Commission to Investigate Source of Memos-Burkett Admits Lies [View All]

[BlueNomad]

CBS: Bush documents can't be verified
'We shouldn't have used them,' executive states
MSNBC staff and news service reports

Updated: 12:45 p.m. ET Sept. 20, 2004

NEW YORK - CBS on Monday said it cannot vouch for the authenticity of documents used to support a "60 Minutes" story about President Bush's Vietnam-era National Guard service after several experts denounced them as fakes

The network said that while it was "deliberately misled," it was wrong to go on the air with a story that it could not substantiate.
"Based on what we know now, CBS News can't prove the documents are authentic," CBS President Andrew Heyward said in a statement. "We shouldn't have used them. That was a mistake, which we deeply regret. Nothing is more important to us than our credibility and keeping faith with the millions of people who count on us for fair, accurate, reliable and independent reporting. We will continue to work tirelessly to be worthy of that trust."
....

CBS said Burkett, a retired National Guard lieutenant colonel, had provided the documents. In a press release accompanying Heyward's statement, CBS said that Burkett "also admits that he deliberately misled the CBS News producer working on the report, giving her a false account of the documents' origins to protect a promise of confidentiality to the actual source."...

Independent review coming
CBS also said it was commissioning an independent review of the incident, and will announce the names of the people conducting the review shortly....


<http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6055248/>