According to
this article at
Raw Story, Newsweek may have identified the source of the TANG memos.
A principal source for the CBS story about President Bush's National Guard duty was Bill Burkett, a disgruntled former Guard officer, who says he was present at Guard headquarters in Austin in 1997 when a top aide to then Governor Bush ordered records sanitized to protect himself, Newsweek will report Monday. Typed memos from the early '70s suggesting officers were pressured to give Bush special treatment and "sugarcoat" increasingly negative evaluations were a central part of the CBS 60 Minutes report.
There is also a quote from the Newsweek piece that sets up the standard line of attack:
Still, in theory, Burkett may have had access to any Guard records that, in a friend's words, "didn't make it to the shredder," report Chief Political Correspondent Howard Fineman and Investigative Correspondent Michael Isikoff. Fellow officers say Burkett wasn't a crank, but rather a stickler for proper procedure-a classic whistle-blower type. Burkett was impressive enough to cause CBS producer Mary Mapes to fly to Texas to interview him. "There are only a couple of guys I would trust to be as perfectly honest and upfront as Bill," said Dennis Adams, a former Guard colleague. The White House, through Communications Director Dan Bartlett, called Burkett a "discredited source."
So, repeat after me:
- __ is a Democratic operative
- __ is trying to sell a book.
... create your own "boilerplate excuse" here.