60 Minutes Benghazi Report Takes A Huge Credibility Hit

[RockaFowler]

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/11/01/60-minutes-benghazi-report-takes-a-huge-credibi/196705

The Benghazi "witness" featured in a CBS 60 Minutes report that galvanized new discussion of the administration's response to the attack previously said he never got near the diplomatic compound on the night of the attack, according to a report from The Washington Post.

The revelation comes just days after Fox News reported that they had previously been using the same man as a source, but broke contact after he asked the network for money. Two days after the CBS report aired, Threshold Editions, an imprint of Simon and Schuster that "specializes in conservative non-fiction," published the supposed witness' book, The Embassy House: The Explosive Eyewitness Account of the Libyan Embassy Siege by the Soldier Who Was There. According to the Post, the book "largely comports with the 60 Minutes account."

Together, these details paint a damning picture of the credibility of the supposed eyewitness -- and that of the CBS report which promoted his story.


And yes people should be fired for reporting this non-story. I still remember what happened to Dan Rather - and he told the truth!!

[kysrsoze]

1. I'm really surprised this story wasn't reported by Steve Kroft, who is so obviously a hack

I'm even more surprised CBS still stands by this steaming pile of "journalism." I thought Lara Logan was actually a decent reporter, but they obviously didn't follow-up on this asshole's background and credibility at all. What a joke. I'm now deleting 60 Minutes from my DVR recording list.

[deminks]

2. The so called witness never got near the compound that night

(snip)

But according to the Post, "Jones," whose real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies, revealed none of those details in the incident report to his security contractor employer that he wrote following the attack. Instead, he wrote that he never got near the compound that night and learned of Stevens' death from a colleague. From the Post:

In Davies's 21 / 2-page incident report to Blue Mountain, the Britain-based contractor hired by the State Department to handle perimeter security at the compound, he wrote that he spent most of that night at his Benghazi beach-side villa. Although he attempted to get to the compound, he wrote in the report, "we could not get anywhere near .  . . as roadblocks had been set up."

He learned of Stevens's death, Davies wrote, when a Libyan colleague who had been at the hospital came to the villa to show him a cellphone picture of the ambassador's blackened corpse. Davies wrote that he visited the still-smoking compound the next day to view and photograph the destruction.

(end snip)

and there is this:

(snip)

The 60 Minutes report, which also attempted to revive the long-answered "lingering question" about why no U.S. military forces from outside Libya came to the aid of Americans in the compound, was widely praised by conservative media and received 47 minutes of coverage on Fox News the day after it aired. In response to the CBS segment, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said he would block the confirmations of all administration nominees until Benghazi witnesses testify to Congress.

(end snip)

If the GOPers can't find the scandal they need, they manufacture one. So, where are the calls for GOPer heads? for MEdia heads?

[Blue_Tires]

3. kick

[spanone]

4. yet the story ran and people 'believe' 60 minutes. that's our media in a nutshell.

[Berlum]

5. He wanted money for telling his "story"? Had to be a Repubulicon

Do the math.

Figures that the pointless & hypocritical Benghazi blather is arising from a Republicon grasping after cashmoneybucks.

[mikeysnot]

10. Follow the money to the "Gate"

Troopergate
PaulaJonesgate
Filegate
Monicagate.

They all wanted money for their lies...

[Berlum]

12. Lying for money is a republican tradition by now

...and they wonder why Americans no longer trust them.

[Atman]

6. So where are all the Dan Rather haters?

I thought they all hated CBS anyway. Why should anyone be surprised that CBS used a bad source, right GOP?

[Auntie Bush]

7. FOX "News" is pure propaganda! I watched 60 Min

with some visiting Rethug family members. I was appalled by that program as it gave my relatives a chance to say, "Told you so". We had just been discussing Benghazi and I said Rethugs were making a mountain out of a mole hill. Then to watch that program...embarrassing!
Now they are not here to see they were wrong...again!

[meegbear]

8. Credibility, Schmedibility!!

It's all in the ratings.

[bullwinkle428]

9. Witness = Curveball v2.0

[DallasNE]

11. 60 Minutes Used To Be Must Watch TV

Indeed, it was the top rated show on television. But that was a long time ago. The topics they covered changed and were less interesting. By the time of the Dan Rather report on Bush's National Guard service I rarely watched it and in fact that episode is the last time I watched 60 Minutes. The accuracy in media issue is a serious one and has been with us for several years now. Meet The Press is the new poster boy for this. And the selection of guests on Sunday talk has had a strong Republican bias for at least a decade. David Gregory, Jonathan Karl and Chuck Todd stand out as openly partisan hacks, along with all of Fox News. Junk reporting is a fact of life and I don't expect anything to change in that regard any time soon, sadly.

[SleeplessinSoCal]

13. "specializes in conservative non-fiction,"

KEEP AN EYE OUT . . . . . Threshold Editions, an imprint of Simon and Schuster, specializes in a brand new genre:

"conservative non-fiction".

[deminks]

14. Not very much written in that genre, I would guess.

I wait for the first work with anticipation. /sarcasm off.

[madinmaryland]

15. Isn't that an oxymoron? Or maybe it's just a Moran!

[lastlib]

21. It's an OxyContin-Moran!

[Jackpine Radical]

37. That would be the aptly named "Rush," no?

[JHB]

28. About Threshold Editions

http://imprints.simonandschuster.biz/threshold

Threshold Editions is an imprint of Simon & Schuster that specializes in conservative non-fiction. Recent successes include #1 New York Times bestsellers Liberty and Tyranny by Mark Levin, An Inconvenient Book by Glenn Beck, and The Obama Nation by Jerome R. Corsi, Ph.D.

Authors include Glenn Beck, Karl Rove, Jerome R. Corsi, Mark R. Levin, David Kupelian, Lynne Cheney, Arthur B. Laffer, Mary Cheney, Jerry Doyle, Reid Buckley, Brian Jennings, George Melloan, Burton W. Folsom, and Stephen Moore.

And on http://www.matalin.info/

In addition to her successful careers in politics, television, and radio, (Mary) Matalin is also a widely read, respected and acclaimed author and serves as Editor at Large for Threshold Editions, a conservative publishing imprint at Simon & Schuster that has published authors from Vice President Dick Cheney to Karl Rove to Glenn Beck.

[frylock]

32. otherwise known as fiction

[MADem]

38. I always thought that was called "fiction" to everyone save conservatives.... nt

[SleeplessinSoCal]

41. It's "Orwellian", or as it should be renamed "ReRepublican" n/t

[deminks]

16. According to the Post story, GOPers have had this incident report for months.

http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2013/11/yet-another-benghazi-story-falls-apart

So, why does Lindsay Graham, R-Woo, now use this new fabricated account to base his decision to block Obama's nominees? Hmm? He must have known about the incident report with a totally different story for months now? Hmmm?

[Iliyah]

17. K & R

Issa and his group of goons had witnesses testify in person who were in another country and the corporate media assured their credibility for a na-no second.

What the GOPers are good at is propaganda. Get the BS out there in the main stream media and lets see where the shit hits.

[NealK]

18. WTF? I don't get what the fuss is about, this is ridiculous.

13 Benghazis That Occurred on Bush's Watch Without a Peep from Fox News.

"The Benghazi attacks (the consulate and the CIA compound) are absolutely not unprecedented even though they're being treated that way by Republicans who are deliberately ignoring anything that happened prior to Inauguration Day, January 20, 2009."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bob-cesca/13-benghazis-that-occurre_b_3246847.html

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

19. Woops

Looks like they stepped into that one. [URL=http://www.sherv.net/emoticons.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]

[deminks]

20. What was the security supervisor doing at a beachside villa the night of the attack?

if, you know, everyone was so concerned about AQ in the area and Obama wasn't helping them? /sarcasm off

[politicaljunkie41910]

22. Thanks for posting this. I was very busy yesterday and missed this story. I'm wondering why no one

mentioned it on Morning Joe this a.m.

I recall watching the episode and thinking that his story sounds incredible based on other reports I had read. Now we know it's a complete fabrication. Also the guy is now in the hospital. Such incredible bullshit that gets aired with no fact checking being done. CBS should be ashamed and needs to answer for this.

[7962]

23. So Fox dropped him and CBS picked him up? Fox gets to look like the ethical one with this guy.

You'd think CBS wouldve looked into his backround. And I wonder if they paid him, since he wanted money from FOX.

[benld74]

24. 60 minutes reminds me of Face The Nation at times,,,,,,

[SaveAmerica]

25. We need to find evidence to connect Cheney and KRove to Benghazi

I posted here at DU in the minutes after that 60 minutes episode aired how fishy the timing was with Cheney's comments about Benghazi and the smear campaign that started on social media immediately after the show aired.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023933590

The night that Benhazi happened Rove was interviewed somewhere and he said they had wanted to wait to make comments because it was almost 9/11 in the US and they didn't want to disrespect the memory of that event. His comments were so suspect and Romney's weird statement before any solid information was able to come out was just too strange and convenient.

I'm sorry, I don't have a link - I watched it somewhere as it was happening but don't remember the source. My husband is a channel surfer who goes from station to station during events like that but I imagine it was Fox. I've searched many times for any footage of Rove on Fox news in the early minutes of the news of the attack but I have never been able to find anything.

I just have a feeling that Benghazi would have been very easy for someone with Cheney's connections to orchestrate and then he'd try to use it to keep Obama from being reelected. That didn't work so now its purpose is to drive a nail into any thoughts of H. Clinton running for office.

[deminks]

26. David Brock Calls On CBS To Retract Faulty Benghazi Story

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2013/11/01/david-brock-calls-on-cbs-to-retract-faulty-beng/196716

Mr. Jeff Fager

Chairman, CBS News

Mr. David Rhodes

President, CBS News

Greetings,

I am writing to express my concern about a 60 Minutes segment on the attacks on U.S. diplomatic facilities in Benghazi that CBS aired on October 27. As Media Matters for America noted earlier in the week, the segment revived long-answered questions about the attack and, even more troubling, a Fox News correspondent said that he had spoken to one of the witnesses interviewed "a number of times" about the attacks but stopped after the man "asked for money."

Today, The Washington Post revealed that the very same witness previously said he never got near the diplomatic compound the night of the attack. This completely contradicts what was reported on air by correspondent Lara Logan, who said that during the attack, the witness "scaled the twelve-foot high wall of the compound that was still overrun with al Qaeda fighters." In the interview, the witness told Logan he had personally struck one of those terrorists in the face with his rifle butt and, following the attack, he went to the Benghazi hospital and saw Ambassador Chris Stevens' body.

(snip)

A network spokesman told the Post, 'We stand firmly by the story we broadcast last Sunday." This is not sufficient. When questions were raised about documents involving President George W. Bush's service in the Air National Guard, CBS appointed an independent panel "to help determine what errors occurred in the preparation of the report and what actions need to be taken." Similar standards must be applied in this case.

(end snip)

[Tarheel_Dem]

29. Thanks for posting this. nt

[RockaFowler]

31. Good for David Brock

This story and the horrible story about people on Disability make me physically ill about 60 Minutes. It used to be a reputable source for honest reporting. Mike Wallace and Don Hewitt are gone and the show has lost all credibility. Just disgusting in my book!

[Democrats_win]

27. Breaking: CBS to fire Dan Rather for Benghazi report.

I wonder if, in standing by their report, they can smell the BS.

[Rex]

30. CBS is just another propagnada outlet for the 1%.

FUCK anyone that would fire Dan Rather for political reasons!

[Tx4obama]

33. ... the man identified in the report as Morgan Jones... real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies...

Media Matters Founder Calling on 60 Minutes to Retract Report on Benghazi

60 Minutes did a new, in-depth report on the attack at the American consulate in Benghazi last year, and it helped to revitalize the national debate over the attack. CBS’s report featured an exclusive with a man who recounted what he witnessed, but Media Matters founder David Brock is calling on 60 Minutes to retract the report for a big error.

The key criticism here surrounds the man identified in the report as Morgan Jones (though his real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies afterwards). He told 60 Minutes he was witness to the attack, and described what he saw around him, but a Washington Post report on Thursday says that does not match his earlier testimony on the matter, just three days after the attack on the compound.

In Davies’s 21 / 2-page incident report to Blue Mountain, the Britain-based contractor hired by the State Department to handle perimeter security at the compound, he wrote that he spent most of that night at his Benghazi beach-side villa. Although he attempted to get to the compound, he wrote in the report, “we could not get anywhere near . . . as roadblocks had been set up.”

He learned of Stevens’s death, Davies wrote, when a Libyan colleague who had been at the hospital came to the villa to show him a cellphone picture of the ambassador’s blackened corpse. Davies wrote that he visited the still-smoking compound the next day to view and photograph the destruction.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/media-matters-founder-calling-on-60-minutes-to-retract-report-on-benghazi/

[JDPriestly]

34. This individual needs to be interviewed on TV.

The story is very strange. Maybe there is more than has been discovered thus far. .

He needs to answer questions in public. Otherwise why should anyone believe any of his stories?

[Uncle Joe]

35. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, RockaFowler.

[SunSeeker]

36. K & R

[SHRED]

39. 60 Minutes is 1 hour you'll never get back

[DeSwiss]

40. CBS no longer requires the level of credibility that it once had.....

...since most of the ''news'' today is manufactured pap anyway. Hell, even Greta Van Whatshername pwned these suckers.

- You know it must chap the collective CBS ass to have Faux News (and Xenu-follower) showing them up for the frauds that they are.....

K&R

But food stamps take a cut.....

[blkmusclmachine]

42. .

.

[Enthusiast]

43. The media is no longer interested in the truth.

Isn't this clear?

[ReRe]

44. You know....

K&R

60 Minutes is one show I never watch, let alone anything else on CBS (unless it's a local basketball game!)
A boot to the head of CBS' 60 Minutes.

[frog64]

45. Hllary

This ought to help Hill. She needs it right now.

[magical thyme]

46. 60 Minutes lost me when they rail-roaded Dan Rather. I haven't watched them since.

Better things to do with my time than watch right-wing schills try to manufacture outrage by made up stories and outright in-your-face lies, all while protecting war criminals.