Fair, balanced and ... bogus.
That's Faux News military analysis.
By JIM RUTENBERG
New York Times
April 28, 2002
Joseph A. Cafasso knows people — retired admirals, generals, government officials. More to the point, he has said, he knows his way around the netherworld of counterintelligence through contacts he built during a sterling career as a lieutenant colonel in the Special Forces.
The Fox News Channel thought it had found an asset when it hired the gruff, barrel-chested former military man as a consultant to help in its coverage of the fighting in Afghanistan. He claimed to have won the Silver Star for bravery, served in Vietnam and was part of the secret, failed mission to rescue hostages in Iran in 1980.
For more than four months, Mr. Cafasso assisted and shared tips with reporters, producers and on-air consultants. Then on March 11, he abruptly left Fox amid complaints that he had overstepped his bounds and had become an annoyance. Soon afterward, Fox News, and many associates of Mr. Cafasso, learned that his office style may have been the least of his problems. The real story, many people say, was that he was not who he said he was.
He released a statement on Sunday in which he said he was the victim of a "gossip campaign" by "self-centered individuals with their own political agendas."
People at Fox News had taken his credentials at face value. So had the presidential campaign of Patrick J. Buchanan, for which he was an organizer; WABC radio in New York; and several representatives, military officials and activists to whom he had sold himself for years. But records indicate that his total military experience was 44 days of boot camp at Fort Dix, N.J., in May and June 1976, and his honorable discharge as a private, first class.
Mr. Cafasso had promised to appear at The New York Times to provide documents contradicting records that he only served in boot camp but never appeared. Military officials said they had no record of anyone named Joseph Cafasso retiring as an lieutenant colonel.
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