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In the wake of the General McChrystal firing because of the article titled: Runaway General, Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings is being berated for the fact that he was "hanging around" the general and his staff and therefore somehow must have hypnotized his crew into expressing thoughts and feelings that were classified. (Kind of like the Svengali-like powers only Russian spies in espionage novels by Robert Ludlum could possess.)

And after they were duped by his super powers of persuasion by the great 'hang out,' he was somehow able to put together the type of long form journalism that has been sorely lacking in the traditional media of today. You would think he would be celebrated by the mainstream press for getting a tremendous scoop by doing real investigative journalism, but instead he's being vilified. Are they just jealous, or do they feel their access is now threatened too? The type of access that allows them to print almost propaganda type press released, but gets them invited to cocktail parties.

I didn't realize Michael Hastings 'hang out' interview technique was so easy to do. Find a destination that is remote enough because let's face it, McChrystal was the general in charge of the entire Afghanistan war. It's not like he's hanging around a Jack In The Box, sucking down a a few tacos. Buy a couple of guys a drink at an Irish pub in France and suddenly they open up and tell what they think of Vice President Biden. That was very slimy of Michael Hastings, we now learn.

Here's Howard Kurtz:

KURTZ: And he got fired rather quickly by President Obama. Do you think that McChrystal and his top aides got so used to your hanging around that they let their guard down?

Yeah, the elite team that McChrystal assembled was easily distracted by the constant appearance of Hastings, so they let their guard down. And these are the men running a war. Don't you feel confident now that it will end soon?

Hastings' response:

HASTINGS: No. I don't think that was the case, because some of the most talked-about parts of the piece happened within the first 24 hours that I was with his team.

One of the most -- I guess people have called it inflammatory passages is when I quote a top adviser saying, "Biden -- did you say 'bite me'?" That was the second morning I was with them in Paris covering an on-the-record meeting that they were having to prepare for a speech later on.

I mean, in fly-on-the-wall journalism, you're there to capture exactly those kinds of moments.

But you were hanging around, Michael. Dammit, you unprofessional hack.

KURTZ: But when you are there --

HASTINGS: That what makes fly-on-the-wall journalism so wonderful to read.

KURTZ: When you are there that much, you don't think it's likely that McChrystal and his team assume that some of their joking, that some of their banter would be treated by you as off the record?

... You got some criticism for quoting one comment by one aide while he was getting drunk, or "hammered" is the way you put it. Any second thoughts about that?

HASTINGS: Which quote are you referring to?

KURTZ: I don't have the piece in front of me, but certainly it's been widely commented upon that there was some drinking going on.

Michael, I have a big show on CNN and I ask the questions because I'm the media critic even if I don't know what I'm asking about, OK? You fill in the blanks. And really, these people were getting shitfaced. Isn't that a bad time to ask them questions?

HASTINGS: Yes. There was drinking going on.

But the only quote from that scene, if I remember, were two of the top senior military officials singing a song that they called "The Afghanistan Song." So I quoted the refrain which was, "Afghanistan!" "Afghanistan!"

And then I quoted General McChrystal observing his men, and saying, "I'd die for these men, and they'd die for me." I don't see what's so controversial about those quotes.

Bam. Take that beeatch!

KURTZ: You certainly did illuminate the human side of war. Michael Hastings, thank you very much for joining us from Afghanistan.

Now let's hear from fellow Beltway Villager CBS Lara Logan who has been pretty damn good covering Iraq.

LOGAN: Well, it really depends on the circumstances. It's hard to know -- Michael Hastings, if you believe him, says that there were no ground rules laid out. And, I mean, that just doesn't really make a lot of sense to me, because if you look at the people around General McChrystal, if you look at his history, he was the Joint Special Operations commander. He has a history of not interacting with the media at all.

And his chief of intelligence, Mike Flynn, is the same. I mean, I know these people. They never let their guard down like that.

To me, something doesn't add up here. I just -- I don't believe it.

Interpretation: "F--k him, Howard, he beat me to the scoop so he must be full of shit."

Or maybe it was because he took the time out after meeting the general earlier and went by himself to seek out General McChrystal and his staff and ask to do a real article instead of using the all powerful EMAIL. Why travel to a hell hole like Kabul when you can email the general a few basic questions and wait for his reply in the comfort of your own home or office in D.C. or New York?

And then these people wonder why the public has such a dim view of their credibility.

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Bill O'Reilly has been on a mission to first destroy the credibility of Rolling Stone, that fine upstanding DFH mag, which includes the author of the piece that brought down Gen. Stanley McChrystal, Michael Hastings. And secondly, he's now attacking liberalism in general and blaming McChrystal's downfall on the idea that he's a liberal, so he deserved his fate.

And you know BillO hates Michael Hastings -- who once upon a time ran some scathing pieces on Bill O'Reilly's sexual peccadiloes -- so as usual he brings on Bernie "I hate Liberals" Goldberg to attack Michael Hastings and call him a weasel. He's blaming Hastings for ruining General McChrystal, which is absolutely ridiculous. Hastings didn't make anything up and the general and his staff have not refuted anything at all about the article.

BillO has not been able to prove that the general is a flaming treehugger -- he says so in this segment -- but that doesn't stop him from promoting the idea anyway. BillO uses Lara Logan's opinion about how the military grants access to journalists. She is shocked that there were no rigid ground rules.

UPDATE: Read Glenn Greenwald's piece on Lara Logan's response to Hastings.

That in itself is meaningless since Rolling Stone has said from the beginning that they were granted access to write their piece in its entirety. Bernie says she knows what she's talking about, but he can't prove that Hastings sandbagged the general and a reporter is not there to do PR for the military. Good for Bernie. Then Bill delves into liberal-conspiracy-land with Bernie happily along for the ride.

O'Reilly: I don't know his ideology, but when I heard that her's an avowed liberal who turned off FOX News in his office, which as you know is the most widely watched network on all the army, marine and naval bases, all over the globe by far...FOX NEWS,FOX NEWS, FOX NEWS. When he did that and I heard that,"OK, maybe his own ideology brought him down. I wonder if general McChrystal is as liberal now today as he was today before the Rolling Stone article? So I think you live by the liberal sword, you die by the liberal sword.

Goldberg: Exactly, exactly, God created irony. If you're a liberal military man and you take a liberal journalist into your confidence and then he turns around and screws you, I mean that's what we call ironic.

Ahhh, it's all so ironic, Bernie. Well, BillO and Bernie get to their own warped version of what it means to be a liberal and how the media will treat you. You see you stupid liberal military men. All liberals in the media will bring you down in a cloud of shame if you talk to them. Beware, only the halls of the NRO are worthy for you because they will protect you no matter what you say. That's real journalistic integrity. Then Bernie says in a fit of hubris that if Hastings pretended to like McChrystal to win his confidence and he knew he was going to screw him before he did the interview, then Hastings is dishonest. It's killing these wingnuts that General McChrystal might actually be a lefty. The man dubbed the savior of Afghanistan even hates FOX News.

Bill's proof that he must be a liberal is found in Marc Ambinder's piece, which says he is a liberal and banned FOX News from his office. I like him a little more if this is true, but O'Reilly's idea that he got the axe because he was a liberal is absurd as usual.

Today there's a report in CNN which has a military spokesman saying that Hastings didn't fact check some of his quotes.

But days after his ouster, one military official who worked for McChrystal in Afghanistan has told CNN that many of the controversial quotes in the article were never meant to be used on-the-record. But at no point did the official dispute the accuracy of comments about the president or other key administration officials that appeared in the article.

If you have access as a journalist to do an article then he/she is not going to refrain from including controversial comments because you suddenly realize that you made a mistake in making those comments for the record for the fact.

Bill O'Reilly then defends his own "ambush" tactics by calling it "eye to eye' and 'face to face' with someone you want answers from directly.

O'Reilly: ...This Hastings is a weasel, Bernie. He's a weasel. You know he's a weasel. This is a weasel with a capital "W"

Goldberg: I suspect he is...

And there you have it, Michael Hastings must be a weasel and McChrystal is a liberal and deserved his fate.

If this is real resistance, and not a choreographed dance to make himself look "strong," we might possibly (it's a long shot, I know) avoid sinking deeper into this Afghanistan quagmire:

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama does not plan to accept any of the Afghanistan war options presented by his national security team, pushing instead for revisions to clarify how and when U.S. troops would turn over responsibility to the Afghan government, a senior administration official said Wednesday.

That stance comes in the midst of forceful reservations about a possible troop buildup from the U.S. ambassador in Afghanistan, Karl Eikenberry, according to a second top administration official.

In strongly worded classified cables to Washington, Eikenberry said he had misgivings about sending in new troops while there are still so many questions about the leadership of Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

Obama is still close to announcing his revamped war strategy — most likely shortly after he returns from a trip to Asia that ends on Nov. 19.

But the president raised questions at a war council meeting Wednesday that could alter the dynamic of both how many additional troops are sent to Afghanistan and what the timeline would be for their presence in the war zone, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss Obama's thinking.

Military officials said Obama has asked for a rewrite before and resisted what one official called a one-way highway toward war commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal's recommendations for more troops. The sense that he was being rushed and railroaded has stiffened Obama's resolve to seek information and options beyond military planning, officials said, though a substantial troop increase is still likely.