Now that CBS News and Dan Rather have accepted the obvious, i think its an excellent time to hit them with another round of e-mails calling for Rather's resignation. Throw Mapes in there too, for good measure.

In case you haven't seen it, here's the statement:

STATEMENT FROM DAN RATHER:

Last week, amid increasing questions about the authenticity of documents used in support of a 60 MINUTES WEDNESDAY story about President Bush's time in the Texas Air National Guard, CBS News vowed to re-examine the documents in question—and their source—vigorously. And we promised that we would let the American public know what this examination turned up, whatever the outcome.

Now, after extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confidence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically. I find we have been misled on the key question of how our source for the documents came into possession of these papers. That, combined with some of the questions that have been raised in public and in the press, leads me to a point where—if I knew then what I know now—I would not have gone ahead with the story as it was aired, and I certainly would not have used the documents in question.

But we did use the documents. We made a mistake in judgment, and for that I am sorry. It was an error that was made, however, in good faith and in the spirit of trying to carry on a CBS News tradition of investigative reporting without fear or favoritism.

Please know that nothing is more important to us than people's trust in our ability and our commitment to report fairly and truthfully.

More: Why does it take "extensive additional interviews" (presumably referring to CBS's upcoming Burkett interview) for Rather and company to discern what anyone else can see, simply by looking at the documents for five minutes.

That's the problem with "journalists." They don't have the brainpower to understand technical issues (which the bloggers grasped immediately), so they rely on hearsay almost exclusively. They would make horrible lawyers.

He that liveth by hearsay, must perish by hearsay.

Send those e-mails, please.

Update: A rather amusing poem by Smallholder at Nakedvillainy.com.

Posted by: annika at 09:40 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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