit hacks and bargain basement muckrakers to shack up with.

PS – what the hell is Staudt’s rank? Did he perhaps serve as a general “acting-lacking” and retire as a Colonel or something. I’m not surprised that the MSM can’t get ranks right, but there seems to be much confusion even among usually reliable bloggers.

CBS annouces 1) they are forming a Blue Ribbon Panel(BRP)of outside journalists and 2) Rather, Mapes, and Heywood have been suspended and are forbidden to talk to anyone other than the BRP until this matter is resolved.

Later CBS (not Rather) apologizes to President Bush and the American people, and announces that 1) Rather, Mapes, and Heywood have decided to terminate their relationship with CBS, 2) as a condition of their severance packages they are forbidden from ever speaking about the circumstances of this ‘project’, and 3) here’s how it happened starting back in 1999 when Mary Mapes, Bill Burkett, and James Carville stopped for a cold one after work ………

“BOYCOTT CBS UNTIL DAN RATHER IS FIRED”.

PASS IT ON

“BOYCOTT CBS UNTIL DAN RATHER IF FIRED”.

PASS IT ON

>Window of opportunity

>Keep calling CBS – they are answering the phones:

>CBS Evening News

212 975-3691 and 202 457-4385

fax 212 975-1893

fax 212-975-1998

evening@cbsnews.com

Executive Producer: Jim Murphy

Senior Producers: Susan Bean, Ingrid Matthews

Dan Rather

212 975-3691

Senior Broadcast Producer: Lynne Pitts

212 975-2258

60 Minutes II

212 975-6200

60II@cbsnews.com

Executive Producer Jeffrey Fager

CBS Administration:

>CEO of CBS: Mel Karmazin 212 975-4321

President CBS Television: Leslie Moonves 323 575-2345

CBS News President: Andrew Heyward 212 975-7825, ajh@cbs.com

Senior VP Marcy McGinnis 212 975-5007, mam@cbs.com

>At 3:45 today I decided to call CBS and ask where the statement was they had put off since noon. A woman answered, later identified as Leslie Molson, A news manager, I think she said. I said “there’s a rumor that Dan is on the window ledge, can you confirm?” and she laughed. She asked if she should put me in the “resign” column for Daniel and I of course said yes. She was quite friendly, but I am quite charming. We chatted about Dan’s misfortune and I got the impression that she thought he was full of shit. She told me Dan wasn’t there. I don’t know if that meant his office, the news set, the window ledge, or the building. I closed the conversation by asking if she was sure he wasn’t barricaded in the men’s room. She laughed and I hung up.

>I think we had a moment.

>Call and email CBS! Keep the heat up. I want Dan to take that dive in the middle of a newscast. The camera chasing him down the hall as he clutches memos to his chest, busting a window open with a bust of Walter Cronkite, hurling himself into space as he yells “I regret nothing”.

>That’s good tv.

*

I assume you say The Fever Swamp. I suppose there is some tepid female understanding and sympathy for Senator Icabod Lurch.