Lot’s of crazy conspiracy theorists are finding a bit of egg on their faces right now.  The list is long and sordid, including, but most certainly not limited to, the New York Times.

After WHNT’s broadcast of the Don Siegelman segment on 60 Minutes suffered technical problems that resulted in the bulk of the story not being seen many assumed that it was an intentional act by WHNT.  The ringleader was, as usual, Scott Horton of Harper’s.  The veracity with which Horton and his ilk - including the Alabama Democrat Party - presumed it was an intentional political hit job was astounding. 

Horton immediately made up his mind that the blackout was an intentional act.  He claimed that some unnamed person at CBS told him it was an “editorial decision” by the station.  [I would link to the particular column, but he has since removed this language.]  He went on to state that the station was owned by Oak Hill Partners, which “represents interests of the Bass family, which contribute heavily to the Republican Party.” [Again, he has removed this from his site as well.]

Fortunately the internets often lets our words live on long after we might otherwise desire.

It turns out that all of the wacky conspiracy talk about the blackout was bunk.  (I’m just shocked.)  WHNT has since offered sufficient description of the technical errors, including a timeline of events.  Better yet, it turns out that the particular member of the Bass family that runs Oak Hill Partners is predominantly a Democrat contributor and has never, I repeat, never given one thin dime to George Bush.  The New York Times issued a correction to their piece and published an additional article that is something of a mea culpa.  As for Horton, he was a big boy and wrote his own “oops” piece which was quite fair - right up until the end.  Here goes:

I have now gotten considerably more detail on the political campaign donations of the investors behind Oak Hill Capital Partners, the investor group that acquired WHNT from the New York Times Company in 2006. The key figure in the Oak Hill group is Robert M. Bass. His campaign donation profile shows that he has supported both Democrats and Republicans, but that his donations to Democrats far exceed those to Republicans. The complete five-year search can be examined here. Note specifically that he has never supported George W. Bush–either in his races for governor of Texas or president. Sid, Edward and Lee Bass, who have been heavy Bush supporters, do not appear to have any interest in Oak Hill Capital Partners. Consequently, the supposition that the blackout at WHNT was politically driven censorship on the part of the ultimate owners has no merit. The station continues to insist that the problems were purely technical.

He was doing so well and then had to toss in that last sentence.  Instead of saying something to the effect of, “Gee, it really does look like WHNT had technical problems,” he instead opts to say the equivalent of, “They’re still cowering behind their excuse, but I don’t believe them.”  He stubbornly writes that the station “continues to insist” as though it is some petulant child unwilling to fess up to its bad acts.  He would have done better to just leave that last sentence out.  Something tells me that his ego and myopia just wouldn’t let him do that, though.  No, he has to interject a hint of disbelief that there was no intent, although he does so by cowering behind the “I’m just telling you what they said,” tactic.

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This entry was posted by Brian on Friday, February 29th, 2008 at 8:43 pm and is filed under Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Please note the copyright policy.