Dear Editor:
Once at the epicenter of investigative journalism the CBS program "60 Minutes" has stumbled badly twice in a month. The most recent miscue is the embarrassing airing of lies from a discredited source on Benghazi. This source was so bad that even Fox news initially refused to use him as he demanded money for his fake story. Yet once reported by CBS, Fox cited CBS as the gold standard and ran with outrage over the false events depicted. Sen. Lindsey Graham got on his high horse and basically made a fool out of himself on Fox saying the revelations would cause him to oppose all presidential appointments until the President came to terms with him.
A few weeks earlier "60 Minutes" aired a hit piece on the Social Security Disability program giving Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn a big stage to make blatantly false statements about the program. This followed a PBS Planet Money program that was aired earlier this year which made the same unsubstantiated claims about the disability program. Both programs alleged anyone could scam the system and rip off tax payers. Senator Coburn added his standard claim that the system was going broke.
It's a lie to say the program is going broke. The Planet Money segment was re-aired on "This American Life" where it so angered the last five Social Security commissioners that they made a joint statement denouncing the blatant errors in PBS the program.
Three of the commissioners were George Bush appointees. The fact is that America's SSA Disability program is the hardest to qualify for in the industrialized world according to the international OECD. After all levels of appeal no more than 40 percent of applicants are allowed. There are ongoing reviews of those who are allowed benefits.
It was the best and worst of times when Watergate happened to America. It was the golden age of journalism. Two rookie reporters followed a lead, published one story after another and finally brought down a president for his misdeeds.
Later in 2000 Bob Woodward wrote a book called "Shadow" to explain how Watergate had an impact on all later presidencies. But the most clarifying book of all was written by Arkansas journalist Gene Lyons who explained Watergate in his excellent "Fools for Scandal."
Yes our media are fools for scandal. After 50 years they chase after every potential "scandal" hoping to strike gold one more time.
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