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| Rolling Stone Broke Rules to Sensationalize McChrystal Interview |
| 2010-06-26 |
| It was 2:30 Tuesday morning in Kabul when Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal was awakened by an aide with grim news. "There's a Rolling Stone article out," the aide told McChrystal. "It's very, very bad." Forty hours later, McChrystal had been relieved of his command, his 34-year military career in tatters. Apart from a terse apology, McChrystal has not discussed publicly the disparaging remarks that he and his aides made about administration officials and that appeared in the article. On Friday, however, officials close to McChrystal began trying to salvage his reputation by asserting that the author, Michael Hastings, quoted the general and his staff in conversations that he was allowed to witness but not report. The officials also challenged a statement by Rolling Stone's executive editor that the magazine had thoroughly reviewed the story with McChrystal's staff ahead of publication. The executive editor, Eric Bates, denied that Hastings violated any ground rules when he wrote about the four weeks he spent, on and off, with McChrystal and his team. "A lot of things were said off the record that we didn't use," Bates said in an interview. Ya. Lotsa stuff. Three weeks six days 23 hours worth. All the boring stuff. "We abided by all the ground rules in every instance." Who ya gonna trust, the General or a joke of a left-wing rag? A U.S. military spokesman in Kabul, Air Force Lt. Col. Edward T. Sholtis, acknowledged that Hastings, like other reporters who have interviewed McChrystal over the past year, was not required to sign written ground rules. "We typically manage ground rules on a verbal basis," Sholtis said. "We trust in the professionalism of the people we're working with." Well, there ya go! End of story! Why would they do that? |
| Posted by:Bobby |
| #2 The general and his staff probably thought Hastings was on their side, considering the general's politics. As badanov sed, "Snakebit". |
| Posted by: Pappy 2010-06-26 17:04 |
| #1 Did it ever occur to anyone that maybe McChrystal wanted to get fired? For whatever reason? Or is it standard MO for generals to take actions without having any idea of the likely result? |
| Posted by: Goober Goobelopolous 2010-06-26 16:46 |