Posted on 09/19/2005 8:36:17 PM PDT by aculeus
NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Former CBS News anchor Dan Rather said Monday that there is a climate of fear running through newsrooms stronger than he has ever seen in his more than four-decade career.
Rather famously tangled with President Nixon and his aides during the Watergate years while Rather was a hard-charging White House correspondent.
Addressing the Fordham University School of Law in Manhattan, occasionally forcing back tears, he said that in the intervening years, politicians "of every persuasion" had gotten better at applying pressure on the conglomerates that own the broadcast networks. He called it a "new journalism order."
He said this pressure -- along with the "dumbed-down, tarted-up" coverage, the advent of 24-hour cable competition and the chase for ratings and demographics -- has taken its toll on the news business. "All of this creates a bigger atmosphere of fear in newsrooms," Rather said.
Rather was accompanied by HBO Documentary and Family president Sheila Nevins, both of whom were due to receive lifetime achievement awards at the News and Documentary Emmy Awards on Monday evening.
Nevins said that even in the documentary world, there's a certain kind of intimidation brought to bear these days, particularly from the religious right.
"If you made a movie about (evolutionary biologist Charles) Darwin now, it would be revolutionary," Nevins said. "If we did a documentary on Darwin, I'd get a thousand hate e-mails."
Nevin asked Rather if he felt the same type of repressive forces in the Nixon administration as in the current Bush administration.
"No, I do not," Rather said. That's not to say there weren't forces trying to remove him from the White House beat while reporting on Watergate; but Rather said he felt supported by everyone above him, from Washington bureau chief Bill Small to then-news president Dick Salant and CBS chief William S. Paley.
"There was a connection between the leadership and the led . . . a sense of, 'we're in this together,"' Rather said. It's not that the then-leadership of CBS wasn't interested in shareholder value and profits, Rather said, but they also saw news as a public service. Rather said he knew very little of the intense pressure to remove him in the early 1970s because of his bosses' support.
Nevins took up the cause for Rather, who was emotional several times during the event.
"When a man is close to tears discussing his work and his lip quivers, he deserves bosses who punch back. I feel I would punch back for Dan," Nevins said.
Rather praised the coverage of Hurricane Katrina by the new generation of TV journalists and acknowledged that he would have liked to have reported from the Gulf Coast. "Covering hurricanes is something I know something about," he said.
"It's been one of television news' finest moments," Rather said of the Katrina coverage. He likened it to the coverage of President Kennedy's assassination in 1963.
"They were willing to speak truth to power," Rather said of the coverage.
Rather sidestepped the question of what should happen to the evening news in the expected makeover. "Not my call," he said. And he said he hadn't been asked, either.
"I gave it everything I had, I didn't hold anything back. I did the best newscast we were capable of doing," Rather said.
Nevins, who almost single-handedly has kept the art of the independent documentary on television, said the HBO documentaries show real life and do it with as little damage to the subjects as possible. She said the producers and directors "respect mostly the people on the other side of the camera."
Nevins said she didn't shy away from such R-rated topics as "G-String Divas" and "Taxicab Confessions" but noted that sex and passion have been topics of literature since Chaucer's day. "The most R-rated is a body bag, not a naked body," Nevins said.
... suspense ... suspense ... (NOT) ...
Dan Rather!!
... suspense ... suspense ... (NOT) ...
Dan Rather!!
Rather's NUTS!
Perfected by the Clinton administration where the "news" rooms coached him through to victory as President not once but twice. You're damn right WE are going to fight back against a "news" department like that!
We mustn't deamnd accuracy from journalists. It might interfere with how they do their jobs.
HBO's Sheila Nevins
As executive VP of original programming at HBO, she is in charge of documentaries and family programming for HBO, Cinemax and their multiplex channels.
"Thank you, Dr. Suzy, for showing me that sex education can be sexy television."
Sheila Nevins, Executive Vice President, Original Programming, HBO
Lifetime achievement award for what? Most inept use of a forgery?
November 06, 1996
NEW YORK CITY, NOVEMBER 6 1996 --The Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) announces the Fairness Awards, established to honor a long-term commitment to fairness by leading supporters of equal rights nationwide. Honorees are HBO's Sheila Nevins and the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. The Awards will be presented during a luncheon at the Rainbow Room, located at 75 Rockefeller Plaza, on November 19, 1996 at Noon.
The GLAAD Fairness Awards recognizes corporate leaders and institutions that are on the front lines in the battle for fair and accurate representation of gay men and lesbians. Fairness Awards recipients demonstrate exemplary leadership in combating discrimination based on sexual orientation through education, communications and civil rights protection.
"The tireless work of Sheila Nevins and the attorneys of Skadden, Arps clearly shows how our nation's corporate and cultural landscape has grown to embrace all Americans-including lesbians and gay men," said Peggy Brady, Co-Chair of GLAAD's Board of Directors. "GLAAD's Fairness Awards honor them with recognition from their peers and the public at large for their work to end intolerance and bigotry and to promote fairness."
Sheila Nevins, HBO's Senior Vice President of Documentaries and Family Programming, is responsible for overseeing the development and production of all documentaries and family programming at HBO. Sheila has supervised the production of more than 150 programs, winning 35 CableACE Awards, 12 Emmy Awards, eight George Foster Peabody Awards and five Academy Awards. Among her most notable programs dealing with lesbian and gay issues are: The Celluloid Closet; Why Am I Gay?; More Than Friends: The Coming Out of Heidi Leiter; The Broadcast Tapes of Dr. Peter; Cinemax's Singing Positive; and the upcoming Paul Monette: The Brink of Summer's End.
With more than 1,100 attorneys in 21 offices, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom is one of the largest law firms in the world, providing a wide array of legal services domestically and internationally. The firm represents a broad spectrum of clients, from small high-tech start-up companies to more than one third of the Fortune 250 industrial corporations, in addition to many financial and governmental entities. Skadden, Arps also maintains a strong commitment to pro bono legal services, as evidenced by the firm's active pro bono program, its unique Skadden Fellowship Program and its supports of individual Skadden, Arps' attorneys pursuing pro bono causes, including lesbian and gay rights advocacy and legal advice.
Featured speakers at the GLAAD Fairness Awards luncheon are the Honorable Bruce Lehman, Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks; Jeff Bewkes, Chairman and CEO of HBO; esteemed television journalist and producer Linda Ellerbee; and Tom Stoddard, former Executive Director of Lambda Legal Defense Fund.
Ticket prices for individuals are $300 and $500 (for preferred seating and a program listing), and are $3,000 for tables of ten and $5,000 for corporate sponsors (both include a program listing plus an ad for corporate sponsors). To purchase tickets, please call Mark Tadlock at GLAAD at (212) 807-1700. Requests for tickets must be received by November 11, 1996.
GLAAD was founded in 1985 by a group of writers, including the late Celluloid Closet author Vito Russo, who were outraged by the defamatory headlines about AIDS in the New York Post. They mobilized to change the way lesbians and gay men are represented in all forms of media. Today GLAAD is a national organization that effectively mobilizes public response to media coverage and educates media professionals on lesbian and gay issues and concerns. GLAAD has offices in New York, Los Angeles, Washington, San Francisco and Northampton (MA) and affiliates in Atlanta, Kansas City and St. Louis.
GLAAD is the nation's lesbian and gay news bureau and the only national lesbian and gay media watchdog organization. GLAAD promotes fair, accurate, and inclusive representation as a means of challenging discrimination based on sexual orientation or identity.
Rather whimpered like a baby because he is a pariah and he knows it. Nobody, but nobody - - including his old buddies at CBS - - want anything to do with Rather. The rest of his days will be spent looking for speech gigs at liberal venues (mostly colleges) and hoping for the occasional interview request, which he can pretend to entertain for a day as if he's still a big star.
That pig resigned in disgrace just as surely as Nixon did.
It was like The View. Presided over by Sheila Nevins (standing in for Barbara) and together with associate producer Sara Bernstein and producer Lisa Heller, we huddled round analyzing every line, processing every nuance in obsessive scrutiny. It wasn't uncommon to spend four hours on a conference call or twelve hours watching a rough cut, poring over every detail. And we fought with an intensity that took us all by surprise. Rarely it seemed did we agree about anything, alternating between pity for Monica to incomprehension at how she could have gotten herself into this mess.
LOL !!! PING
Wasn't Trudeau's 'Roland Hedley' supposed to be Dan Rather?
Sheesh. It must have been at least 20 years ago that I could even stomach Trudeau's crap.
Yeah, it's really hell suddenly being held to some kind of minimal standard for truth and accuracy in reporting (by pajama people, no less) after getting away with telling lies and half-truths your whole career.
Yeah, you weaasels. Tell the truth with a vengeance, or lose your jobs and reputations.
Dan Blather is an a$$hole of the first order!
Danny Boy you are a liar, a creepy liar. FreeRepublic ended your career. And not one report on Juanita Broaddrick.
He did try to turn an election. But, being human and very ambitious, his principal motivation was to get a scoop, to be the first with the mostest. And he didn't report a falsehood. He made assertions which couldn't be adequately substantiated. Quite a different thing.
Katrina coverage was nothing short of a Bush hit piece..Half truth and biased reporting. Yea Dan , I BET you wish you were involved in it .
He made assertions which couldn't be adequately substantiated. Quite a different thing.
He made assertions that he didnt BOTHER to substantiate because it was a HIT PIECE on Bush and THAT"S what he was most concerned with .Violated the most basic law of reporting.
Despite his protests, does anyone doubt that he'd jump at the chance to host a prime time show on Fox News if it was offered?
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