An Old Excuse Returns

Mary Mapes continues to occupy the captain's chair of the Fantasy Express, three years after she produced what turned out to be the mother of all bogus stories:

Actually, we had done a straightforward, well-substantiated story.

And we're still waiting for that substantiation. But the problem wasn't the story, according to Mapes, it was "bully boys:"

Instantly, the far right blogosphere bully boys pronounced themselves experts on document analysis, and began attacking the form and font in the memos. They screamed objections that ultimately proved to have no basis in fact.

Actually, the documents were so bad you didn't even have to be an expert, all that was needed was a little common sense. And, I'm sure the "bully boys" would welcome any evidence, as yet unseen, that their assertions had no basis in fact.

Now, here comes the money shot:

These critics blathered on about everything but the content. They knew they would lose that argument, so they didn't raise it.

It's the return of the "fake but true" defense!