Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: blackbart.223
After forty two years? His ratings are in the crapper and yet CBS hangs on to him. I don't get it but CBS better figure it out.

Regardless of what the CBS organizational chart says, Dan Rather is the de facto head of CBS News. Only Andrew Heyward could even challenge him, and Heyward's neck-deep in this scandal as well, so he can't make a move.

On top of that, CBS has been the worst network news organization for many years now. They have few resources and no bench strength, so nobody is there that could take over for Dan and have any near-term positive effect on the ratings, or the newsroom morale.

Their only hope is if Viacom would allow a big payout to lure somebody else to jump ship from another TV network. And considering what a cesspool CBS News is in its current form, I doubt anyone at Viacom is interested in spending the funds.

8 posted on 09/24/2004 11:20:09 PM PDT by Dont Mention the War (Calvinism Fever: Catch It! (Or don't. It's not like it's going to do you any good anyway...))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies ]


To: Dont Mention the War
"And considering what a cesspool CBS News is in its current form, I doubt anyone at Viacom is interested in spending the funds."

I guess Viacom is rational enough to avoid a loss of money.

9 posted on 09/24/2004 11:30:52 PM PDT by blackbart.223
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies ]

To: Dont Mention the War
Your post is absolutely correct. There have been several disconnects from reality in the reporting of this story. The first, and I think deliberate, incorrect information, is the assumption that Rather was duped. Rather has never been a reporter. He is a political idealogue and a propagandist. He also epitomizes the Godless mind, which does not believe in the concept of truth. His interview, where he stated that Bill Clinton could lie about many things and still be an honest man illustrates this. In the Bush story, he didn't care whether the story was true or not. He didn't care if the documents were forged. He didn't care if Ben Barnes was making up his story, and that Barnes directly contradicted his own earlier statements. He didn't care if Bill Burkett was mentally unbalanced. The only question he had was, "can we get away with it?"

The second point is exactly what you said. People keep talking about Rather getting in trouble with the brass at CBS News. Rather IS CBS News. He had enough power to block Cronkite from doing any on air work after he stepped down from the anchor desk.

I also think Rather has gone senile. For several years now, he's looked about as balanced as Jerry Lewis in the last two hours of the MD marathon. Rather is the same dishonest propagandist he's been for his entire career, but he's lost a step and can't make up stories as well as he used to. Also, of course, the leftists in the old media don't control the agenda anymore. Ten years ago, he would have gotten away with these crappy forgeries, just like Bill Clinton was able to mush the Flowers affair and his summer in the Soviet Union when he was supposedly at Oxford. It ain't happening anymore.

30 posted on 09/25/2004 9:01:13 AM PDT by Richard Kimball (Kerry Campaign: An army of pompous phrases moving across the landscape in search of an idea)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies ]

To: Dont Mention the War
Dan Rather's eternal return ends here with the collapse of his reputation and the collapse of the 20th-century American news industry in which he was one of the last grand potentates. And it is a bleak end, unless he can console himself with the thought that he didn't fail to live up to the standards of his predecessors. He followed perfectly in their footsteps.

Highlighting from the article.

34 posted on 09/25/2004 10:02:09 AM PDT by cyncooper (Have I mentioned lately that I despise the media?)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson