Pentagon Calls Bergdahl Reports (by Fox and NBC) 'Patently False', Rear Admiral: "Let me put a fork in it".

[Fred Sanders]

Last edited Tue Jan 27, 2015, 09:17 PM - Edit history (2)

Pentagon and Army officials on Tuesday strongly denied claims that the U.S. military has decided to file desertion charges against Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was released by Taliban-aligned militants last year in exchange for five Guantanamo prisoners.

The claim was first made by retired Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, a former military intelligence officer who now works at the London Center for Policy Research. He told Fox News' "The O'Reilly Factor" Monday night that he's learned of the military's decision from two sources.


"The Army has come to its conclusion, and Bowe Bergdahl ... will be charged with desertion," he said.

But Maj. Gen. Ronald F. Lewis, the Army's chief of public affairs, put out a statement Tuesday afternoon calling the reports, including a similar one by NBC News, "patently false."
.......................

Opinion: Fox manufactured another lie, NBC got fooled into running it, and now they got what they wanted, a response from the Pentagon calling them liars, now they have a news cycle.

It is a media circus going on, the MSM is an unreliable source of actual information.

http://news.yahoo.com/video/bowe-bergdahl-face-desertion-charges-181339838.html

................................

"Let Me Put A Fork In It", Rear Admiral John Kirby

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2015/01/27/pentagon-disputes-that-a-decision-has-been-made-in-the-bowe-bergdahl-case/

“Let me just put a fork in this right now, if I can,” Kirby told reporters at the Pentagon on Tuesday. “No decision has been made with respect to the case of Sergeant Bergdahl. None. And General Milley is not being put under any pressure to make a decision, either way.”

____________________________________________

EDIT: This the NBC story, they have kept the headline and just attached a video of the Pentagon calling them out for their sloppy work. No correction....

NBC: "Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was held captive by enemy forces in Afghanistan for five years, will likely be charged with desertion, (a) senior defense officials tell NBC News.

The officials point out that Bergdahl will likely face a lesser charge of desertion described in the Uniform Code of Military Justice as leaving a post to avoid duty or shirk an important assignment, based on his actions when he left a remote outpost in June 2009."

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/bowe-bergdahl-likely-be-charged-desertion-officials-say-n294466

[louis-t]

1. Sounds like Shaffer made it up, told fox

and NBC reported on the fox story. Jeez.

[Fred Sanders]

3. Yep. Made the whole shit up and sold it to Billo, Chief Shit Purchaser at Fox.

[merrily]

4. After Fox's recent apologies, picking up the story from Fox was irresponsible, at best, let

alone a story like this.

[merrily]

2. This man was very fragile when we got him back. Unless Shaffer had impeccable info, he's a POS.

[Fred Sanders]

5. One unnamed source. Then changed to "more than one". They ran with it and so did NBC.

[merrily]

8. Personally, I don't believe he had impeccable info. However, I believe it is

very possible to have impeccable info from one source that you cannot name, depending on who the source is.

For example, if this were a civil case and Eric Holder told me the complaint would be filed first thing tomorrow morning, I'd consider that impeccable info.

[Fred Sanders]

11. Yes, because a public official lying is a criminal offence and is officially announced not on Fox.

If you do not understand the difference...so be it.

[merrily]

15. Not sure what you mean?

A public official lying to me or to a retired general would not be a criminal offense, AFAIK.

I meant only that Holder would know better than anyone if the D of J was going to do something at 9 am tomorrow or not. If he leaked it to me on a no names basis, I'd believe him.

[madokie]

7. The kid needs to talk to a good lawyer

what shaffer, fox and nbc done is some sorry ass shit.

[KingCharlemagne]

10. "Sorry ass shit" doesn't even begin to cover their quasi-libel and slander of

Bergdahl. I'm sure in the back rooms of the Executive Producers, a careful cold-blooded calculus was performed: will running outright libel or slander (or what we should have had good reason to suspect was such) earn us more in increased viewership (and thereby higher ad $$) than the resulting civil verdict against us for libel and slander will cost us in terms of higher liability insurance premiums going forward? They've gambled on the former.I hope a good lawyer secures a jury that puts Fox and NBC out of business or at a minumum secures a verdict that really hurts their shareholders.

[madokie]

14. I agree with you

[Fred Sanders]

16. Their fucking computer algorithm is simple, hate and lies in, cash and sheeple out.

[Aerows]

23. Exactly.

He was held for over a year and a half, and many leaped to make him a political football.

They should be ashamed of themselves. They weren't there, they didn't suffer as the man did, and as such, should at the very least lobby to provide funding for veterans, not be caustic and horrible to people who served when they DID NOT.

[KingCharlemagne]

6. Will Fox News news publicly repudiate Shaffer? Somehow I doubt it, b/c they're too busy

promulgating the latest version of the stab-in-the-back myth, i.e., we could have won in Afghanistan were it not for the pesky liberals and the liberal media. And here George H.W. Bush boasted that he'd finally kicked the 'Vietnam Syndrome.'

[elias49]

9. Shaffer a rogue.

Wrote a book called "Operation Dark Heart" which should have put him in jail. Gave up lots of classified info, later redacted by the NSA and the DIA. Also 'reported' that the President watched the attacks in Benghazi from some secure location.
What's really up with this guy?

[Fred Sanders]

12. Another hater from Britain, like the no go zone idiot who also pulled shit from his ass and flung it

across the Pond towards Fox America for professional B.S. processing and mass consumption.

Anyone apologizing in this thread for saying Fox is not dangerous has not read the thread.

(Not you)

[underpants]

13. It's Fox News of course it is BS. This is typical of our copy cat news bubble.

Fox News is #1 and the rest of the media follows any BS they come up with.

[TwilightGardener]

17. That Fox has dubious sources isn't a surprise.

I mean, do you really expect Bill O'Reilly to scoop serious journalism on a big story? NBC is the real disappointment here. But they say "senior defense officials" confirmed the story--would be interesting to know who that was.

[Fred Sanders]

18. The fake Fox story would have gone nowhere without NBC doing copy without calling the Pentagon.

How does that happen?

Ex-Fox news producer from Fox 7 Austin, the late young man Phillip Perea, killed himself yesterday with a shot to the chest in front of Fox News HQ in Manhattan to try to explain how that could happen and does happen in American media every day.

He can tell it better than me.

[pinboy3niner]

19. It was NBC's Chief Pentagon Correspondent who reported the story

He attributed the info to "senior defense officials."

http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/bowe-bergdahl-face-desertion-charges

[Aerows]

24. It's disgraceful

This shouldn't be played out on the national stage this way.

[Rhiannon12866]

20. MSNBC reported on this during Alex Wagner's 4pm hour and confirmed this story is false

And that no decision has yet been made. They got this from The Pentagon...

[Fred Sanders]

21. The story is not just the reporting of the Fox lie, it is the Fox lie reported by Fox.

[Rhiannon12866]

22. Breitbart and The Blaze were reporting this as fact, as well...

No big surprise...

[Fred Sanders]

25. The only surprise is NBC, it is a big surprise because they did not confirm the sources.

Running a story on a sensitive matter without solid confirmation is media civil negligence for NBC, SOP for Fox.

[Rhiannon12866]

26. And I first heard this debunked by MSNBC...

BTW, Rev Al is reporting on this right now.

[SoCalDem]

27. Most likely, they will offer him an "out".

He will take the general discharge, and that will be the end of it. He does not seem like a very talkative fellow, and will probably melt back into obscurity.