THURSDAY'S LETTERS: Knight Ridder, 'Rathergate' and the Left's 'Big Lie'

By: E&P Staff To have your voice heard, send an e-mail to letters@editorandpublisher.com.

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Re: Knight Ridder Reporter Warns of Hostile Takeover -- with Political Twist?

Your piece was alarming, to say the least.
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Your article inspired me to write to you to tell you that I've just published a book, "Feet to the Fire: The Media After 9/11, Top Journalists Speak Out," which features interviews with 21 of this nation's best known and most accomplished reporters talking about their pre-war and war reporting.?The book is anchored by a section entitled "National Security and Intelligence" in which there are interviews with Barton Gellman and Walter Pincus of the Washington Post, David Martin of CBS, James Bamford and, of course, Knight Ridder's John Walcott, Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel.

KR's?Washington bureau triad of Walcott, Landay and Strobel have been, and continue to be, spectacularly good.?Virtually everyone else in the book (and they're all heavyhitters) pointed to these three as having done?by far the best pre-war work.?I also interviewed KR's?Middle East corrspondents, Tom Lasseter and Hannah Allam.?They too have?distinguished themselves by consistently delivering sterling reporting.

Kristina Borjesson

Ed's Note: For more on Lasseter, see our report from yesterday: "Knight Ridder's Tom Lasseter Offers Voice of Truth in Iraq."

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I just finished reading about the RNC takeover of PBS...and now this! Why aren't the Dems screaming about the media? Look at the situation with Ed Schultz and Armed Forces radio!

Where is George Soros or Al Gore?

I like your idea of selling off the papers to non-profits.

Good luck!

Diane Morris
Laguna Beach, Calif.

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Re: Greg Mitchell's latest Pressing Issues column, "Our Myth Brooks":

Attacking other writers...hapless...addled...this is journalism? Libby nor Rove revealed Plame's CIA position, no such indictment was made. Lying under oath is serious, but if you are making 80-100 phone calls a day, getting the sequence of events straight can be a problem. The really big lie in all this is the left and the media continually harping that we invaded Iraq without reason. But all our allies, and even the Germans and the French, believed that Iraq had WMDs. Pull the troops out, and then what, civil war, chaos, oil crisis, and then a giant world economic downturn. Not a good script.

Rob Pritchard

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Re: CBS' Mary Mapes, in 'Vanity Fair,' Defends Role in 'RatherGate'

Mary Mapes is correct in making the claim that there is a McCarthyesque aspect to the 60 Minutes story on George Bush National Guard service. But if anyone is acting like Gunner Joe McCarthy, it is Ms. Mapes. She is correct about one thing -- the independent investigation didn't answer the question of the authenticity of the documents. Perhaps we need a Special Council to investigate just who produced those documents. There is evidence to suggest that it emanated from the Travis Democratic Party and it was used as a part of a political smear campaign -- a campaign to smear President Bush.

In any event, it is unlawful to forge an official document. It is unlawful to engage in a conspiracy to disseminate such documents! I wonder why Ronnie Earle isn't going to a grand jury with an investigation! Perhaps it is because Ronnie Earle is also an official in the Travis Democratic Party!

Yes! Ms. Mapes, your story had all of the hallmarks of a Senator Joe McCarthy attack. The difference is that as bad as he was, there were communist spies in the State Department. Your story was part of an effort to defeat the re-election bid of President Bush!

H. Michael Sarkisian
Sacramento, Calif.