Will TerriGate go as far as MemoGate?

Rob Lister

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I think not but...

Does this have any significance? Not much, but I wanted to set the record straight because earlier today I repeated my conviction that all four mistakes noted with a "sic" had been changed. As far as the genuineness of the memo is concerned, this is a relatively minor point. What we know is this: There were at least two versions of the memo, the second a cleaned-up version of the first. The second version appeared online after the text of the original had been posted by ABC, with errors noted. We don't know who created either version, or when, or why; we don't know when or why the corrections were made. The errors are a minor part of the story, but they illustrate how little we know about the provenance of the memo. And, of course, the very poor quality of the memo is at odds with its purported status as a high-level strategy document.
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...the hounds have picked up the fox scent.

Link Dan Rather will certainly read. Not because it concerns him, but just so he knows he's not long alone in his new, but soon closing, 60minII office.
 
Will people ever stop using the word "gate" as if it were a proper suffix meaning "political scandal"?
 
aerocontrols said:
Not only 'no', but I suspect that before I am dead, it will have entered the dictionary as a proper suffix meaning "political scandal"
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Heh.

From Dictionary.com:

-gate
suff.

A scandal involving alleged illegal acts and often a cover-up, especially by government officials: Irangate.
 
aerocontrols said:
This post is just to confirm that I was not yet dead when you posted that.
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Sorry, but your post falls short of the level of evidence required on a skeptics forum. How do we know that it's you posting this? It could just as easily be your parent, little green aliens or super intelligent shades of the colour blue.
 
Rob Lister said:
I think not but...



...the hounds have picked up the fox scent.

Link Dan Rather will certainly read. Not because it concerns him, but just so he knows he's not long alone in his new, but soon closing, 60minII office.
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What is your criteria for expecting public figures to resign if they are knowingly or unknowingly part of a fraudulent representation of information to the public. Not saying any crime is committed, but just from a moral standpoint. You appear to believe the resignation of Rather was the right thing for him to do in this case.
 
I saw your post yesterday and had a strong emotional response. I decided to sleep on it before replying.

If ABC did report it that way, then they deserve every criticism they receive. Third-hand anonymous accounts which contain outrageous claims should not be reported as fact.
 
Re: Re: Will TerriGate go as far as MemoGate?

a_unique_person said:
What is your criteria for expecting public figures to resign if they are knowingly or unknowingly part of a fraudulent representation of information to the public. Not saying any crime is committed, but just from a moral standpoint. You appear to believe the resignation of Rather was the right thing for him to do in this case.
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Rather is an anchorman, and probably wasn't all that involved in putting together the story in the first place. The focus on Rather is, I think, misplaced.
 
Re: Re: Re: Will TerriGate go as far as MemoGate?

Renfield said:
Rather is an anchorman, and probably wasn't all that involved in putting together the story in the first place. The focus on Rather is, I think, misplaced.
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Rather was managing editor. I think the focus was properly placed. But he isn't the issue. The issue now is ABC, not CBS. No, I don't think much will come of the memo. Most news agencies have already dismissed it as a fraud. ABC was a little more careful than CBS in that they never outright said that the memo was legit. That care exonerates them for the most part unless other facts come to light.

And they will.

But it will be handled in a quite manner.
 
Yep, Rather was the right man to be booted. He was largely responsible for the continued defense of the documents and their source long after they were both indefensible.

Calling Burkett "unimpeachable" should have gotten Rather booted immediately. That was clearly a comment that he knew to be a lie. He knew who Burkett was all along.

ABC and others continued to refer to the fake Schiavo document as a GOP document right up until it faded from the news. Long after they knew it wasn't a GOP document.

Little effort is made to find the sources of these phoney docs, so the MSM will probably continue to get, and use fake documents. They will continue to be busted by bloggers.

The MSM is paying for these lies in loss of trust, readers, and viewers.

Likely the MSM will blindly continue to wonder why more and more folks are getting their news elsewhere......
 
I think this is what AUP is trying to show us.

Schiavo Memo Is Attributed to Senate Aide
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK

ASHINGTON, April 6 - Senator Mel Martinez, Republican of Florida, said Wednesday that a senior member of his staff had written an unsigned memorandum about the partisan political advantages of intervening in the case of Terri Schiavo that became a controversial footnote to the debate over the wisdom and motives of Congress's actions.

In a statement on Wednesday night, Mr. Martinez said that he had just learned that the memorandum originated in his office and that its author had resigned. He did not name the author, but aides said it was Brian Darling, his counsel.

Mr. Darling could not be reached for comment.

"It is with profound disappointment and regret that I learned today that a senior member of my staff was unilaterally responsible for this document," Mr. Martinez said. "It was not approved by me or any other member of my staff, nor were we aware of its existence until very recently."

Mr. Martinez added: "This type of behavior and sentiment will not be tolerated in my office. As the senator, I am ultimately responsible for the work of my staff and the product that comes out of this office. I take full responsibility for this situation."

The anonymous memorandum, which was distributed to news organizations by Democratic aides and first reported by ABC News, became widely cited in news reports as evidence that at least some Republicans were applying a political calculus to the case of Ms. Schiavo, the brain-damaged Florida woman. Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader, and many other Republican Senators quickly disavowed the document, saying they had never seen it and that they condemned it.

In his statement, Mr. Martinez said that on March 9 he had mistakenly and unknowingly handed the document to Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, on the floor of the Senate. Mr. Martinez said that he had meant to reach for a different document and that he did not know how it had entered his possession.

"Senator Harkin was kind enough today to call me and tell me this afternoon that he believes the memo he received was given to him by me," Mr. Martinez said. "Until this afternoon, I had never seen it and had no idea a copy of it had ever been in my possession."
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http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/07/politics/07memo.html?pagewanted=print&position=&oref=login
 
For those of us old enough to remember, the suffix "...gate" came into use as a result of a real place, Watergate. Ever since the break-in, any scandal was described as a "...- gate." The use of the suffix has no bearing on its original meaning, but rather its popular misuse. The term was never used before Watergate and then only rarely in the years following, usually in a satirical sense alluding to the similarity between some new scandal and the Watergate scandal. It is now a pretty common
usage. but didn't realize this actually made it into the dictionary but then again most of us don't read dictionaries everyday. Thanks.
 
Seems like the democrats, such as Tom "Bug your office" Harkin might have some dirty hands in this matter.
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Don't believe everything you read in the Conservative News Media.

"Senator Martinez has never seen the memo and condemns its sentiments," spokeswoman Kerry Feehery said. "No one in our office has seen it, nor had anything to do with its creation."
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Oops.

Fred Barnes:

"There wasn't a hint in these reports the memo could have any other source but Republicans. Yet there was no evidence it had come from Republicans. It was unsigned and had no letterhead or date. Nothing indicated it came from the Republican leadership or the House or Senate campaign committee or from the Republican National Committee or even from a stray Republican staffer," Mr. Barnes said.

"The only evidence was of a dirty trick -- and there wasn't much evidence of that. Powerline, the influential blog, found a version of the memo with typos cleaned up on left-wing Web sites.

"The only basis for blaming Republicans was the unsubstantiated allegation that the memo was spread among Republican senators. Yet no senator stepped forward and said, 'Yes, I got that memo.' Now consider what would have happened if a damning memo had been distributed to Democratic senators, saying the Schiavo issue could be used politically against Republicans. Would anyone in the mainstream media have jumped on it? I doubt it. Only right-wing bloggers would have.

"So rather than an example of aggressive reporting, the memo story turns out to be yet another instance of crude liberal bias, in this case against both Republicans and those who fought to have Schiavo's feeding tube restored. Naturally, the memo had a second life when the story was picked up by other news outlets, pundits, and columnists. How did ABC and others get wind of the memo in the first place? It came from 'Democratic aides,' according to the New York Times, who 'said it had been distributed to Senate Republicans.' Not exactly a disinterested source."
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Oops.

Newsmax:

Closer examination by The American Spectator, talk show hosts Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, The Weekly Standard, and Accuracy in Media (AIM) indicates that the memo is a fraud – a political dirty trick, if you will, specifically aimed at causing public revulsion at Republicans.
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When TAS, Rush, and Hannity can't be trusted to authenticate documents, what is the world coming to? After all, Tom DeLay is an expert on neurology, surely pundits are also experts at whatever is convenient at the time.
 
Beer Monkey said:

When TAS, Rush, and Hannity can't be trusted to authenticate documents, what is the world coming to? After all, Tom DeLay is an expert on neurology, surely pundits are also experts at whatever is convenient at the time.
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As an token of their dedication to responsibility for what they report, they will all be handing in their resignations, and offering an apology for inept reporting.
 
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