Posted on 06/19/2006 7:56:13 PM PDT by LdSentinal
LOS ANGELES (Hollywood Reporter) -- CBS is expected to announce today that former "CBS Evening News" anchor Dan Rather will leave the network after 44 years.
Rather's contract runs through November, but he is expected to leave CBS immediately to pursue other opportunities.
A special tribute to Rather's career is expected to appear on tonight's "CBS Evening News."
The move was widely expected in the past few weeks after Rather, 74, had said that he would be leaving CBS after negotiations on a new contract hadn't guaranteed him anything but an office at the network.
After leaving "CBS Evening News" in March 2005, Rather became a full-time correspondent with "60 Minutes." While he filed several stories that appeared on "60 Minutes," Rather was said to be unhappy that he hadn't been working on anything in recent weeks.
His position with the network had been strained after a September 2004 report he did for "60 Minutes Wednesday" that questioned President Bush's National Guard service during the Vietnam War. The report, which was prepared by producer Mary Mapes and only involved Rather minimally, was based on documents that failed to live up to intense scrutiny.
Mapes was fired, and three other executives were forced to resign. Rather wasn't disciplined but said before Thanksgiving 2004 that he would leave the anchor desk the following March.
Rather is said to be talking to others about opportunities, including doing a one-hour newscast/interview show for HDNet. HDNet chief Mark Cuban, who also owns the National Basketball Association's Dallas Mavericks, confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter on Friday that he was talking to Rather Rather's departure would close a career with CBS News that has been one of the most distinguished in network news history.
After becoming famous as the reporter who first confirmed that President Kennedy had been assassinated in November 1963 in Dallas, Rather has covered the Johnson and Nixon White Houses, Watergate, the Vietnam War, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Gulf War, the war in Iraq and much more. He was anchor of "CBS Evening News" from 1981-2005.
Rather didn't respond to an interview request Monday.
Don't let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya.
Being the weather guy is some backwater town would be too good for Dan.
About 44 years too late.
They could send him to Houston to cover the flood and he would have gone full circle. Again!
Good riddance to one of the biggest "morans" in newscasting!
Heard Kinkos is hiring.
Actually I find it a sad end to an amazing career. I did not agree with him on his politics, but I certainly do not wish him ill.
I guess Cronkite has a new pool boy.
On the way out the door I hope he trips and gets splinters.
Sorry, I cannot agree with you on this one.
Oh, isn't that special. You are so nice. Barf.
Maybe Danno should contact the Psychic Friends Network. I hear they're big on "fake but accurate."
Don't you just love the way the MSM puts these things? The word is "forge," Rooters, forged. Forged.
And Rather not only tried to pass of obviously forged documents on his viewers, he stubbornly refused to admit it afterwards. And he deliberately lied again when he said that experts had checked out the documents for CBS. The experts had said no such thing, even though they were tame experts paid by CBS.
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