Truth and the New York Times

[Draggingtree]

City Journal :

SCOTT W. JOHNSON

 

Truth and the New York Times

 

The paper of record shills for a movie that claims to exonerate Dan Rather—against all evidence.

 

October 12, 2015

The episode known as Rathergate represents one of the great journalistic frauds of our time. The scandal erupted from a 60 Minutes Wednesday segment rushed to air on the evening of September 8, 2004, in time to influence the approaching presidential election pitting George W. Bush against John Kerry, as it was clearly intended to do.

 

The segment consisted of two parts that didn’t quite fit together except in their antipathy to Bush. In the first part, based on an interview with the vice chairman of Kerry’s national finance committee, Dan Rather essentially claimed that political influence had been brought to bear to secure Bush’s admission to the Texas Air National Guard as an interceptor jet pilot in 1968.