Dick Thornburgh (PNAC'er) investigating CBS

[IkeWarnedUs]

Dan Rather just announced that the "Independent Review Panel" that will investigate the infamous documents will include Dick Thornburgh and Louis D. Boccardi.

They describe Dick Thornburgh as Attorney General under Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush and former Governor of Pennsylvania. That is not much of a bio. He seems to have started his career (in the 60's) as a moderate Independent, but soon joined up with the Republicans, but not with the neo-cons.

A bio from a reveiw of a book he wrote said this:

"In 1964, frustrated that the radical right threatened to take over the Republican Party--to its detriment--Thornburgh, then a lawyer in downtown Pittsburgh, began complaining to anyone who would listen about the problems with the GOP. When finally challenged to do something about it, he set out on a course that would ultimately take him to the highest corridors of power in the United States."

In the mid 90's Karl Rove sued Thornburgh (and won) for $200,000 in unpaid fees from Thornburgh's 1990 campaign for PA governor.

He seems to have gotten over that. On November 20, 2000 he appeared on Larry King as an advisor to the Bush/Cheney campaign to discuss the election.

Thornburgh is now also a member of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). He, along with William Kristol, authored a letter to President Bush about Hong Kong on November 25, 2002 and a Statement in Support of the People of Hong Kong on June 29, 2004. He is the Chairman of The U.S. Committee for Hong Kong, which co-sponsored the letter and statement and has worked closely with PNAC to push for democracy in Hong Kong.

And if you want some really juicy dirt on just how muddy Thornburgh is, check out this article on OnlineJournal.com about his involvement in illegal sales to Iraq when he was Attorney General in the 80's.

http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/Chin111402/chin111402.html


Now, let's see what Louis D. Boccardi is all about.

[Artemis Bunyon]

1. Great work!

This just gets curiouser and curiouser.

[alittlelark]

2. Sounds like CBS wants to get rid of Rather

and 60 Minutes, and real news if they allow this PNACer on their 'independant review panel'x(

[acmavm]

3. There's a lot of people in this country who are being stupid and looking

at this the wrong way. The first thing that should pop into everyone's minds is, 'hey, this stuff is true'. Screw the reliability of those memos.

And if they are proven to have been planted by the bush* cabal of liars, killers, and thieves, than they all should be tried in a court room in this country, not the Hague. There is no way that that homely, sweaty, nasty minded cretin that likes to parade around and call himself pResident doesn't know about all of this. He's in it right up to his neck.

When in the hell is anyone going to start pounding it into the heads of the parent's in this country that this bunch of chicken shit cowards are going to send their children to war, maybe even unto their deaths, all for money and power? And that their fearless leader is a coward of the worst type.

That frigging beheading video that I saw tonight (accidentally) has me completely unhinged.

[creeksneakers2]

4. Odds are

Thornburgh will use his new position to create stories that point suspicion toward the Democrats as the source of the memos. Thornburgh is highly partisan.

Whenever the left gets investigated, the right insists that it must be done by a RW so there is no fox guarding the hen house situation. Whenever the right gets investigated, the right insists that they be investigated by a RW, so there won't be a partisan witch hunt against them. They seem to win every time, somehow.

[IkeWarnedUs]

5. Louis D. Boccardi

Seems like a good guy. There are lots of instances where he stood up to defend the First Amendment and the press' right to do their job. He may be strong enough to stand up to Thornburgh. Here's a couple of examples:

In testimony on Election Night 2000 Coverage by the Networks before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on February 14, 2001 Mr. Boccardi said this:

<snip>

The Associated Press first wants to place on the record its deep concern about the nature and scope of the Committee's inquiry into decisions made by journalists in the course of gathering and reporting the news.
Chairman Tauzin has stated in correspondence with executives of Voter News Service and the networks that there are "potential First Amendment issues raised by the nature of this inquiry." We agree with the Chairman's assessment. There certainly are.
AP has serious doubts that the Committee and its staff, no matter how sensitive they may be, can avoid crossing the line between appropriate government concern with the electoral process itself and, on the other hand, inappropriate government involvement with the reporting on that process by a free press.
To put it more plainly, we believe that such an official government inquiry into essentially editorial matters is inconsistent with the First Amendment values that are fundamental to our society. That is said with conviction, but without disrespect to the important role -- important but critically different from that of the media -- played by both legislative and executive branches of government.
I respect you. As a citizen, I benefit from what you do. But your job is different from mine, and a hearing such as this one confuses the two.
We agree that there were serious shortcomings -- call them terrible mistakes -- in the election reporting of November 7 and 8 and that these mistakes cannot be allowed to happen again.
But fixing them is a job for the nation's editors and news directors, not its legislators.
What we report and when we report it are matters between us and the audience we try to serve, not matters between us and our Congressman.

Link: http://energycommerce.house.gov/107/hearings/02142001Hearing216/Boccardi326.htm

He was given the Zenger Award in April 2001:

<snip>

The Zenger Award, sponsored by the University of Arizona Journalism Department and the Arizona Newspapers Association Foundation, was given to Boccardi and the AP to recognize their ongoing efforts during the past decade to support access to government records.

Boccardi, president and CEO since 1985, has been a news industry leader on critical First Amendment issues and matters involving press credibility. He has guided the AP’s leadership in several states to audit the opportunity of citizens to view records intended to be public.

The university’s journalism faculty decided to honor Boccardi and the AP for its work on government records access audits.

The award was the 46th since it was started in 1954. Past recipients include Walter Cronkite; Wes Gallagher, former president and general manager of the AP, Katharine Graham of the Washington Post and former television news executive Fred Friendly.

Link: http://www.communitypapers.com/ANAGRAMS/myarticles.asp?S=409&PubID=2713&P=367854

[gauguin57]

6. Thornburgh! Jesus!

Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse!

[IkeWarnedUs]

7. My point exactly

This is like appointing Kissinger to the "Independent" 911 Commission.

At least Boccardi seems to be an independent defender of a free press. Or rather, I found lots of evidence to this and I haven't found any evidence to the contrary.

[George_S]

8. Maybe they know...

... it will lead to a vast, right-wing conspiracy and think they have to have someone in there the repubs will believe?

[IkeWarnedUs]

15. I understand your theory George S

In theory it makes sense to have a representative from one point of view and another rep from another point of view. A couple of problems with that approach.

The first is the assumption that there are two oposing points of view - a gross oversimplification I will address in a moment.

What is it we are looking to this "Independent Review Panel" for? The truth. That's what all of these "Independent" commissions are supposed to be doing. Find out the truth about ___________.

What are the two different points of view on that? One would be to find out the truth and report it to the American people. The oposing point of view would be to hide the truth and report another story to satisfy the commission's requirements - right?

Who is on which side? We have allowed ourselves to be divided into two camps. Call them what you will - Liberal vs. Conservative, Left vs. Right, Democrat vs. Republican, sane human being vs. neo-con - whatever. We say they are lying and they say we are.

"They" are much better at this than "We" are. They've been at it a long time.

It is one of a number of perfect covers when the truth is finally being revealed. Make people believe everyone lies and they will assume the truth tellers are lying.

I haven't found any evidence that Boccardi is connected with the Democratic party. In fact, everything I read is that he made a point of remaining neutral and reporting on the candidates, not spinning for them.

Why can't we expect THAT from members of an Independent Commission?

Either that or quit calling them Independent.

[Andromeda]

9. Good find!

I've never like or trusted Thornburgh and I don't know much about him except that he's a former U.S. Attorney General and a Republican. He was alway on CNN bashing Bill Clinton during the impeachment trials.

I wonder if he's related to Kenny Starr? At the very least I'm sure they're kindred souls.

[area51]

10. Dick Thornburgh's past

Isn't Dick Thornburgh the one who okayed the bombing of the MOVE people in Philly in the '80s? Maybe it's Thornburgh who needs some investigating.

[creeksneakers2]

11. Philadelphia Mayor Wilson Goode bombed the move people

Thornburgh was governor here in PA. I can't remember any outstanding scandals while he was here. He looked much more partisan when he became AG.

[KoKo]

12. Kick!

:kick:

[starroute]

13. Thornburgh helped squash investigations of BCCI and Silverado

http://discuss.50plus.com/ubb/Forum45/HTML/000884.html

"One link between Bush, Saddam, and Iran-Contra was the corrupt Middle Eastern bank, the Bank of Commerce and Credit International (BCCI). BCCI, it turns out, laundered drug money, financed CIA and Mossad covert operations, and helped Bush, Saddam, and others split over $250 billion in extortion from the sale of Persian Gulf oil. (BCCI also might have had links to the corrupt drug-money-laundering-and-CIA scandals involving Australia's Nugan Hand Bank.) Attorney General Richard Thornburgh squashed an investigation into First American Bankshares, secretly controlled by BCCI, in October 1990; and William von Raab, former U.S. customs official, was fired by Treasury Secretary Nicholas Brady for delving too deeply into BCCI. This may have a lot to do with the links between Prescott Bush, First American director Stephens, Bahrain, and Iraq."


http://www.atforumz.com/archive/index.php/t-220447.html

"While the national news media pretended that President Bush was remaining neutral after the news of his son's multiple conflicts of interest finally were given national notice, political meddling was obvious from the start. Secretary of the Treasury Nicholas F. Brady is a longtime close friend of President Bush. The man Brady and Bush hand-picked to be director of the Office of Thrift Supervision and who imposed the mildest possible penalty on the president's son was T. Timothy Ryan Jr., who served in the Bush presidential campaign in 1988 and whose appointment to head the OTS was pushed through despite intense congressional opposition.

<snip>

"Shortly before the 1988 election, when the regulators wanted to close Silverado, a call came from Washington to delay that action for 45 days—until after election day. After George Bush was elected, an order was issued to close the bank. A Treasury Department request to the FBI a year ago for an investigation of White House pressure on federal regulators to delay closing Silverado until after the election received no attention from the president's good friend, Attorney General Dick Thornburgh (whom the voters of Pennsylvania last month temporarily removed from public office once they could get their votes on him)."

[IkeWarnedUs]

14. I shouldn't be suprised

The OnlineJournal.com article in my opening post was my introduction to Thornburgh's involvement with Iran/Contra. If he was involved in Iran/Contra, he had to be a part of the BCCI affair - if not as a direct player, then certainly as cover by virtue of his position as US Attorney General.

[IkeWarnedUs]

16. I'm watching Countdown now (replay)

#4 - Thornburgh may have a grudge against CBS and against Karl Rove. Do the two conflicts of interest make him neutral?

(I think I am going to be sick)

It turns out in 1989, as Attorney General of the United States, Thornburgh publicly branded CBS "Unfair" because they reported a leak that a Philladelphia congressman was under investigation. Thornburgh's office spent $2,5000,000 to find out who leaked the story and a top aide quit and two more had to be demoted over it.

Then Keith talked about Thornburgh being sued by Rove (see opening post). When asked about the suit today, Thornburgh said "That was business, not personal." When the reporter pointed out it was a personal law suit, Thornburgh said, "Yes, but the issues weren't personal. I know Karl well."

Olberman doesn't argue that the two "conflicts" cancel each other out, but you can see that will be the spin.