Unsurprisingly, I find the Belmont Club analysis of the Rathergate issue very good. See sections, "The End," and "The Truth Shall Set You Free." Of course, the links are worthy. He doesn’t think that CBS can maintain the truth of their story one day longer. Good paragraph:
"Viewed from this angle, it is easy to see the role the alternative media has played in the conservative movement. As a ’mouthpiece’ or ’propaganda organ’ the Internet is, as Stanely Kurtz points out, still largely inferior to the Mainstream Media. But as an organ of accurately understanding the world, it is vastly superior. This has allowed conservatives to outmaneuver liberals time and again, to understand, for example, that neither Afghanistan nor Iraq were Vietnam; to see that the United Nations was a sham, among other things. In many ways the Mainstream Media is a liability to the liberal cause, a profoundly effective way of deceiving themselves. The Killian memos are fakes. ’And that’s part of our world.’"
What does this CBS episode tell us about the MSM, given their markedly different handling of sworn affidavits by honorable men (the swift-vets) and those more interested in documents or other evidence that can be claimed not to depend on the reputation of individuals? To the point that people with questionable reputations and some (faked or not) documentation rank higher than those people (even a group of people) with no blemish but without a document... My sense is that all parties would be better served if they paid less attention to paper, and put their proponents in front of a camera and made their opinions and reputation visible to voters, who will make up their own minds. It appears that there are people who remember Mr. Bush as "privileged" during his service (they should stand up and recount their experiences). They could certainly take a visible position (perhaps even w/ sworn affidavits) similar to the swift-vets and be judged in the same way. Right, when the MSM says the swift-vets claims are "un-corroborated" I see red, since all we have for any of these 30 year old issues are what individuals will testify to, and stand on their honor and reputation. Assume the documents were all real, should it change anything given a lack of individuals (who were personally party the issue) willing to stand up and argue their position?
Actually, I wonder how this should affect our image of the "MSM." Shouldn’t we have expected them all to circle the wagons, falling in line behind CBS? Instead other media outlets have been reporting this story a great deal, and making CBS (which is, after all, a competitor) look worse in the process. Granted, it’s fair to ask whether this would have happened without the prodding of the blogosphere, but it still makes me suspicious of the long-held conservative view of a monolithic mass media.