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Why have we not heard a peep about Ra^thergate from Mary Mapes?

Mapes, a senior producer (one of CBS’s “most highly regarded,” according to Associated Press) for Dan Ra^ther, worked on the disastrous 60 Minutes II segment and obtained the dubious Killian docs, which were reportedly faxed from a Texas Kinko’s. Newsweek reported that Mapes met in Texas with retired Texas National Guardman Bill Burkett, who has a long history of disgruntled anti-Bush activism. (More good stuff/chock full o’ links on Burkett and the Kinko’s connection at The Politburo Diktat.)

There’s interesting background on Mapes at RatherBiased, Talon News, and Mudville Gazette. Random Nuclear Strikes has more, including insights from KVI talk show host John Carlson, who worked with Mapes in the Pacific Northwest in the early 1990s:

On Friday of last week, Seattle’s own John Carlson, of KVI 570 fame, got wind that Mary Mapes was involved in this latest crapfest [from] the MSM aimed at GWB.

Mapes is from the Seattle area and has worked in the local media. She worked at the same broadcasting station as Carlson did in the early 1990′s, and Carlson shared some anecdotal stories of having to deal with Mapes as a co-worker on a day to day basis.

Let’s just say that the stories weren’t pretty. But they were funny.

Mapes thought of Reagan and GHWB were evil incarnate and said so on several occasions. When confronted with evidence of a mistruth spoken during a water cooler debate or pertaining to a mistake she had made in reporting a story, her usual MO was to say “oh well” and walk away.

AnalogKid at Random Nuclear Strikes added:

I remember Mapes as a race baiting reporter who specialized in waiting until the local NAACP officials released a statement about police shootings and then start demanding what she called “justice” in her own special way.

Anywho, if she thought GHWB was evil incarnate, it isn’t a stretch to think that she’d go anywhere or do anything to kick evil’s son out of the White House…

Via Nexis, I see that Mapes was the lead CBS producer of another anti-G.W. Bush segment in April 2000, which highlighted the then-governor’s decision to refuse a delay in the execution of death-row inmate Jerry Lee Hogue. In an interview with the Dallas Morning News, by the way, Rather denied that the presidential campaign motivated that story.

I hesitate to say his campaign isn’t a factor at all, Mr. Rather said. But it certainly wasn’t a determining factor.

Uh-huh.

I found a few other items of interest as well. Mapes, as several bloggers and MSM stories have mentioned, was also the producer behind CBS’s Abu Ghraib expose. Back in those glory days, Mapes was all too happy to talk to the press about her role in producing blockbuster, Bush administration-undermining news segments. Here’s a link to Mapes’s May 3, 2004 appearance along with Seymour Hersh on the Charlie Rose show (which includes an audio file).

And here’s a laudatory Dallas Morning News article that appeared on May 7, 2004, headlined “Woman who helped break abuse story based in Dallas.” (The piece notes that Mapes is married to Dallas Morning News reporter Mark Wrolstad.) Recounting her Abu Ghraib scoop, Mapes exulted:

It’s turned into quite a whirlwind…I’ve never had a story that reverberated like this.

Hoo-boy. She can certainly say that again. But I have a feeling we won’t be seeing Mapes resurface in the media for quite some time…unless she takes the fall for Ra^thergate and launches her four-day Victim of the Vast Right Wing Pajama Conspiracy on the Today Show. Watch out for it.