From MSNBC.com:

CBS said Burkett, a retired National Guard lieutenant colonel, had provided the documents. In a press release accompanying Heyward’s statement, CBS said that Burkett “also admits that he deliberately misled the CBS News producer working on the report, giving her a false account of the documents’ origins to protect a promise of confidentiality to the actual source.”

What an unbelievable journalistic scandal. Is it even imagineable that “60 Minutes” would have taken documents from a “Clinton hater” with a similar background and then, in a rush to smear him, short-circuit all of the normal rules to get to air?

Basically this story was based on the words of Ben Barnes and Burkett, two known partisans with a Big League gripes against Bush and — in Barnes’ case — monumental ties to the Kerry campaign. CBS not only served as a transmission belt for this stuff but they willfully cut journalistic corners in the process. Then, when caught, they stonewalled. Rather said his source was “unimpeachable.” Unimpeachable!!!! If Burkett is unimpeachable in Dan Rather’s eyes. Someone needs to re-open his stories from the very first hurricane.

This is flatly outrageous. Rather should be fired. Mapes should be fired. Period.