The right loses its hero at CBS

CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, known for her critical reporting on the Obama administration, resigned on Monday, bringing an end to months of hard-fought negotiations stemming from her dissatisfaction with the network, sources familiar with her departure told POLITICO.

Attkisson, who had been with CBS News for more than two decades, had grown frustrated with what she saw as the network’s liberal bias, an outsize influence by the network’s corporate partners, and a lack of dedication to investigative reporting, several sources said. She increasingly felt that her work was no longer supported and that it was a struggle to get her reporting on air.

At the same time, Attkisson’s coverage of the Obama administration, which some CBS staffers characterized as agenda-driven, had led network executives to doubt the impartiality of her reporting. The bulk of Attkisson’s work since 2009 has focused on the failures or perceived failures of the administration, including its troubled green-energy investments and the attack in Benghazi.

The White House declined to comment for this story. It is well known in Washington that Attkisson’s work has touched a nerve in the administration.

With CBS in the rear-view mirror, Attkisson is also at work on a book — tentatively titled, “Stonewalled: One Reporter’s Fight for Truth in Obama’s Washington” — that addresses what she describes as the challenges of reporting critically on the administration. That book, which is being published by HarperCollins, a division of NewsCorp (and not by Simon & Schuster, a division of CBS Corp.), was also said to be a source of frustration among some executives.

Feeling increasingly stymied and marginalized at the network, Attkisson began talking to CBS News President David Rhodes as early as last April about getting out of her contract. Those negotiations intensified in recent weeks, and her request was finally honored on Monday.

Reached by phone, Attkisson described her resignation as “amicable.” In a statement released later, she said it has been “one of life’s great privileges to work at CBS News and I’m sincerely grateful for the many opportunities I’ve had.”

Oops, more of the article.

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“Sonya McNair, senior vice president for communications for CBS News, said in a statement: “CBS News veteran Sharyl Attkisson is leaving the news division to pursue other endeavors. We appreciate her many contributions and we wish her well.”

But Attkisson had become a polarizing figure at the network, sources there said. While some championed her relentless dedication to investigations — ranging from defective Firestone tires to the “Fast and Furious” gun-walking case — others saw evidence of a political agenda, particularly against President Barack Obama.

Pat Shevlin, the executive producer of CBS Evening News, was especially wary of Attkisson’s motives and had even dismissed her, in private, as a partisan carrying water for Republicans, sources said. Shevlin often turned down Attkisson’s pitches, especially when they pertained to the attacks in Benghazi, they said.

Others have suggested that CBS News — and Shevlin in particular — are where the bias is to be found. “It’s no secret that Sharyl has been unhappy about CBS’s lack of interest in investigative reporting, especially when it comes to stories about the Obama administration,” a source close to Attkisson said.

Whatever the case, Attkisson’s profile on CBS News programming has diminished in recent years. From 2007 to 2009, Attkisson was among the top 20 most prominent reporters on the major network’s nightly news broadcasts, averaging two-and-a-half hours of on-air time a year, according to the network news analyst Andrew Tyndall. Since 2009, she’s dropped out of the top 20. On Monday, Tyndall told The Washington Post’s Erik Wemple that Attkisson appeared for just 54 minutes on “The CBS Evening News” in 2013, a third of her previous totals. “She was obviously being sidelined,” Tyndall said. “

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“Attkisson joined CBS News from CNN in 1993. She served as an overnight anchor for two years before becoming a Washington-based correspondent, a position she held until this week. She has won five Emmy awards for her reporting on Fast and Furious, the Red Cross, Republican fundraising, TARP and border patrol.

In interviews with POLITICO last year, Attkisson’s defenders describe her as a dogged reporter, driven not by partisan ideology but by a strong skepticism of government. Producers at CBS News once nicknamed her “Pit Bull,” a source said, because she gets on a story and won’t let go.
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“She goes after the stories others won’t go after, and she was right to go after them,” Greta Van Susteren, the Fox News host, said at the time.

“She is actually doing what journalists are supposed to do,” said Laura Ingraham, the conservative radio host. “That’s not easy in Washington, D.C., where we have a president with whom the majority of reporters agree with politically.”

Among Attkisson’s most notable achievements was her landmark report about the Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal, which earned her an Emmy award. She has also reported extensively on the Obama administration’s failed green energy investments and has made a sustained effort to try to uncover information about the September 11, 2012, attacks in Benghazi.

Such reports have caused headaches for the Obama White House, which sees Attkisson as an agenda-driven partisan. In an interview with Ingraham, in 2011, she said that officials from both the White House and the Justice Department had yelled and screamed at her because of her Fast and Furious report.

“[The White House and Justice Department] will tell you that I’m the only reporter — as they told me — that is not reasonable,” Attkisson told Ingraham at the time. “They say The Washington Post is reasonable, the L.A. Times is reasonable, The New York Times is reasonable, I’m the only one who thinks this is a story, and they think I’m unfair and biased by pursuing it.”

Liberal media watchdogs have tried to discredit some of Attkisson’s work. Media Matters For America has accused her of “shoddy, irresponsible reporting” and pointed to holes in her reporting on green energy and autism vaccines.

But those who know Attkisson describe her as more anti-authority than partisan, and are quick to point out the investigations she’s done into Republican wrongdoing, including a 2008 probe into the so-called “TARP Bait & Switch” under then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson (which won her an Emmy award for investigative reporting) and a March 2012 report on GOP freshmen hobnobbing with fundraisers at a resort in Key Largo.

“You ask what makes Sharyl tick: It’s that she’s highly skeptical of people in power, and right now the people in power are Democrats,” one source said last year. “I don’t see her as an agenda-driven reporter.”

“[Attkisson believes] that public officials and federal officials work for us, and that it’s gotten to the point where they don’t believe that they should be held accountable,” another source said. “That’s not partisan.” “

Uncle Walter went to 'Nam and saw the Tet Offensive unfolding.

He soiled his pants and as a result of his reportage the war lost popular support.

Never mind that the Tet Offensive was the last gasp of the enemy and that all of their gains were erased in short order.

Uncle Walter, together with Kerry and Fonda, make up the Unholy Trinity who snatched Defeat out of the jaws of Victory.

Look at the bloodbath that was unleashed after our departure! Hundreds of thousands dead and hundreds of thousands dispersed. How many of the Boat People died trying to get out or having gotten out died on the ocean? Those deaths are on Kerry's hands, on Fonda's hands and on Cronkite's hands.

Yes, I'm still bitter after forty-five years. Good men died in that war, which was an honorable cause. We won every engagement in the field and we were kicking ass when I was medevacked out.

This year (2012) on Memorial Day, there will be a ceremony at the Wall at which Obama will speak. I have no desire to hear anything that Marxist bastard has to say regarding the Vietnam War. He was in his nappies then, has never served and has no clue what it means to serve your country in the military.

His presence on that site profanes the memory of the brave men and women who served, bled, and died in that war.

Thank the Lord for the brave men and women who fell in Vietnam and in all the wars we have waged on our Nation's behalf! By virtue of their service and sacrifice we continue to live in Freedom!

America demands Justice for the Fallen of Benghazi!

O stranger, tell the Lacedaemonians that we lie here, obedient to their command.

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

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