(Below is wild speculation because I can’t stand a mystery so I had to have a plausible explanation. Get a case of salt and enjoy the ride.)
Ok so Jeff Goldstien and Allah have been wrestling with the same problem with Burkett being the source. Clearly CBS would never take the word of a guy with known mental problems who has a grudge against Bush. So who was the “unimpeachable source” if not Burkett? (read both links above or at least Jeff’s if I lose you.) Jeff makes an interesting point but he does not explain the Kinkos connection. I think I can.
Consider what we know. (IOU links to original sources, I’m really too busy to type this.)
* One of the experts CBS hired told Newsweek that a producer told them they received the memo’s anonymously thru the mail.
* Another expert said they had Kinkos makings on them. These people have no real reason to lie.
* There has been a debate how long CBS was on the story. CBS said 6 weeks then later around Sept 1.
* Remember some of the CBS documents had markings on them, others didn’t. Leading people to believe CBS had marked them up after they got them.
* The producer (Mapes) got a tip a few weeks ago that she got permission to follow THEN got excited when she scored a few days before broadcast.
* CBS was damned sure they had Bush nailed. They must have had something. right? right?
I had a few more in my brain but I forgot while I was typing, I’ll update.
What would tie up ALL the loose ends?
Two sets of memos.
What if Mapes got them mailed to her anon from one source. She goes to CBS and says, “I think I got it” they give her permission to follow it up. She beats the streets then finally, another set up memos shows up from a second source. (Burkett via kinkos)
CBS would think they struck gold. They had it from 2 sources.
OK wild speculation and if I had more time, I’d fill in some more blanks. But it is the only thing that would explain everything in one swoop.
Of course it would open another whole set of questions.
Make no mistake, I’m not into conspiracy theories. That’s not what this is. There are a bunch of questions out there and this is the only thing that explains them all.
Am I right? Who knows. But I love a puzzle.
BTW I’d love for any information confirming this and I’d especially love someone who can shoot it down.
PS- If anyone needs me I’ll be checking paul at wizbangblog for a while. Mail to my regular domain may not be checked for a few more days.
I wouldn’t have thought receiving additional copies anonymously would have encouraged them any great deal.
They must have realized it would be possible to fly to some other part of the country, send a document, fly back home and then fax them in, thats even if you are going to the trouble of sending them from a different state.
My guess is that the whole ‘impeachable witness’ bit was just Rather being a blowhard about how good his source was, in order to hold off any questions about it.
– Col. Lively [TANG commander in the Bush era] went on FOX this morning and debunked every one of the claims in the “contents” of the fake memo’s…
– I personally think there was yet another higher up Dem/DNC voice in all this egging CBS on….
– “Deep paper” Burkette is a well known nutcase and Barnes is not above skull duggery as he has shown repeatedly in his checkered past….I think no matter how much Mapes was champing to pursue this CBS mucks insisted on additional concurance on authenticity and they got it…
– That would explain why they were so sure of the position they were in when the fraud first broke….So far everything is designed to not “out” whoever that official was….They have more or less rolled over on deep paper (Burkette) and Barnes….All this activity is a smoke screen…there has to be more…
Has anybody confirmed that the documents faxed from Kinkos was actually sent to CBS?
Is it possilbe that Burkett faxed them to somebody else from Kinkos, then that person mailed or delivered them to CBS?
It would be interesting if there was a way to get the phone logs to see what number the document was faxed to.
Kiliman
Not a bad explanation for CBS having two sets of docs. It’s also not bad at all to reason that, if CBS got the docs from two different sources, that they would then run with it and think the docs “unimpeachable”. Nice thinking Paul.
How can you “not [be] into conspiracy theories” and be attempting to determine who made/produced these documents and the timeline of how they made their way to CBS’ Dan Rather?
That is intellectually dishonest, to claim not to be into conspiracy theories, while talking about one you are debunking.
This was all planned.
You don’t accidentally create forged documents (no matter how poorly) by most likely a single “lone gunman” nutjob, and then somehow managed to get them to a major media outlet – that is actively and eagerly seeking such damaging documents at a time that the anointed candidate is floundering in the polls/public eye.
That just doesn’t happen, or it would have happened many times before especially in every prior election that Democrats had a stake in (okay maybe it does and the story is either debunked internally or other forces intervene).
Maybe it *has* happened as with Bush’s DUI “news” revealed a week before an election.
Or Al Gore having a plane load of lawyers sitting on a runway waiting to be dispatched where needed. With Al Gore in a limo on his way to give a concession speech and suddenly turning around and heading back to HQ to coordinate said lawyers to sway heavily Democratic counties in Florida. Also such an effort aided by a heavily Liberal state Supreme Court that literally created new laws from the bench explicitly favoring Al Gore over G. W. Bush.
Oh wait, more conspiracy theory-type stuff that you are not working to debunk, sorry.
Mapes lied to the document expert about getting them through the mail, because she didn’t want to admit she didn’t have the originals.
That is intellectually dishonest, to claim not to be into conspiracy theories, while talking about one you are debunking.
Neo, to be interested in debunking conspiracy theories is not the same as being “into” conspiracy theories.
According to Fox News’ Carl Cameron, the Kerry campaign was telling people that this 60 minutes airing was a must-see up to SEVERAL weeks in advance.
If CBS only got the documents from Burkett less than a week before, and Ben Barnes was ‘pressured’ (not sure where I read that) on the basis of the documents, then having two sets of documents sounds very plausible.
Combine that with the DNC’s ‘Operation Fortunate Son’ and it becomes much less a conspiracy theory than a real conspiracy.
Maybe we need a ‘Bloggers for Truth’…
Paul, I’ve laid out the two sets of documents theory in a post of mine from yesterday here.
Early on Rather clearly referred to sources, not a source, so this is consistent with that. Does anyone have access to early transcripts?