‘Truth’? Try Lies and Distortion

The truth-in-advertising folks will likely have a field day with Robert Redford’s newest film.

“Truth” revisits RatherGate, the journalistic imbroglio that stained the career of veteran CBS newsman Dan Rather. The anchor famously accused President George W. Bush of shirking his duties with the National Guard in the early 1970s during a “60 Minutes II” piece that aired at a critical point in the 2004 presidential campaign.

Rather eventually lost his CBS anchor slot and his professional stock tumbled.

Rather’s report, based on documents that were swiftly debunked as frauds, suggested Bush family friends played up his National Guard service and that Bush himself skipped an important physical exam.

Rather eventually lost his CBS anchor slot, his professional stock tumbling as a result. His producer, Mary Mapes, got canned, too. And that, more or less, was that. Disgraced, they slunk away.

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Except that the new film, which debuted to a standing ovation Saturday at the Toronto Film Festival, appears to blame a vast right-wing conspiracy for Rather’s fall.

Redford plays Rather in the film, while Oscar-winner Cate Blanchett portrays Mapes. “Truth” is set for an Oct. 16 limited release, but early media accounts of the film paint a rather obvious picture.

“The clear suggestion in the movie is that Rather and Mapes were fired to appease the Bush White House and to protect the CBS financial bottom line,” according to The Hollywood Reporter.

“And in the end, to a degree that will strike detractors as excessively soft and sympathetic, ‘Truth’ is clearly and unapologetically on Mary Mapes’ side,” said Variety’s review.

The movie is based on Mapes’ self-serving account of the debacle, “Truth and Duty: The Press, the President, and the Privilege of Power.”

So what really happened? Here is the unvarnished truth.

• An independent panel concluded in 2005 that CBS news “failed to follow basic journalistic principles” in crafting the report, which led to the firing of four employees (including Mapes). The panel blasted the team for being “rigid and blind” in defending its findings and found 10 “serious defects” in its packaging and presentation. Rather’s report was neither fair nor accurate, it concluded.
• Thomas Phinney, fonts program manager for Adobe Systems, and a self-described Democrat, told the Washington Post it was “impossible’ for a typewriter from the early 1970s to produce documents like those Rather and company said backed up their story.
• Rather eventually sued CBS News for $70 million. The lawsuit was thrown out in 2009 and a New York court failed to reinstate the lawsuit several months later. Rather once vowed to back up the questionable story beyond the questionable documents, thereby proving he was right all along. Said proof has yet to be found.
• The disgraced anchor insists the documents used in his report were true.

You won’t see that kind of truth in “Truth.”