BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!

Subject: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: red_clay
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 10:55 PM

Expert Calls Missing Weapons Story Biased Media Hit Job

By Chad Groening
October 28, 2004

(AgapePress) - A media watchdog says CBS is once again preparing to do a hatchet job on President Bush when it airs a controversial story this Sunday on 60 Minutes.

The New York Times has already released a report on what CBS plans to air Halloween night: a news story suggesting the Bush administration was somehow negligent because nearly 400 tons of explosives were reported missing from a facility south of Baghdad. But last year, NBC reported that when U.S. troops arrived at the site where the weapons supposedly were stored, no weapons were there to be found.

Tim Graham of the Media Research Center suspects the selective reporting on these alleged missing weapons, and its timing, suggests that this is just another cheap trick from left-leaning mainstream media. "This was meant to be the 'October surprise,'" he says, adding, "CBS has a history of dirty tricks. This is their latest one."

And stranger still in the way CBS News is harping on the story, the media analyst asserts, is the fact that the report about the explosives really does not even help the Democratic presidential candidate.

"It's funny for me," Graham says, "that the media can turn around now and say here were these dangerous weapons, and they were neglected by the Bush administration. Well, the fact of the matter is, this cache of weapons makes the case for war. It doesn't make the case for John Kerry."

Nevertheless, the MRC spokesman expects the same politically biased media that painted Jimmy Carter as competent in Iran will paint President Bush as incompetent in Iraq. Graham contends the upcoming 60 Minutes report is simply another "partisan hit job by the national news media."

An October 27 CyberAlert from MRC noted that a number of the mainstream network and cable news agencies have at least provided new details on the missing weapons story, including satellite photos of trucks that had been at the storage facility before U.S. troops had arrived. CBS News, notably, still had not reported these new details by the time of the alert.

© 2004 AgapePress all rights reserved

posted by TARHEEL

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Bobert
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:18 PM

Haha... Like CBS has anything else they can do for Bush??? Come on, give me a break... Karl Rove had the "National Guard" phony letters planted for CBS so that it would defuse the fact the Bush was indeed AWOL. This was real smart on Rove's part 'cause now that real story is dead.

I can't think that CBS would be suckered by Rove again but who knows???

Rove makes Lee Atwater look like a choir boy when it comes to dirty politics...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Bill D
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:33 PM

Chad Groening, honest, unbiased reporter of the news, unlike the scurvy rats at CBS.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: PoppaGator
Date: 28 Oct 04 - 11:49 PM

My theory on the last CBS scandal is this: Rove (or some likeminded zealot) retyped an actual, authentic, decades-old document into his computer and printed it out contemporary-style on a nice new laser printer. Even went to the extra trouble to format every "st" in "1st," every "nd" in "2nd," etc., to print as superior characters, just to emphasize the anachroism.

All he had to do then was find an ambitious and typographically unaware network news worker, and sit back to watch a *true* story get "disproved."

Farfetched? Maybe, but not necessarily, not by a long shot. Slicker than pig snot, is how it looks to me.

Oh, yeah, this guy Chad Groening is unbiased. He says " . . .the way CBS News is *harping on* [emphasis mine] the story . . ." about a story that HAS NOT RUN YET!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 12:07 AM

Hatchet Job?

not according to this...al QaQaa ca-ca

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 12:09 AM

Here it is if you don't want to sign in.

Last update: October 28, 2004 at 10:12 PM
KSTP tape may show Iraqi bunkers
Bob Von Sternberg and Paul Mcenroe, Star Tribune
October 29, 2004 KSTP1029






Videotape shot by a Twin Cities television news crew in Iraq suggests that explosives and munitions were still being stored at Iraq's unsecured Al-Qaqaa military installation nine days after the fall of Baghdad in 2003.

The explosives could include HMX, powerful high-grade explosives that were recently reported missing from Al-Qaqaa.

The KSTP-TV footage has become a new focus in a controversy that has dominated the presidential campaign this week.

Sen. John Kerry contends that President Bush must take responsibility for the missing explosives. "You were warned to guard them," Kerry said Thursday in direct challenge to Bush. "You didn't guard them."

Bush has accused Kerry of jumping to conclusions about the missing explosives, calling it a dangerous thing for a wartime president to do.

The Pentagon has said the weapons could have been moved before the U.S. invasion in March 2003. But in a potential blow to Bush's case, the U.N. nuclear agency said on Thursday that it had warned the United States about the vulnerability of explosives stored at the installation.

The videotape shows a door of one of the Iraqi storage bunkers sealed with cable and a disk that resembles seals used by the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

If that is confirmed, it would mean that high-grade explosives monitored by the agency were still being stored at Al-Qaqaa on April 18, 2003, the day the video was shot. In January 2003, U.N. nuclear inspectors had placed fresh seals over the doors of storage bunkers that contained HMX.

David Albright, a former U.N. weapons inspector, said Thursday that he believes the explosives in the KSTP footage are HMX. He was in Iraq in the mid-1990s and is now president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington, D.C.

Inside the bunkers, the videotape showed boxes, plastic bags and drums of what appeared to be various munitions. "I could see that there were these cardboard kind of squarish boxes in the background, and that's how I remember HMX being stored," Albright told the Star Tribune.

Albright said he sought further confirmation with another former weapons inspector, whom he asked to review the tape. He declined to identify the colleague, but said he was at Al-Qaqaa during the last round of U.N. inspections. "He knows about these bunkers," Albright said. "He definitely was in these bunkers at various times."

His former colleague said that not only did the seal on the bunker in the video look like an IAEA seal but also that the inside of the bunkers "look just like I remember them when I was in there last."

Earlier this week, it was reported that 377 tons of high-grade munitions disappeared from the Al-Qaqaa complex. Exactly when the munitions disappeared has become a flashpoint in the presidential race, with questions lingering over whether the explosives disappeared before or after U.S. troops overthrew Saddam Hussein. Portions of the KSTP videotape were aired Wednesday night after Dean Staley, the reporter embedded with the 101st Airborne Division, recognized recent news photographs of the bunkers. "We didn't know what we had until the issue of the missing explosives came up," said Chris Berg, news director at KSTP. "At the time it was shot, Iraq's munitions weren't the news we were interested in."

The footage shows U.S. troops cutting into the bunkers with bolt cutters, inspecting various kinds of munitions and then leaving without securing the bunkers.

The TV report created a buzz on the Internet, and KSTP reported that its Web site had received 200,000 hits Thursday, a tenfold increase over a typical day.

The buzz was fueled in large part by liberal and partisan bloggers using it as ammunition against Bush.

On Thursday, the U.N.'s nuclear agency announced that U.S. officials had been warned about the vulnerability of explosives stored at Al-Qaqaa after another facility -- the country's main nuclear complex -- was looted in April 2003. The agency cautioned U.S. officials directly about Al-Qaqaa, the main storage facility in Iraq for high-grade explosives.

Iraqi officials say the explosives were taken amid looting some time after the fall of Baghdad on April 9, 2003, although the Pentagon and Bush have suggested the ordnance could have been moved before the United States invaded on March 20, 2003.

An IAEA official told the Associated Press that the high-grade explosives were stored in hundreds of heavy cardboard drums. A portion of KSTP's video shows similar drums, labeled "explosive" and filled with powdery material.

"We're not munitions experts, so nobody was sure what it was," said Joe Caffrey, the photographer who shot the video during a five-hour tour of the complex.

Caffrey and reporter Dean Staley had been embedded with an air assault battalion at a base 2 to 3 miles south of Al-Qaqaa. On April 18, two off-duty soldiers decided to drive up in their Humvee to take a look at the complex, and the journalists went with them.

"They were just going up there to look around, and we decided to tag along," Caffrey said.

They passed as many as 50 bunkers, some broken open and empty, others locked with chains and at least one with a seal resembling the kind used by the U.N.'s nuclear energy agency. The soldiers used bolt cutters to open about a half-dozen locked bunkers.

The soldiers were able to identify detonation cord, bombs and proximity fuses scattered on the ground. "I'm an air traffic controller, not a weapons expert," one soldier said on-camera as he poked through a box of explosives.

Some barrels and boxes were labeled "explosive" and one crate was stenciled with the words "AL QAQAA STATE ESTABLISHMENT."

The soldiers gathered some documents to pass to their superiors, but they took none of the munitions. "They didn't tell their officers anything about it," Caffrey said.

John Pike, who maintains an Internet Web site specializing in satellite imagery, GlobalSecurity.org, reviewed the station's video for the Star Tribune.

Using the video and global positioning system coordinates provided by Caffrey, Pike concluded that the KSTP journalists were at Al-Qaqaa. He said he reached that conclusion because the video shows igloo-like structures that are consistent with buildings at Al-Qaqaa and because the global satellite coordinates recorded by the film crew match where the complex is located.

Military officials with the 101st Airborne Division's 2nd Brigade, in Ft. Campbell, Ky., said Thursday they couldn't say for sure if the television crew had actually been at Al-Qaqaa.

"I don't know if it's the same place, but we did missions in that area," said Lt. Fred Wellman, deputy public affairs officer for the unit. "There were several facilities in that area that we dealt with."

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 12:10 AM

"But last year, NBC reported that when U.S. troops arrived at the site where the weapons supposedly were stored, no weapons were there to be found." I don[t know about NBC but there is video showing clearly that the materiels were there well after the war. (As though the war were over. Hmmph.)

"the fact that the report about the explosives really does not even help the Democratic presidential candidate."

This should really truly not be about what helps someone politically. It has a great deal more to do with competence, not to mention prioities.


"Well, the fact of the matter is, this cache of weapons makes the case for war. It doesn't make the case for John Kerry." These barrels of weapon gases were clearly marked and SEALED by the UN inspedtors.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: beardedbruce
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 12:21 AM

Ebbie:

Well, if they had UN seals on them, I guess they were harmless, and certainly could not have been used against us.... So what is the fuss if they are missing?

Oh, you think someone might actually take off the seal and USE it???


Not Iraqis- otherwise, the fact they had seals did not mean they were not still a clear and present danger. Saddam was supposed to DESTROY them.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 12:57 AM

They were under the control of the UN and being safely kept out of the hands of anyone except the UN inspectors until the US kicked the UN out of Iraq and took charge there. Then, instead of taking over the job the UN was doing in keeping them safe, it just... I can't even think of a word that adequately describes this sort of incompetence and total lack of responsiblity. It just blew them off.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: beardedbruce
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:05 AM

CarolC,

The UN was not keeping them out of anyone's hands. They put the seals on, then checked to see if they were still there at (long) intervals. IN NO WAY were they preventing the use of the items: They were just keeping track of IF they had been used.

But I agree: "I can't even think of a word that adequately describes this sort of incompetence and total lack of responsiblity." But I would apply it to the UN.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:05 AM

You are fool Bruce a fool!!

No they weren't a clear and present danger until the Iraqis walked in and looted, the next day, the next week or some other unspecified and unknowable time later. For want of a platoon of soldiers to guard the place, and five minutes of planning by Rumsfeld's staff, enough explosives to knock down 780,000 airliners or to make a couple of thousand IED's to blow up young Marines in their Humvees, went from US control into the hands of insurgents.

Saddam didn't screw up on April 18. Saddam was the enemy your asshole hero said was dangerous. How can you reward these clowns for their profounf incompetance by voting for them? Do you think they've had freaking BRAIN transplants between April 18 3003 and now.

Monday, this Monday, they were caught with their pants down. After eighteeen months they still not had checked on the bloddy explosives. They want to do and investigation now. I can tell them where the explosives went. US soldiers are going to find them a few pounds at a time after they are detonated!! Even now the only response they have is "Any man who jumps to conclusions without knowing all the evidence does not deserve to be president!" For once in they last four bloody years, Bush is right!

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Jack the Sailor
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:10 AM

Bruce,

Bush had a chance to secure the explosives and didn't. The US military had control of the sight and let it go. That's it. End of story.

While you are at it, why don't you blame France or Santa Claus Or the Easter Bunny. They had as much control of the explosives as the UN did.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Ebbie
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:13 AM

Saddam was supposed to DESTROY them. Uh uh,BB, these were/are CONVENTIONAL weapons. Except for one that could be utilized in bringing down aircraft and other nasties like that.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: CarolC
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:13 AM

beardedbruce, you can't possibly be as stupid as your last post to me looks. The materials were still there as long as the UN was in charge of them, and then, when the US was in charge of them, and not the UN, that's when they disappeared. You can't possibly hold the UN responsible for materials that remained where they were supposed to be while the UN was taking care of them, and that disappeared when the UN was no longer there and the US was in charge.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Nerd
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 01:54 AM

beardedbruce can do that, CarolC. he can blame the UN for anything and exonerate Bush for anything.

Subject: RE: BS: cbs planning new hatchet job on bush!!!
From: Metchosin
Date: 29 Oct 04 - 02:42 AM

Come on, lets get priorities straight here....the US did protect those precious oil wells, didn't they? What danger was there is some munitions dump? After all, the Iraqi people love being invaded by the US. Its solved so many problems for them.....