The Secret is Out: It's a Conspiracy

"Our job is only to hold up the mirror--to tell and show the public what has happened."

  - Walter Cronkite (1916-     ), American broadcast journalist

As most of you know by now, CBS's Dan Rather is being accused of using forged documents in a 60 Minutes II story about George Bush's Air National Guard service that was aired last week. I've been following the blogworld's coverage of this for several days now and have seen both sides of the issue argued with equal fervor.

To be sure, depending on how you want this to come out, you can find someone in blogland who supports your point of view. This e-mail posted on Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish captures one of his reader's thoughts about the various arguments for and against Mr. Rather's story and I must admit they closely match my own.

So what is the truth? It's hard to say, but the attention that bloggers have given the story is now spilling over into major media. It appears that Rather and CBS may have painted themselves into a corner from which it will be difficult to escape--at least without a lot of damage to their credibility as a news organization.

To that point, Belmont Club's Wretchard reported earlier today that the Washington Post has made a pronouncement on the authenticity of the documents and CBS would not find it to their liking:

"The Washington Post has run an article which practically humiliates CBS and Dan Rather. It begins with a repudiation of the Killian memos by the 60 Minutes chief document expert, Marcel Matley. The Post then pronounces on the documents themselves: they are fake."

Wretchard fails to see how CBS can continue to insist that the memos are the real mccoy in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. Andrew Sullivan joins the Belmont Club blogger in chastising Rather in this post which includes excerpts from his recent article appearing in The New Republic. 

The dilemma that remains for me is why Rather and CBS would have chosen to go with a story like this when the experts they conferred with had so many questions about the authenticity of the documents. It makes no sense to me. Perhaps there's a conspiracy at work here. Some have already said there is, and that Republican Karl Rove is masterminding it. Come on now. Would anyone believe such a thing? 

Rich Hailey over at Shots Across the Bow does, but he suggests it's the Democrats, not the Republicans, who are responsible for these shenanigans. What could the Dems possibly hope to gain from such devious behavior? Hailey knows and he reveals the secret right here. Good grief! Who woulda thunk it?