Three Words Lose Meaning as Rather Departs

Dan Rather launched an attack on the english language yesterday as he was finally removed from the network anchor's chair at CBS News. Not satisfied with helping to end the careers of his closest staffers and destroying what little credibility the news division had left, Rather turned on three unsuspecting nouns in his final comments during his last broadcast. All three appeared in the same run-on sentence, and all three must be wondering what their place in modern day vocabularies will be after this embarrassing association. The three words: "Journalists," "Truth," and the mortally wounded "Courage."

To fully understand the damage Mr. Rather caused to the character and definitions of these words, one only needs to recall Rather's "memogate" scandal regarding President Bush's tour in the Texas Air National Guard. "Jounalists" are expected to honestly investigate a story with a presumption of fairness. In this case, exceptional care was to be expected from the superstar "journalist" and his major news network, as the charge made was that of tarnishing a sitting president, during wartime, fifty days before a presidential election. We later find out that Dan's staff had been working on the story for over five years, and received the memos in question from a well known local partisan nut. Agenda journalism had replaced journalism.

"Truth," and the pursuit thereof never was an prerequisite with the "memogate" story. The known identity of the discredited sad clown who forwarded the memos should have been enough for CBS and Dan to easily determine this was a fraud. So should have the words of their own hired "experts," who all had great doubts about the memos authenticity. The fact that it took the blogasphere less than twenty-four hours to totally discredit these memos reinforces the fact that the memos were a fraud, and an easily determined fraud at that. Dan and CBS ran with these lies only because they wanted them to be true. If they wanted truth they would have immediately reviewed the enormous and compelling evidence that was weighing against this story. Instead, Dan launched further attacks, claiming the story was completely researched and vetted, and he even paraded out the octogenarian secretary that worked in the office in question at the time, but she actually had no specific knowledge of these memos. If truth were a pursuit, Dan would not have at one point asked us to put aside the question of the memos authenticity and replace it with an examination of the veracity of the overall story. What was obvious to everyone who wasn't peddling this lie was that the story hinged on the validity of the memos. Dan was caught embracing a lie, so to save face, he asked us to just focus on the lie "by-product!"

How much courage does it take to let your subordinates take the fall for your own lack of character and judgment? After the criticism started to mount, was it courageous for Dan to claim that he really didn't have much journalistic input into the story? Is it courageous to continue to hide behind the facts and still to this day pretend the story is true. There is a better word for a news division and their anchor who participates in a callous lie upon the public, and then celebrates an internal investigation that becomes little more than a protracted whitewash. That word is "cowards."

It is hard to imagine how someone who only reads the news can turn his chair into a "hot seat." I guess that may explain the old truism: "Liar, liar. Pants on fire!"

Do us a favor Dan. Put yourself out, and stay out!