October surprise falls flat on its face

I'm a little late to the party here, but when I first heard this story yesterday, I didn't think much of it. However, when I heard this morning that the story first broke in April of 2003, it took on a completely different complexion.

The short version is that the Old Media shockingly reported yesterday that 380 tons of conventional explosives where missing from an ammo dump near Baghdad. One critical oversight was that they left out the details of when these explosives went missing.

The story was a rehashing of an April 2003 story about how the explosives were removed before we ever got to Baghdad. This new version of the story has been on hold until they could generate some new angle (in this case, a phony letter from the United Nations) to re-report the story, just before the election, and with just enough ambiguity to make the story appear to be "breaking news".

The implication here is that Bush's leadership of the war resulted in severe incompetence because he didn't safeguard weapons that weren't there, which is exactly how Lurch framed it on the campaign trail yesterday.

Now Drudge is reporting that the NY Times, CBS and the LA Times were colluding about how best to break this story and help the Lurch/John Boy campaign.

60 MINS PLANNED BUSH MISSING EXPLOSIVES STORY FOR ELECTION EVE

News of missing explosives in Iraq -- first reported in April 2003 -- was being resurrected for a 60 MINUTES election eve broadcast designed to knock the Bush administration into a crisis mode.

Jeff Fager, executive producer of the Sunday edition of 60 MINUTES, said in a statement that "our plan was to run the story on October 31, but it became clear that it wouldn't hold..."

Elizabeth Jensen at the LOS ANGELES TIMES details on Tuesday how CBS NEWS and 60 MINUTES lost the story [which repackaged previously reported information on a large cache of explosives missing in Iraq, first published and broadcast in 2003].

The story instead debuted in the NYT. The paper slugged the story about missing explosives from April 2003 as "exclusive."

An NBCNEWS crew embedded with troops moved in to secure the Al-Qaqaa weapons facility on April 10, 2003, one day after the liberation of Iraq.

According to NBCNEWS, the explosives were already missing when the American troops arrived.

It is not clear who exactly shopped an election eve repackaging of the missing explosives story.

The LA TIMES claims: The source on the story first went to 60 MINUTES but also expressed interest in working with the NY TIMES... "The tip was received last Wednesday."

CBSNEWS' plan to unleash the story just 24 hours before election day had one senior Bush official outraged.

"Darn, I wanted to see the forged documents to show how this was somehow covered up," the Bush source, who asked not to be named, mocked, recalling last months CBS airing of fraudulent Bush national guard letters.

It's nice to see the Old Media getting caught red-handed this election season. This is the kind of media collusion, bias and fraud that has been foisted upon the public for decades - and it's becoming clear that they can't get away with this shit anymore.

The Old Media still tries to masquerade as an unbiased watchdog - what they are is an old, diseased dog that needs to be taken to the vet and put to sleep.

Plenty of folks are already on this case:

Right on Red - NBC vs. NYT; KE04 SOL
Say Anything - The Iraq explosives non-story
Protein Wisdom - Oh no you di-ent
Ace - The New York Times and CBSNews: House Propaganda Organs of the DNC
Michelle Malkin - DANGER! EXPLOSIVES--HANDLE WITH CARE
Backcountry Conservative - Missing explosives facts
Wizbang - Explosives vanish into thin air
In the Bullpen - Tons of explosives missing in Iraq
The Captain - 380 tons of explosives missing - but when?
Jawa Central - Al Qaqaa in Perspective