The story Dylan Davies told CBS though, was wildly different than the far more subdued account he gave his superiors, according to an incident report that was obtained by The Washington Post on October 31. According to the Post, Davies had previously filed a report with his security contractor employer saying that he "could not get anywhere near" the compound the night of the attack.
Davies responded that he lied to his employer because he didn't want his boss to know he'd disobeyed strict orders that night to stay away from the Benghazi compound. While acknowledging that deceit, Davies claimed he was telling the truth on 60 Minutes and said he would be vindicated by the FBI's report on what he told them shortly after the attack. But the Times reported yesterday that two senior administration sources say that FBI report shows that Davis also told agents he failed to make it to the U.S. compound on the night of the attack.
For a week, nobody at CBS was willing to address a litany of outstanding questions, including:
1) Was CBS News aware of the incident report indicating that Davies "could not get anywhere near" the Benghazi compound on the night of the attack prior to releasing their story?
2) Did CBS News learn at any point during their year-long Benghazi investigation that Davies had previously offered a contradictory take on his activities? If so, why didn't they reveal that to their audience?
3) What steps did CBS News take in attempting to verify that the story Davies had told them was true?
Only with Logan's apology this morning has the network begun to answer those questions. And until this morning, CBS failed to address the claim by a Fox News reporter that Davies had asked him for money in exchange for an interview.
Plagued by questions and with the network's boilerplate statement that they stood by their segment clearly insufficient, Fager finally emailed a response to the Huffington Post's Michael Calderone on November 6, insisting he's "proud of the reporting that went into the story and have confidence that our sources, including those who appeared on 60 Minutes, told accurate versions of what happened that night."
But as Calderone noted, Fager's statement failed to address the fundamental questions about why the 60 Minutes report "should be trusted in light of Davies' admission that he previously lied about his whereabouts." (It clearly should not.)
And by the way, if Fager was so "proud" of CBS's work, why wasn't the veteran journalist willing to discuss the Benghazi issue with a reporter who can ask follow-up questions, rather than Fager issuing a one-way statement and dodging the details? That's not how a "proud" chairman deals with a newsroom crisis. That's how a nervous chairman deals with one.
Again, none of this behavior matches with how journalists should conduct themselves, according to Fager's own advice, especially when reporters face pointed, fact-based criticism. "I just think especially the press, we hold people to certain standards, we should be held to the highest of standards," he said in 2011.
The unmistakable conclusion? CBS News didn't abide by the journalism standards that its own chief thinks others should.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
