On CBS News

[lionkingcmsl]

There are some that are calling for the ouster of Mr. Rather.

There is apparently a ground swell of opinion against the veteran news caster in regard to those "memos" and subsequent behavior after people started to question their validity.

Mr. Rather and CBS News have apologized about the story. Is that enough? Should Mr. Rather resign gracefully? I don't know.

However, I will remind, those that think that Mr. Rather is safe in his position as news anchor, that TV news is business. BIG business.

It probably is safe to assume that CBS will be watching the Nielsen ratings for its CBS Evening News with Dan Rather for the foreseeable future. If there is a major viewer loss, then CBS will possibly rethink its contract with Mr. Rather.

There is more however. CBS' parent company, Viacom, may, and possibly will, be pressured by its advertisers on the Evening News. I know as a company, that was advertising on a news show, I would expect a level of fair, responsible and accurate reporting to be done. If I felt that this was not the case then I would at least threaten, if not in actuality, pull my ads off of said programming, and possibly off the entire network.

This type of financial pressure, coupled with the possible loss of millions of viewers would put the CBS News/Dan Rather relationship on rather (no pun intended) shaky grounds.

As I have said, it is not for me to say if Mr. Rather should be ousted, either by him resigning or being fired, or not, but this is a reminder to people the news is no longer a "public service" of the broadcast companies, like it once was. It is now very big business, and if you don't fit in with the company's "vision" then out you go, no matter what your name is or status may be.

Comments

[yaochi.livejournal.com]

The big problem and issue for CBS News is the level of denial and obfuscation of the evident and obvious that they did in initial response to getting caught with their pants down. They circled their wagons when they would have been so much wiser to have simply come clean.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Rather still refuses to say these are forgeries. They simply "cannot be authenticated", but their content is "still true".

===|==============/ Level Head

[yaochi.livejournal.com]

And by so stubbornly doing so, he is squandering his credibility and losing the trust of his audience.

[the-lizard-rat.livejournal.com]

I think it's time for Danny Boy to go. While I haven't been paying attention to all of this, it seems like Dan would NORMALLY have the smarts to wise up and say "Okay, so we were duped, let's put it behind us, we've had slip ups in the past. NEXT STORY!" Or something to that effect.

If he's still saying these are real, then he's only deluding himself rather than John Q Public.

Lizard Rat out.
John R. Public in New Haven CT

[ceruleanst.livejournal.com]

"Cannot be authenticated" are the right words. There isn't any significant evidence that they are forgeries or not. Political bloggers don't know jack cheese about typography, and to call something into question is not to debunk it.

[kelloggs2066.livejournal.com]

Come on, Kevin, you're a lot smarter than that.

If the bloggers can reproduce the documents using MS Word in a few hours, they evidently know a good deal more about typography than the experts CBS called in. (Who actually raised concerns, and Dan Rather chose to ignore.)

Personally, I thought that one of the Bloggers who was quoted in the Investor's Business Daily summed it up very well. (Sorry, I don't have a direct quote. Going from memory of the hardcopy.):

CBS's basic complaint against Bloggers is that they 'do not have editors'. The Blog guy basically said that if the news team at CBS gets something wrong, they have one or two editors to catch it. On the Web, he has *thousands* of editors. If he posts something that's incorrect, *thousands* of people will point it out and correct it.

Heck, I'm a web small fry, even I can attest to this. If I screw up the science in my strip, Boy Howdy do I ever hear about it!

[lowen-kind.livejournal.com]

The last part of your reply is exactly what I'm talking about.

And the CBS editors can, in the past, let something slip by them and not hear about it for days, if not weeks later, if ever.

On the web it is immediate. I know I've e-mailed the_gneech as soon as a comic went up of a typo.

The same is true with blog's. I refresh my friends page every so often and I've called out mistakes to people.

The same is true for forums and news groups. I would say the longest one would have to wait for a mistake to be caught on the web would be 2 hours, and that is on a slow day.

[lowen-kind.livejournal.com]

While the political bloggers may not know "Jack cheese" about typography, there are others that do.

I believe they are forgeries, and not because of the bloggers.

The Washington Post has secured actual military documents, from the Pentagon, from Pres. Bush's unit, of the same time, and presented them side by side with one of the "memos".

There are so many inconsistencies, between the two, that they must've not come from that unit.

Also many typographers have ruled that they could've not been reasonably made using the technology available in a "remote" TANG unit.

As an ex-NJNG member, back in the late '70's, I can tell you that they don't get the most up to date equipment from their parent military branch. Typewriters are hand me downs as is most of the office equipment. Also NG units aren't super flush with cash, so they can't just go out and buy something, especially a state of the art "composing machine" that could've made those memos in the early 70's.

Don't get me wrong, you are entitled to your views as I am to mine.

Ack! Typos!

[kelloggs2066.livejournal.com]

Ack! Typos!

Oh boy, do I ever get hammered for typos!
Of course, I make a lot of them, so I can't really excuse myself on that account, but the strip goes up at 10PM, and by morning, 6AM I've already got typo reports!

It's an embarrassing way to start the day, realizing that I've goofed! But, fortunately, if I jump on it fast enough, I'll correct it before I get a *torrent* of e-mails reminding me of "I before E except after C..." :)

[quentincoyote.livejournal.com]

As they so often do, I think the Daily Show on Comedy Central, ironically, best grasped the larger picture here, where most of the other "real" news outlets failed:

"JON STEWART: Well Stephen, what do you think is going to happen now at CBS News?

STEPHEN COLBERT, Daily Show Senior Media Correspondent: Jon, there's got to be some accountability. Dan Rather is the head, the commander in chief if you will of his organization. He's someone in the ultimate position of power who made a harmful decision based upon questionable evidence. Then, to make things worse, he stubbornly refused to admit his mistake, choosing instead to stay the course and essentially occupy this story for too long. This man has got to go!

STEWART: Uh ... we're talking about Dan Rather...?

COLBERT: Yes Jon, Dan Rather. CBS is in chaos, it's unsafe, riven by internal rivalries. If you ask me, respected, reputable outsiders need to be brought in to help the rebuilding effort.

STEWART: ... at CBS News?

COLBERT: Yeah, at CBS news! What possible other unrelated situation could my words be equally applicable to?! Now people need to be held accountable. The commander in chief, the vice president, the secretary of defense, the national security adviser -- everyone at CBS News needs to go! Jon, I can tell you, Walter Cronkite is rolling over in his grave.

STEWART: Walter Cronkite is still alive.

COLBERT: Not according to my sources ... at CBS News."

Q.

[kamau-d-lyon.livejournal.com]

I'm not entirely sure that Rather should leave because of this. While this may have been a sizable error and very poor judgment I am really against anyone getting nailed for 'one mistake'. If there are others or if it becomes a pattern then yes they deserve to be booted. I feel we have become too much of a society that expects perfection from anyone who is in the spot light. Every one of us is human (even if we're furry) and thus capable of mistakes. In my book you get one, and after that I'm watching for a pattern. If the pattern shows up then action is taken.

The one thing this has brought out is that Mr. Bush used political pull to get the NG assignment and by the sounds of thing a lot of it. With my own personal experiences with political brats and military service I can tell you it has left a very bad taste in my mouth.

[lowen-kind.livejournal.com]

Ahh, but Kamau, it is coming to light that Mr. Bush did not use any political pull to get into the TANG.

According to much varied sources there was a waitng list for airmen, but not for pilots.

If he was trying to avoid going to 'Nam, then a pilot career, even if did use leverage, would've been a poor choice.

Think about it. Pilots were in constant need over there, and apparently, he even volunteered to go with the "Palace Guard" even though he had not logged enough flight time. If he had stayed on in the TANG chances were he probably would've rotated over there.

Also, from the different sources I read, his being let go a full seven months before his time was up was not that unusual. They were changing to another type of jet fighter and it didn't make sense to train him for such a short period of time.

I understand the "very bad taste" in your mouth, but it seems more and more that Mr. Bush got in on his own merits.

As for me, I don't know whom I'm going to vote for. I don't like Kerry and Mr. Bush also seems like a poor choice.

Anyone for "Go Pogo!"?