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OK, so they're fake--that's a given. In fact, they're such an obvious fake that the real question is: who forged them and why?
If the Kerry campaign or some well-meaning but not very bright ally did the deed, Kerry should withdraw and Dan Rather should spend the rest of his unscrupulous life confined to a small padded cell with Rush Limbaugh piped in 24 hours a day. Frankly, if Kerry and his cohorts would do something this dumb, they're not fit to govern. Do you really want a president that's that clueless about dirty tricks and their consequences?
Now, if the Bush campaign did it, this is a tactical masterstroke! It certainly makes a jackass out of the anti-Bush media, which they surely knew would jump all over the story with minimal fact checking. If Karl Rove wanted to ruin Dan Rather, he couldn't have written a better script than Rather did himself. And it casts doubt on every anti-Bush criticism and accusation the Kerry campaign makes going forward. Even the ones that are true.
Dan Rather should still end up in the Limbaugh cell, though, since his handling of the issue has destroyed his journalistic credibility no matter who it was that set him up.
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