♪ >> if he makes it on to the dance charts, that will be quite a feat. the correct answer to our challenge question by the way is b, dpr b, graphene. remember you can always subscribe to our podcast on itunes. thanks for being part of my program this year. i will see you next week. stay tuned for "reliable sources." the president's national security adviser quit on friday, and white house aides say it's because of this book. bob woodward casts a new light on james jones but the whole afghan war debate. are his unnamed sources pushing their own agendas and why is woodward promoting the hillary for v.p. rumor? lou dobbs accused of employing illegal immigrants and rick sanchez finally apologizes for the words that got him fired. should a nevada reporter have published a secretly

recorded tape of senate candidate sharron angle? tired of hearing about the salahis? this author says the media got much of the story wrong about the white house party crashers. i'm howard kurtz and this is "reliable sources." -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com the debate over afghanistan has been pretty well covered by the media, at least when it hasn't been crowded out by attack ads, witch craft and quarterbacks behaving badly. president obama's handing of the 9-year-old conflict and his decision to dispatch more troops has been making headlines again thanks to one behind the scenes account. >> a new book causing a stir today, obama's wars by bob woodward who spent almost two years talking to more than 100 people behind closed doors. >> now the white house is already reacting to the book this morning. senior administration officials putting out a fairly lengthy memo about the book.

>> woodward spent a year and a half researching the way the white house, the pentagon and the military have struggled to shape the strategy in afghanistan, and as usual, none of his sources are named, except for the president of the united states. the book is called "obama's wars," and i spoke to him earlier here in the studio. bob woodward welcome. >> thank you. >> given the diversity of sources and the stakes involved, you write at the beginning of this book, there was no way i could write asterlyized or laundered version of this story. you seem to be preempting possible criticism. nobody had said that. >> somebody read that and said it's a note to sources, to say look, there's no immunity here, where people say things off the record, as you well know. that means you can't use it, but if you get it someplace else, you can, and in this kind of hot house environment of the white house, and the national security team, everyone knows everyone else's business and attitudes and i tried to reflect that. >> no immunity in the sense that

you're not more generous to somebody who gave you more inside stuff? >> i try not to be. i try to, you know, tell the story as what carl bernstein and i 40 years ago used to call the best obtainable version of the truth. >> on friday, as you know, james jones resigned as white house national security adviser and here's the "new york times" reporting that white house staff members who had been critical of general jones and you get into this in the book said that this was related to statements he apparently made to bob woodward for obama's wars. do you think this book was a factor in the general's demise? >> i have no idea. i haven't heard that. >> but here is a book in which you say that jones, who was kind of an easy fit at the white house, had said of rahm emanuel, david axelrod, top aides there, called them waterbugs, likened them to the politburo and the mafia. >> there are a lot of things in there. this is as we say close to the

bone. this is a total universe portrait and the nature of the relationships and the attitudes, jones was, you know, somebody who wasn't part of the campaign team, very senior general, and you know, he didn't fit. i think everyone has noted that, as he resigned. >> there are people also in washington who believe that something where there's attributed to robert gates, the defense secretary talking about the guy who has now been named to be the national security adviser, tom donilon gates is quoted having told general jones that donilon didn't understand the military and his appointment would be a disaster, suggestion here jones told you this as well. >> look i carefully -- no. it's carefully reported, i'm certainly not saying, and remember, this is a portrait of the obama national security team over 18 months, and attitudes that might have existed last

march may not exist now or they actually may be worse. >> you had had a one-hour interview with president obama for the book. sounded more perfunctory than revealing. >> no, actually it was quite revealing, because he validated a lot of the book. he said i'm not going to get into the specific quotes and say that's the exact quote, but then when i would give him quotes he would say well that may not be exact but that's my attitude, and throughout the book, he did not dispute anything, but what's important in that interview is we talked about the nature of war, and it comes through loud and clear, he does not like war, and he quoted some cliches about war being hell, about the dogs of war, when they're unleashed, you really don't have control and how he tries to impose clarity. >> on that point, bob, you're

sometimes accused in the past of vacuuming up facts but not offering up analysis. you said obama is psychologically out of afghanistan, is that an assumption on your part? >> no, it's obvious will from what he's quoted saying. he said "i want an exit plan. i want this plan to be so we can hand it off to the afghans and get the united states out of afghanistan." there can be no wiggle room. >> in pursuit of that withdrawal strategy you quote the president saying privately to his aides i can't lose the whole democratic party. some people jumped on that to say he's playing politics with the war. is that your interpretation? >> what happened in that quote, it's so lindsey graham, well-known republican and graham is saying what is this date about beginning withdrawal really mean, and the president said look, i can't lose the whole democratic party, because in the party, there is a lot of sentiment against the war or

against a full escalation of the war and as you know the president instead of giving the military 40,000, gave them 30,000. >> but in your interpretation, based on your reporting, is this, any leader has to bring a significant chunk of the country along with him in order to maintain a war effort or is this a more crass evaluation of his political prospects when he tells dr. lindsey graham? >> it is what it is and i don't step aside and make any comment on it. i think it speaks for itself >> okay. some of your "bush at war" books it seemed you were moving toward transparency, interviewing donald rumsfeld on the record as well as president bush. here except for obama not one on the record source. why not? >> but there are all kinds of on the record sources, because i have or have seen the documents that i quote from at length, and nothing is better than a document, particularly one that

is produced at a specific time but in this case i'd love to do all the interviews on the record, and as you know, you want to get the truth, and you want to find out what really goes on and if you go in and put a tape recorder down and said okay, this is on the record, you're going to get a lot of untruth. >> but -- >> it's just, you know, i learned that the first day i was a reporter when somebody on a city council in rockville, maryland, said something in public, and then i talked to him afterwards off the record, and he said the opposite. >> from the city council to the white house. for example, sometimes people can say some things on the record but not more sensitive things. you've known david petraeus for a long time. it's impossible for me to believe you did not talk to petraeus for this book but you can't say that. >> that's correct and i'm, you know, people because there is so much cross-sourcing here, somebody says i think this happened at this meeting.

>> you get to the other person. >> i take it to somebody else and get notes and finally get the memo, or get the official notes of some of these meetings, and you get a kind of clarity, and then to come back to people and say these six quotes i'd like to put on the record is kind of a bait and switch, and i think the terms of the transaction are, i want you to really tell me what went on and i'm not going to come back and kind of beg for on the record quotes. >> i'm not sure i fully agree with that but understand your point. with petraeus and other sources you sometimes have direct quotes "he said later." to who, to you? >> my reporting establishes it definitely was said to others, and you know, i -- the book came out, has been out for i guess a couple of weeks.

i've heard some grumbling but nobody saying oh, that was wrong, or this couldn't have happened. >> that's right and it's remarkable. i don't think there's been a single factual statement challenged. >> in the white house, officially robert gibbs, the white house press secretary said everyone should read it. >> how would awe cess the degree of cooperation you got from the obama administration compared to say the last administration? >> you know, it's not as if the administration is a monolith. you get individuals. you get -- >> sure. >> -- the president to sit for one interview. you get some people who will give you documents. some people who will -- i mean it's not -- everyone's operating at a different level, and i think that's fine. i think that's the way the first amendment works best. >> this is a really interesting point, you obtained the somewhat downbeat semiclassified assessment by general mccristical and in the book you describe "there's a popular

impression that insiders with political motivation simply hand over sensitive documents to journalists and the journalists. use as tools of someone else's agenda." i wouldn't say tools but didn't the person or persons who gave you the mcchrystal report have some kind of motivation, wanting it out for some reason? >> ahhh you about this is what is interesting about the 66-page mcchrystal report, it was given in the course of reporting this book. i read it, and realized it was news now. and so the source said fine, the editor of "the post" read it and said we have to get this in the paper and we were able to do it in a very significant way. it informed the debate, but that person was not giving it to me for publication right then. when i read it, and realized i went back and said hey, this belongs in the public record now, and the source was public spirited enough to say yeah, i

agree. >> when we come back, bob woodward ignites a frenzy of media speculation aboutvillery for v.p. in 2012. can he back that up? the turn will make you think. ♪ make you re-examine your approach. change your line. innovate. and create one of the world's fastest-reacting suspensions, reading the road 1,000 times per second. it's the turn that leads you somewhere new. introducing the new 2011 cts-v coupe. from cadillac. the new standard of the world.

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when bob woodward speaks people listen especially if he's throwing red meat to the pundits saying that president obama might dump vice president biden in favor of the secretary of state. >> it's on the table, and some

of hillary clinton's advisers see it as a real possibility in 2012. president obama needs some of the women, latinos, retirees, that she did so well with during the 2008 primaries and so they switch jobs and not out of the question. >> with that bit of speculation the media were off and running. >> bob woodward reporting last night that president obama may shake things up as he heads for election in 2012 as hillary clinton as running mate. >> in 2013 will we be hearing the phrases vice president clinton and secretary of state biden? >> could they be part of a freem deem after all? >> it would be crazy. >> president obama bumping joe biden for hillary clinton, the

news went haywire. >> to wha does it mean? >> actively discussed. >> no, no, on the table, that book is on the table, right? that doesn't mean you're going to read it this week. maybe you'll read it sometime, maybe on your summer vacation. the point was and the book deals with this at some length, one of hillary clinton's strategists, mark penn, when she talked to him about becoming secretary of state. >> right. he saw the potential benefit of 2012 and maybe she could move up. >> maybe she would be needed and take biden's place. >> so as you know hillary clinton responded to this. let's play that for the viewers. >> okay. >> we have a great relationship and i have absolutely no interest and no reason for doing anything other than just dismissing these stories and moving on. >> do you believe her? you're a former partner, carl bernstein, a classic example of

manufactured controversy. manufactured. >> no, no, i did nothing except saying what was in the book, and that when we get into the political season of 2012, this is an assessment that obama and his team are going to have to make. >> briefly do you think some cable news hosts and pundits overreacted, overinterpreted what you said? >> look, you know, the news is what it is. you can't complain that they did too much or too little. they do what they do. what i do worry about is that there's a kind of trivialization and that issue is something that will be important perhaps if somebody decides to act on it in a year or two, but the book is about war, and the book is about truly the most serious matter confronting the president and national security.

people are dealing with this in a very serious way. people are dying there. >> absolutely important matter of national and international security and i don't want to tr trivialize it either. "new york times" got the book. this happens to you almost every time is it frustrating to be scooped by another publication on your work here? >> it's the first amendment. you know, we live by it. >> doesn't mean you have to like it. >> yeah, well, i accept it. it's part of the flow of news. i'm flattered that the "new york times" thought it was important enough to get a copy and write a story in advance. i understand they had five people, they took and divided up the book. >> because they had to speed read it, get it online, break the news. >> okay, so you know. >> bob woodward you said on c-span you are a registered democrat but you act as a political independent. should you be registered with either party given what you do? >> because i take my daughter in

to vote, and it has instructed her in the electoral process. she decides, she's empowered to do this, and so that's the main reason. >> you take her to vote as an independent? >> yeah, but in the district of columbia as you well know -- >> ahh. >> ahh it is meaningless because the democratic party is, if you win in the primary -- >> for mayor, you're the mayor. >> that's the end. so you would disenfranchise my young 14-year-old daughter. >> all right, thanks for clarifying that. it's 2010, why aren't you on twitter? >> because i'm not sure what it is, and part of my problem with the media, which you cover so extensively, is this impatience in speed which drives everything and sometimes the trivialization, and you know, i do long form. on twitter you can do 140 characters. >> that's correct. >> i wouldn't be able to clear my throat in that. >> bob woodward thanks very much for joining us.

i've got to teach him more about twitter. coming up in the second part of "reliable sources" lou dobbs denounces a report in "nation" magazine he employs illegal immigrants and rick sanchez apologizes for the smear that got him fired on cnn. and a secret audiotape of sharron angle. ba voe airs the white house party crasher's episode and the media got the salahi story all wrong days diamond dimond. ♪ where'd you learn to do that so well. ♪ the new cadillac srx. the cadillac of crossovers. cadillac. the new standard of the world.

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if there was one issue lou dobbs crusaded on in his final years at cnn was illegal immigration. an investigation report created his own something of a storm. dobbs denied the gist of the account and attacked the nation on ideological grounds. a reporter spoke to several undocumented workers and has the facts to back up her story. >> lou made himself an emblem of his approach to immigration and he has not actually responded to the substantive evidence i present there were at least five undocumented workers who cared for his showjumping horses and cared for the grounds of his estate in florida. >> i think we need to understand what her point is, because it

must be larger than what is being bandied around the main stream media which has leaped to suggest i'm some sort of hypocrite. you know, it's astounding. i have never hired an illegal immigrant, nor has any company that i own. this is a hit job by the nation, it is a left wing activist advocacy publication. >> so how solid was the story? what should we make of dobbs' defense? and rick sanchez belated apology after losing his cnn job, kelly gov, journalist, and in seattle radio talk show host michael medved. we heard lou dobbs say he didn't knowingly hire illegal immigrants but isabel found some working for him. does that make dobbs a hypocrite in. >> the problem with dobbs is not hypocrisy. the problem is just total disregard of the truth and the

facts. and what strikes me about this is that lou dobbs did not get as much criticism as he deserved when he was still on the air on cnn about constantly and repeatedly giving wrong information. the statistics about the number of illegals in our prisons, the statistics about alleged statistics about illegals bringing various epidemics and diseases across the border, he promoted the story of the north american union and changing our currency, all wildly irresponsible. here it appears what happened, his wording was weasel words. he never may have hired an illegal and no company that he owns may have hired an illegal but companies that he employed who did hire illegals as many gardening companies and horse care companies apparently do. so he ought to just acknowledge that, and then go on. >> let me jump in with kelley goff. macdonald's point, dobbs once

called for employers of illegal immigrants to face charges. it's not easy to make sure every contractor you hire is not employing people who are in the country illegally? >> i agree with michael to a degree. i give lou props because i'm sure there are plenty of crisis communications consultants who would have told him to issue a statement and then to basically go into hiding, and so he gets props for not doing that, howard but -- >> just to jump in repeated on his own radio show on "good morning america" and msnbc. go ahead. >> we know there are plenty of people who would have hidden and waited until the story died. on the other hand those who appeared on lou's programming and i have several times, know that had he been sitting in the interviewing chair he would not have displayed the level of patience and tolerance or given a slight benefit of the doubt that lawrence and robin roberts did to him. there is no way he would have been buying what he was selling to put it mildly, right? and i think the other irony about this is actually lou dobbs

has done more to help the nation crucify him this week than anybody else. if he had done what michael suggested and simply said there is some truth here, i'm shocked, dismayed, saddened, disappointed but this proves this issue is bigger than all of us when someone like me trying to dot right thing can't, instead he spent the last week trying to debate the meaning of "is" saying i didn't hire any illegal immigrants but the guy i hired did. it's ridiculous. >> seems to me he had a perfect opportunity, first of all he blew two opportunities. one he didn't speak to isabel macdonald. she tried to contact him and later he said they didn't contact me. they did and she put in the story that neither he nor his spokespeople spoke to her. number two, the appropriate point here, you may remember during the campaign mitt romney had the same thing, mitt romney never hired illegals but a gardening company that took care of his lawn hired illegals like some gardening companies are known to do in different parts

of the country. lou should have said this shows how even someone like me who is concerned about this issue, and doesn't want to employ illegals can't avoid it. it shows how big a problem it is, how huge a problem it is. let's work together and find solutions. he didn't say that. he pushed back sort of crossing ts and dotting is. >> he did not say that. kelly goff, gobz said he was disappointed with the national media saying they gone along without doing any reporting of the only organization that contacted him for a statement was cbs news but it's hard to duplicate the reporting of isabel macdonald. she spent a lot of time talking to the workers, not using their names because they're in the country illegally. >> i've been on this program to defend my team of new media if you will, howard. this is definitely an example of a feather in the cap of old media. this was some very well done investigative reporting. so i'm not really sure where lou's coming from to say that this was a hit job, this was a smear job. i mean a reporter can have a set out agenda or intent, but if they actually do the

investigative work and get evidence, then i'm not really sure where he has a leg to stand on. >> the fact that it's a left wing magazine, that is true but doesn't mean what she reported is not true and he kept coming back to that. let me turn to rick sanchez. one week after he was fired by cnn he finally broke his silence, put out a ten id statement and talked to george stephanopolous on "gma." take a listen >> it was my mistake. i screwed up, i take full responsibility. 'not cnn. it's rick sanchez. rick sanchez screwed up. i went in there with a chip on my shoulder, i was a little bit angry, and look, i will be honest with you, and i hope you don't mind my saying this but i'm going to go ahead and say it, if you look at the landscape in our media in prime time, there's not a single hispanic, there's not a single african-american. >> elizabeth vargas. >> in prime time hosting a prime time show in the united states. >> "20/20." >> i'm talking aboutcasts in cable. >> true. >> i'm referring to cable

newscasts >> michael medved given sanchez attacked jon stewart as a bigot, said jus basiccally run cnn and other networks is that apology enough? >> no, the apology is ridiculous and digs him in deeper. he's trying to count people on the air, not based upon their accomplishment, not based their competence and excellence but based upon their background. >> doesn't he make a legitimate point is that it's a safe of mostly white anchors? >> absolutely. >> his mission was about the news executives and he was flat out wrong, and this again is the problem here. is that previously and this was something that stephanopolous brought up and good for him, he had done an interview in exchange with ed koch, talked about jews dominating the bush administration and listed a bunch of people who weren't in

the administration. this guy is obsessed with labeling people, for instance, he mentioned bill crystal, who has never been a part of this george bush administration, and the idea that this is a guy obsessed with counting who is ju irn a jewish and hispanic. he doesn't talk about fareed zakaria. >> i can jump in here? i would say that absolutely his apology was ridiculous. i'm sick and tired of i'm sorry your feelings got hurt apologies which we keep hearing over and over again. the unfortunate thing about, this however, is that rick actually was making a legitimate point. i mean because what he said was so offensive and stupid that got lost in there. george trying to point out elizabeth vargas occasionally appears on prime time, which is not considering part of the, making her a nightly prime time host is sort of like saying we have black friends. i mean the real sit anyone who has eyes and has a television knows there's a lack of diversity on major network

programming, not something up for disputed debate. >> i've got to go to a break. one sentence from you, michael, does sanchez have a future in television after all this? >> probably, just because he's gotten a lot of publicity and by the way a lot of this helped publicize his book which had been failing beforehand. >> kelly goff? >> i won't be buying the book. i'm not sure who will buy the book because of the comments. >> two words from me, elliott spitzer. if elliott spitser can come back, anybody can. thanks very much. up next, sharron angle, a secret tape and a press corps she views as hostile. nevada's top political reporter talks about his controversial scoop. [ male announcer ] alka-seltzer plus rushes relief for all-over achy colds. the official cold medicine of the u.s. ski team. alka-seltzer plus.

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jerry brown's aide overheard on a voice mail calling meg whitman a whore. should the press be jumping on the private moments? a journalist who made all kinds of news this week for changing jobs. that would be me. more after the break.

when politicians huddle in private they don't expect words to be recorded. that's what happened to sharron angle when she tried to persuade tea party candidate scott ashgen to drop out of the debate. some embarrassing words no question but was it fair game?

joining us is john ralston, political reporter and columnist for "the las vegas sun." for someone to secretly tape a private meeting and leak it sounds like a dirty trick. did you have any hesitation publishing the story? >> well i would have had hesitation, howard, if i hadn't authenticated the tape and made sure that there were some interesting stuff in there and of course there were no national security secrets or anything in this meeting, but you know you heard bob woodward tell you earlier he tries to get the first obtainable draft of history that, famous comment. this was history. how often do we as reporters have to talk about meetings held through second and thirdhand accounts? this is an actual window into how politicians really talk and you can look at the motivations of the person who taped it and sharron angle of course may be the most famous republican nominee outside of christine o'donnell running for the u.s. senate. >> fascinating story. certainly relevant to the race, but you kind of became part of this story because you had to

protect the source who gave you this in an effort to embarrass sharron angle. true? >> well, i don't think that the source, and scott ashgen eventually outed himself, i did not get the tape directly from scott ashgen, he outed himself later on to cnn, howard but what's ironic, it's obvious listening to the tape who taped it by the volume of the voices, and i knew who had taped it originally. i knew a few days earlier that ashgen, because of some things he had said to me might have taped the meeting so i was not that surprised when i found out about it. this was not so much designed to embarrass sharron angle as it was to elevate scott ash gen. if you listen to him that's another revelation or maybe not so much for those following the race, that he really cares about the spotlight, he really believes he's a factor in this race, which by the way is very debatable. >> but when you wrote that initial column before scott ash gen acknowledged he had done the taping and somehow got continue to you, did you have any

obligation to tell your readers something while protecting your source, tell you something about the motivation of the person giving it to you, why you were being favored with this leak? >> that's always a concern, right, whenever we're reporting anything that's leaked to us and it happens a lot especially in political reporting. again, if i didn't think it was clear who had taped it, and i didn't think that the goal was so much to embarrass sharron angle but to promote scott ashgen and yet, howard, it give us such a window into sharron angle in terms of how desperate she was to get him out of the race, and what she really believes. sharron angle is what she says she is but there were other comments that indicated listen, she's willing to play the political game. >> right. >> under any circumstances, i think that was news. >> let me jump in and ask you a broader question, angle doesn't do many interviews except for what she calls friendly press outlets, goes on fox news and raises a lot of money. why did she do a television interview with you? >> that was early on, right

after the primary, when she was getting a lot of heat for not doing interviews. she had been on video running away from reporters, and so the story i think was getting out that she wasn't willing to do interviews. i had had a decent relationship with her and her campaign. she had seen me as someone at least at that time who was fair. i'm not sure what she thinks now so she did the interview. i did an interview with harry reid shortly afterwards just as tough and just as revealing. since that time -- >> let me jump in, we're short on time. is the senate majority leader any more accessible to the press in nevada than sharron angle is? >> neither candidate wants to do interviews. this has been a last gaffe loses kind of campaign. harry says all goofy stuff when he's out in public. he has an excuse that sharron angle does, he's the senate majority leader, but clearly harry reid doesn't like doing interviews and not very good at them.

>> i pine for the old days when candidates even if they were incumbents felt they had some responsibility to talk to journalists. john ralston thanks for joining us. >> thank you. the salahis star in the final episode of "real housewives of d.c." were media organizations unfair to the so-called party crashers? diamond dimond delivers her indictment. what's this option? that's new.

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my money. my choice. my meineke. >> you know the story lines, social climbing couple crashes their way to a state dinner. my next guest says the media played up the story. in the season finale we see the footage of what happened when any hail and tariq salahi went to the white house more than ten months ago. >> this is the dinner of the year. the whole world tries to come to the event so people of the highest order are turned away. >> the gossip columnists from "the post" creating rumors that we crashed the party. >> joining us to talk about

whether the media blew the story is investigative reporter diane dimond author of the new book "cirque du is ahsalahi." >> i do give their side of the story in the book but that's not why i wrote the book. i wrote the book because the media did get this wrong from the get-go. these people stood in line like everybody else, they showed their passports, several days before they gave the secret service all their personal information, and they were waved in. what part of that sounds like gate crashing to you? none of it, right? >> let me pick this up because you sharply criticize cnn and "the washington post" gossip columnist for initial reporting. let me play a sound as the story was breaking and pick it up on the other side. >> okay. >> -- got punked by some reality tv star wannabies. take a look, the couple here,

they were not on the guest list but somehow managed to sneak through literally layer after layer of security. they got into the party in the same room with the president and posed with some of the most important people in our government. >> president hello! >> president got punked, said campbell brown. but wasn't it accurate that two people who hadn't been cleared by the secret service got into a state dinner, got near the president, and this was considered a security breach for which the secret service apologized. >> you just heard them say -- campbell brown say they snuck into the white house. they did no such thing. you just saw the video. they were allowed in by a secret service agent. they then through a second secret service agent to check in. they thought they were just there for the arrival ceremony and then all of a sudden they were ushered into the dinner tent. they were as surprised as anybody else, but, again, that's not why i wrote the book. i wrote the book because if we don't police ourselves, who is going to police us? this story went on and on for ten months based on a lie.

>> i'm totally in favor of blowing the whistle on the media, but if there was a misimpression created by the salahi's motivation and their conduct. and by the way, they were trying out for a bravo reality series -- >> no, they had already been accepted. they had signed a contract eight months earlier. >> the point is, that added to suspicions about them. we heard tareq salahi said, amy of "the washington post" sent him a facebook message, he ignored it. they wouldn't answer questions initially. so they bear some of the responsible for the media not having the full picture. >> absolutely. not only were personal attorneys but attorneys for bravo television, i believe telling them, oh, you have to be quiet. notice that bravo television held that -- what i call the alibi video -- for ten months before finally showing that the salahis walked up to the gate and they were waved right in. there's a lot that went wrong here, but it first went wrong with "the washington post" gossip columnists saying these people were gate crashes when they were not.

that they snuck in. that they were reality tv show wannabes when they had already been signed. there was so much bad reporting here, i outline a lot of it in the book. i have all of the e-mails from the person they were dealing, with the white house liaison. read it for yourself and see if i'm not right. >> but look, if you're working with bravo as a possible guest on a "real housewives" series, you are somebody -- i don't think wannabes is all that far from the mark. why are you so critical of bravo? do you think it would have helped the salahi ifs bravo would have made this footage available right away? >> absolutely. i don't think we would have seen that absolute kangaroo court, which i write about in the book, at capitol hill. those congressmen and women had already called this couple crooks and perpetrators, before any facts were known. before any hearings were held. i'm not hear to defend the salahis. i describe them in the book as being like mr. and mrs. thurston hal iii from gilligan's island.

they live in a different social strata than i do, and probably you too. >> that was a hit show. but you raise questions about their credibility. you concluded that michaele salahi lied in telling you and the public that she had once been a redskins washington cheerleader. >> yes. but i also said "the washington post" lied when they said she'd never been in the miss usa contest. she had been. i found that she was in the pennsylvania chapter in 1990. i can't police the salahis. i can help police my own profession. and my own profession messed up over and over and over again with this story. taking a lot of info from the blogasphere when they shouldn't have. >> we're coming up on a break, but don't people bear some responsibility to tell the story themselves, to answer reporters' questions, and therefore, they are partially to blame when folks get it wrong? >> yes. and they stayed silent on the advice of counsel for way too long in my opinion. i can't police them. and i'm not telling you this is a couple that is einstein-like.

but i'm telling you i wrote this book because the media's got to start getting it right. we did t with jonbenet ramsey's family, with the atlantic city bomber. there's a long list. and we've got to stop it. >> thank you so much, diane dimond. coming up next, tribune executives party on while they slide into bankruptcy and fox and friends blast off.

time now for the media monitor, our weekly look at the hits and errors in the news business. here's what i like. david karr's "new york times" investigation into the tribune company reveal an almost "animal house" atmosphere at the media conglomerate that sam ells bought and drove into bankruptcy. one executive said to have offered a $100 to bare her breasts. sex talk that some staffers said made them uncomfortable. ann marie la pinskey saying zell pressured her to be tougher on governor rod blagojevich, using a crude term for women's genitals while zell was trying to get blago's administration to buy wrigley field. not a pretty picture and not an easy subject to nail down. here's a story that really took off. fox and friends reporting on a futuristic development at the l.a. police department. >> the city of los angeles already ordering 10,000 jet packs for its police, paramedic, and fire departments. >> and they cost a gravity-the

defying $100,000 a piece. it came from the weekly "world news," not exactly a reliable origin of journalism. the jet pax are real, but there are only a couple in existence. cnn had some fun with the fox foul-up, but the host corrected the mistake during the same program. here's what i didn't like. what on earth was "the washington post" running a opinion piece by dinesh desouza, about how president obama is a kenyan anti-colonialist. he just peddled his same outlandioutlan outlandish theory. he ran several columns critical of desouza and wanted to give the author equal full-time. and finally a few words about me. for the last 29 years, yes, even before reliabbable sources was launched. my day job has been at "the washington