George W Bush Great President oor Greatest President?

[Final-Fan]

HappySqurriel said:

Final-Fan said:
Well, I guess I was exaggerating, but unless someone lied to me the Bush administration got the New York Times to hold off on breaking the warrantless wiretapping scandal until it wouldn't endanger the 2004 elections. That's unheard-of!

As a guess, someone lied to you ...

Heading into the 2004 elections many major news organizations were doing anything in their power to make George W. Bush look bad; and CBS took it to an extreme level when Dan Rather accepted fabricated documents to slander George W. Bush, and wouldn't retract the story even after the documents were proven to be fraudulent. In the wake of the Dan Rather scandal (pretty much) every major news organization started actually checking facts and ensuring their story was correct before running it. It is extremely likely that any delay from the New York Times was from fact checking rather than from any efforts from the President.

Hmm ... looks like you may be partly right.  

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2006/08/14/times/index.html

It sounds like although the Times dragged its feet somewhat on this story, they would have been pushing the envelope to get it out before the election.   And it sounds like the Bush administration's interference was the usual, "What?  Illegal?  Nooo...", instead of political pressure.  

But they could easily have done it in time to screw Bush if they'd wanted to.