Political Football

When I last spoke with Beauchamp in early November, he continued to stand by his stories. Unfortunately, the standards of this magazine require more than that. And, in light of the evidence available to us, after months of intensive re-reporting, we cannot be confident that the events in his pieces occurred in exactly the manner that he described them. Without that essential confidence, we cannot stand by these stories.

The paragraph above is what will “last words” from The New Republic Magazine, but never “famous last words” because many more will have read the lies before they read this – if they do. The damage has been done.

It took TNR 14 pages to explain why they “cannot stand by these stories”.

If you want to read that manifesto go here.

To very briefly summarize – in July The New Republic published a story from a soldier named Beauchamp who wrote about events in Iraq that were not favorable (some horribly ugly) focusing on US soldiers. As usual, bloggers, notably Michael Yon and Little Green Footballs and their readers, researched and reported on the story doubting major elements. As it turned out even though Beauchamp admited problems with the article himself, TNR would never admit any wrong doing. Until now.

Five months later they can’t deny it. But so what, they won… no one will remember this part of the story.

“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”

This was true when Mark Twain said it and truer now when the MSM reports whatever it wants to say and doesn’t verify it’s sources adequately. Media Bias at its horribly worst.

Here is a link to some documentation on this “story” on Little Green Footballs if you want to look through the entire sad story.

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