January 15, 2005

Memogate: The Armstrong Williams Gamble

Here's an interesting take on the Armstrong Williams story and CBS's memogate scandal, from a person who has an, uh, interesting perspective:

In the opinion of this con-artist, one of the biggest scams perpetrated on the public in the last year was the CBS memo scandal, in which political partisans and the establishment media tried to get by with manufacturing a story to further their own ends. They did so consistent with an established BIAS and in conjunction with the Kerry campaign.

But they got caught. What did they do then, exactly what I would do, exactly what anyone above the age of three would naturally do, try to divert attention, point the finger at someone else’s wrongdoing. Hence, they resurrected a part of an old story, the Education Department & Ketchum Public Relations scandal.

Back in October, just after the CBS memo scandal was broken by bloggers, completely outside of the traditional media, the contract between Ketchum and The Education Department first came under scrutiny. It was the subject of widely publicized news reports in the traditional media .

Given the fact that the Freedom of Information Act had been invoked in relation to the Ketchum/Education Department contracts back in October, why did it take three months for the Armstrong Williams mess to come out? Because the elite media and their friends at the People for the American Way knew a storm was brewing over the CBS scandal. They held on to the Armstrong Williams story, sat on it, until it served a useful purpose for their associates in the established media at CBS. Through USA Today the story was disclosed a mere one business day before the CBS internal investigation was released, the timing for which media insiders surely knew quite well. By doing so they rationalized turning attention away from the CBS scandal.

Some will say I’m a paranoid. I answer I am just a con man who spotted a good scam going down.