McCain Falsely Claims The Surge ‘Began The Anbar Awakening,’ But CBS Doesn’t Air It»

[Joanne98]

During an interview with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), CBS Evening News host Katie Couric noted that Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) said recently that “there might have been improved security even without the surge” and asked McCain, “What’s your response to that?”

After first calling Obama’s claim “a false depiction of what actually happened,” McCain proceeded to falsely claim that the surge “began the Anbar awakening“:

McCAIN: I don’t know how you respond to something that is such a false depiction of what actually happened. Colonel McFarland was contacted by one of the major Sunni sheiks. Because of the surge we were able to go out and protect that sheik and others. And it began the Anbar awakening. I mean, that’s just a matter of history.

But in a puzzling move, the CBS Evening News did not actually televise McCain’s false claim tonight. As MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann reported, “CBS curiously, to say the least, left it on the edit room floor. It aired Katie Couric’s question, but in response, it inserted part of McCain’s answer to another question instead.”

CBS’s full interview with McCain (with video) appears online. CNN aired the portion that CBS edited out. Watch it:

http://thinkprogress.org/2008/07/22/mccain-anbar-history/

[AzDar]

1. CBS edits out the TRULY DANGEROUS evidence of McCain's

inability to either : grasp the accurate timeline of events regarding the 'surge'; OR his outright lie about same. Either way, it leaves them both (CBS 'News', and McCain)with ZERO credibility.

B-U-S-T-E-D...you assholes!

[deminks]

2. Side by side video at this link

showing the McShame gaffe which is in the online video, and the edited version without the gaffe that went on air.

http://www.jedreport.com/2008/07/video-of-the-mc.html

What CBS did is outrageous. I wonder if it is criminal in any way. One question is did they do this edit and insert a different answer to the same question with McShame's knowledge, or the knowledge of the campaign. I fear the erasing of emails has already started. Regardless, CBS has been caught manufacturing the news.

Do you hear that America? CBS has been caught manufacturing the news.

K&R

[mod mom]

3. Outrageous-thanks for the link.

[SoCalDem]

4. They want this war to mimic other wartime events..to draw parallels

Prague Spring, if they took the time to look it up, did not turn out well...Their "Anbar `Awakening" is a thinly veiled attempt to tie them together..as if there was a popular uprising.. There was NOT..

It's about MONEY.. We started paying the insurgents to stop shooting at us and we looked the other way as they enthically "cleansed" their own neighborhoods..

The second we quit paying them, they will be shooting at us again..

al Sadr & his guys just went on vacation.. He's smart enough to not want to waste his men's lives while we have "beefed up".. he's a patient man, and will re-group his forces when we stop paying , and when our troops start getting lazy, from the lack of shooting & killing..

al Sadr WILL be the next "real" leader and HE will be the one who controls the oil money..and he likes the Iranians..

Middle east people measure time in the thousands of years.. they will wait..

Right now, they are laughing their asses off at us..

[malaise]

5. Good to see this is getting coverage

and that there is video. KO broke this last night.

[Jim Lane]

6. CBS regains a tiny shred of credibility

CBS at least posted the full interview, including McCain's latest piece of idiocy, on its website: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/22/eveningnews/main4283813.shtml

Thus, CBS brings McCain's actual answer to a few of its viewers -- those who visit the website. Thus, the network isn't lying to all its viewers. It's lying to only, oh, I dunno, maybe 99.9% of them.

[Supersedeas]

8. but this hardly explains what CBS released in the first place...edited for McCain's benefit

[Supersedeas]

7. Katie probably doesn't make these decisions, but it happened on her watch and she needs to correct

the record

[ProgressiveFool]

9. wow, CBS just flushed the rest of her career down the toilet for her

She's really screwed. On the one hand, the right thing to do (assuming she did have nothing to do with the edit) is to denounce it and resign immediately. But then CBS would probably badmouth her in the industry, and besides, the other news corporations would probably see that as unforgiveable disloyalty, and not want to hire her as well.

And if she does nothing, she's complicit, and exposed as a manufactured journalist.

[redqueen]

10. Butbutbut... McShame & Lou Dobbs say the media are all for Obama.

How sad is it that there are people who will choose to believe those lies?