How biased do you have to be to be fired from C-BS?

“Last night, retired Army Maj. Gen. John Batiste appeared on MSNBC‚Äôs ‚ÄúCountdown With Keith Olbermann.‚Äù Batiste has been a CBS News consultant, but last night it was disclosed that he has been asked to leave that position due to his participation in an ad criticizing President Bush. Says Batiste in the ad: “Mr. President, you have placed our nation in peril.” You can watch the “Countdown” segment here.

CBS News Vice President, Standards and Special Projects Linda Mason confirmed to me that Batiste was asked to vacate his position.

“When we hire someone as a consultant, we want them to share their expertise with our viewers,” she said. “By putting himself front and center in an anti-Bush ad, the viewer might have the feeling everything he says is anti-Bush. And that doesn’t seem like an analytical approach to the issues we want to discuss.”

She said that Batiste’s appearance in the ad marked a violation of CBS News standards, in which ‚Äúwe ask that people not be involved in advocacy.‚Äù

The lefties are up in arms crying foul. Amazing that they cry foul only when the person fired is a Bush basher and not the other way around. Fact is that all news consultants are forbidden by contract to participate in political ads unless it is revealed that they are a political operative and thus paid for that imput. Batiste simply violated his contract and was terminated.

Batiste has become the foremost of political hacks since retiring and quite frankly if I had the authority I would revoke his retirement status as well. Nevertheless this is what they call, “What goes around”. Now he can hang out with Crazy Keith which are the sort of bedfellows Batiste calls friends today.