Some Kind of Weird Main Stream Media Strategery?

Or Is this just some kind of modern record for sustained media malfeasance?

No other industry operating in the public view could actually be this incompetent and/or malevolent and survive. Maybe this is part of some MSM grand design? A “strategery” to test the fact-checking limits of the blogosphere so that they may someday return to their roles as exclusive information gatekeepers?

Here's a roundup of the week so far:

PLAMEGATE & “THE LEAK”

April 6th

1. CNN breaks the news that President Bush authorized the Valerie Plame name leak.

2. Oops. No he didn’t. Sorry.

3. But President Bush authorized a ‘leak’ on other national security information!

April 7th

4. Democrats demand explanations concerning the White House involvement in the ‘leak’.

April 8th

5. Uh-oh, President Bush didn’t direct Libby to “leak” anything.

April 10th

6. Wait a minute! The President DID request that Libby perform the disclosure!

April 11th

7. OK. Well, so the President didn’t directly request Libby to disclose the information.

BUSH LOSING A KEY ALLY

11 April 2006

1. Newt Gingrich reverses position and says U.S. made "enormous mistake" in occupation!

2. Well actually, he said nothing of the kind.

SADDAM'S WMD BIOLAB WEAPONS TRAILERS

12 April 2006

1. Bush KNEW the trailers weren’t WMD labs two days before he gave a speech that said they were WMD labs!

2. Actually….NO.

JOE WILSON & NIGER YELLOWCAKE

9 April 2006

1. Bush Authorized the hyping of the Iraq-Nigerian Yellowcake story to discredit Joe Wilson

11 April 2006

2. Oops. The Special Prosecutor filed a correction. Seems there was no effort to hype the yellowcake story after all.

13 April 2006

3. NY Times issues a late and lame correction (Subscripton Required). Details here (5th Item)


THE NEXT NON-STORY?

14 April 2006 (Tonight)

Salon, perhaps best known lately for pimping Abu Ghraib photos in an effort stay afloat reports “Rumsfeld allowed Guantanamo Abuse”

But did he really? 8-10 paragraphs down we find:

Salon cites Lt. Gen. Randall M. Schmidt, an Army investigator, as saying in a sworn statement to the inspector general that “The secretary of defense is personally involved in the interrogation of one person.” Rumsfeld had weekly contact with Miller, according to Salon.

Schmidt is quoted under oath as saying he concluded that Rumsfeld did not specifically order the interrogation methods used on Kahtani, but that Rumsfeld’s approval of broad policies permitted abuses to take place.

Rumsfeld had approved 16 harsher interrogation tactics for use against Kahtani on Dec. 2, 2002, Salon reported. Strategies included the use of forced nudity and removing religious items. Rumsfeld has said publicly that none of these policies led to “inhumane” detainee treatment, Salon said.

It gets better. The very next paragraphs:

Jeffrey Gordon, a Pentagon spokesman, dismissed the report’s allegation that Rumsfeld or the agency condoned abuse.

“We’ve gone over this countless times and yet some still choose to print fiction versus facts,” he said by telephone.

“Twelve major reviews, to include one done by an independent panel, all confirm the Department of Defense did not have a policy that encouraged or condoned abuse. To suggest otherwise is simply false,” he said.

I can hardly wait to see the headlines tomorrow.

Hat tips: Byron York at NRO, Captain Ed, James Taranto at Best of the Web Today