Posted on 04/11/2008 3:33:26 AM PDT by abb
A wide-ranging discussion in February about Katie Couric’s future as the anchor of the “CBS Evening News” threatened on Thursday to turn her into a virtual lame duck in the job.
The discussion took place in New York on Feb. 28 and involved four people: Ms. Couric; her agent, Alan Berger of the Creative Artists Agency; Sean McManus, the president of CBS News; and Leslie Moonves, the chairman of CBS. The meeting took place in Mr. Moonves’s office.
The conversation included what one participant said was some “idle talk and musings” about the big question hanging over CBS News: should Ms. Couric leave her position as the news anchor after the presidential election, a development that had long been rumored.
No one involved in the meeting or briefed on its particulars would be identified for attribution because of the delicate nature of the talks. But Ms. Couric discussed several things she might do if she left the anchor post, according to the executives, including a daily talk show to be syndicated by CBS, or replacing Larry King in a prime-time position on CNN. (Ms. Couric was said to have dismissed out of hand the suggestion that she could return to morning television on the network’s perennially troubled “Early Show.”)
But the conclusion drawn from the meeting, the executives said, was that no decision about the anchor job would be made until after the presidential election and inauguration.
However, rumors from CBS News and reported in the news media may have, inadvertently or not, done what the meeting failed to do: ensured Ms. Couric’s early departure.
Though some people close to Ms. Couric, as well as some professional associates, said Thursday they believed... she would not remain as anchor through the election, and might leave in the next few weeks...
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(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
ping
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-couric11apr11,1,3538087.story
From the Los Angeles Times
Couric seen as discontented at CBS
People close to the CBS News situation say the anchor is frustrated over her program’s ratings.
By Matea Gold
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
April 11, 2008
NEW YORK — Amid swirling news reports that Katie Couric may exit the “CBS Evening News” after the November elections, multiple people close to the situation describe a discontented anchor who is conflicted about whether she wants to continue laboring on the third-place newscast.
Couric has yet to indicate that she is ready to leave the broadcast, but her departure is widely considered a foregone conclusion inside CBS News, according to half a dozen staffers bracing for another anchor transition.
Frustrated by the program’s performance, Couric discussed the possibility of leaving her post several months ago with CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves and CBS News President Sean McManus, according to people familiar with the conversations.
In their talks, which centered primarily on ways to bolster the newscast and Couric’s profile, the anchor and the executives agreed to table discussion about her future until after the November election, said the people, who stressed that no decisions have been made.
Although the “CBS Evening News” still lags far behind its competitors on NBC and ABC, news executives are pleased that the broadcast has regained a hard-edged tone and believe that more viewers may tune in as the 2008 presidential election gains steam.
snip
“Probably to save his own ass...”
The whole bunch of them ought to be fired, but that’s another story.
So if Perky Katie and the CBS suits are strait-shooting, play-it-down-the-middle, unbiased journalists with no axe to grind and no dog in this fight, why should they care whether or not the axe falls on her pretty little neck before or after the Presidential Election?
Wouldn't the time of increased interest in the run-up to a Presidential Election be the ideal time to roll out a new anchor and build loyalty to the new program?
And yet, they are determined to waste this opportunity by keeping Perky Katie in place until January. Why?
What in hell kind of a name is “Moonves” anyway?
and in a bold move to gain new viewers offer the position to Tony Snow
Countdown to Couric’s Jonah-heave.
It's just Hillary cleaning house.
You can dress this pig (Katie Couric) any way ya care to. She still is a pig in a poke and the vast majority of Americans with any brains will not watch her dribble her antiAmerican b.s.
Don’t know who she knew or who she blew past to get this job in the 1st place.
Redstone’s and Moonves’s political donations make interesting reading.
..... or replacing Larry King in a prime-time position on CNN......
Hmmm.... does this lend credance to the rumor that CBS is in talks with CNN? Is CBS counting chicks before they are hatched?
Regarding Redstone? I thought he spun off CBS from Viacom. Is he still involved with CBS.
Because Perky Katie is a certified Demorat and left-wing Moonbat!! Cant take a risk before THE ELECTION of the Century.
Currently, Redstone owns over seventy percent of the voting stock of Viacom, which, in actuality, is a not wholly-owned subsidiary of National Amusements, which is his privately held, family-owned company. CBS Corporation, likewise, is controlled by Redstone through National Amusements. Redstone also owns over eighty-nine percent of Midway Games, both individually and through National Amusements.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumner_Redstone
http://www.secinfo.com/dXQxb.tm.htm
.....CBS Corporation, likewise, is controlled by Redstone through National Amusements....
Thanks
Even though CBS was “spun off” from Viacom, in reality it was merely an accounting function to create a separate business entity. The same person (Sumner Redstone) owns it and runs it.
Two words: Identity Politics
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