Tom Brokaw's defense of the Smear Vet coverage was idiotic.

[AP]

I heard him on the radio today. It was a rebroadcast of the New Yorker magazine conference over the weekend. I understand CSPAN covered this event.

After Rather and Jennings admitted the media gave outright fabrications too much coverage, Brokaw chimed in. He said (1) one of the Smear Vets walked down the street with him at the RNC waving pages of papers at him supporting their claims, and (2) "What about the lies in F 911 -- that got a lot of coverage too."

OK, so about #1, I have questions and comments: Why does a Smear Vet have such incredible access to Brokaw? I wish I could walk down the street with Brokaw and tell him what I thought about the media and about current events. Also, doesn't Brokaw appreciate the allusion to McCarthyism he just described? Also, why does he feel the need to suggest that they weren't lying and that they honestly believe the smears? Thanks, Tom, for rehabilitating their credibility after Jennings and Rather just said they had none.

About #2, WHAT LIES IN F911? Furthermore, what the hell does Brokaw thing the role of the media is today? To offer RW balance to whatever there might be out there that is left wing? Does he think his job is to spread lies or be half-assed about reporting facts just because there might be some bit of info out there that he doesn't like?

What an outrageous asshole. I'm ashamed for the New Yorker readers in the audience who applauded these two points.

[russian33]

1. See how that works..facts in F9/11 with pages of proof, are lies...

..Lies from SwiftBoat liars with pages of 'proof' are true.

[KharmaTrain]

2. Brokaw Ran Into Them At The RNC

Remember, Ben Ginsburg, the Slimeboat lawyer is now a paid "anal-ist" for MSGOP.

He was covering the convention while most of this shit was swirling and had a solid week of nonstop elbow rubbing with the right wing assholes.

I saw the C-SPAN showing and strongly recommend all to watch it. Rather was excellent and stood firm on his story and how he was slimed.

Remember, Brokaw operates out of New York...not inside the Beltway and doesn't have the contacts with the party hacks on a regular basis...that's Timmy Russert's job (and he does is soo very well). I could understand Brokaw getting inundated with this crap during the RNC and at the time just wondering WTF.

It sounded like he regretted both the amount of coverage these asshoels got and the hosing Rather has and is still taking. But, above all, he looks like a guy on the way out...not wanting to make any waves...take the gold watch and head off to into the Cronkite sunset.

[DURHAM D]

3. Don't forget - he really believes the WWII generation was

the greatest generation. You know, the group that has national health care and does not want the rest of the country (the workers paying their medical bills for them) to have it. I could list many more entitlements that you and I are paying for for that generation has received that we will never get.

Meanwhile my own parents have not one but two retirement homes. The one good thing - at least my parents know I paid for them. Unfortunately, none of their friends get it.

[girl gone mad]

4. All of the SCLM..

believes it is their duty to present "balance" rather than facts. If they percieve the truth to be biased, they'll report the spin as truth instead.

[Xenus Sister]

5. The truth is not left-wing

Fuck Brokaw.

[tishaLA]

6. The more important thing, IMHO is this

F911 was not a political ad; it was a film. The critique the member of the audience addressed was that the nightly news kept re-airing the ad and making it a story when there was no money to keep it on the air. It became a self-fulfilling prophesy and it was never investigated until several weeks after they had given it a good portion of attention.

This isn't about cable news, either, because they can be forgiven in certain ways for laziness because they have so much time to fill up. The nightly news has ~22 minutes a night to fill and it wasted TONS of time airing this ad and talking about its implications before it bothered to look into its veracity.

[indepat]

7. May a pox light upon Brokaw and all those of his ilk