Dan Rather: "Rather Outspoken: My Life in the News"
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-05-03/dan-rather-rather-outspoken-my-life-news
Dan Rather reflects on his 60-year career in journalism. He says he can’t remember a time he didn’t want to be a journalist. In 44 years at CBS News, Dan Rather reported from the front lines of the Civil Rights movement, the Vietnam War and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. He was the first network reporter to confirm President Kennedy’s assassination. He stayed on air for 18 hours straight after the September eleventh attacks. But he was pushed out of the anchor chair at CBS Evening News eight years ago after documents he used in a piece about President George W. Bush’s National Guard Service were discredited. career and defends his reputation. Dan Rather explains why he still stands behind the truth of the story.
Guests
Dan Rather
managing editor and anchor of the television news magazine Dan Rather Reports on the cable channel HDNet and former anchor of the CBS Evening News.
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The Diane Rehm Show (http://wamu.fm/JU0GOq): Former CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather talks about his last days at the network and his impressions of Viacom and CBS majority owner Sumner Redstone. According to Rather, Redstone publicly stated before the 2004 presidential election that he hoped George W. Bush would be elected to a second term in office because it would be good for Viacom if he were:
Read An Excerpt
Excerpt from Dan Rather's "Rather Outspoken: My Life In The News." Copyright 2012 by Dan Rather. All rights reserved. Reprinted here by permission of Grand Central Publishing:
Comments
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Actually I'm a bit confused ny Mr. Rather's cpmments ,today on the reluctance of the media to offer any critical coverage of the war in Iraq.
According to the conservative Media Research Center, as cited by "Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting" (FAIR) , Mr. Rather is quoted thusly" If he needs me in uniform,tell me where and I'll be there."(10/3/01).
And on CNN a few years later; "... And I want my country to win whatever the definition of 'win' may be". Is this a liberal talking or even a journalist for that matter?(4/14/03)
Diane asked Mr. Rather 2 direct questions re the apology CBS made him state on air. Twice Mr. Rather dismissed those questions ("Should have would have, could have. I'm not going to play that game.")
Mr. Rather indicates E. R. Murrow is one of his heroes. I wonder what Mr. Murrow would have done in this same situation.
Heaviest Cat wrote:
"liberal bias"? Where? Yes, even on ostensibly public radio where do you see "liberal bias"? When was the last time,an NPR program talked to a socialist? Or an opponent of US wars? or a Union activist? "
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Good to know that you define a true liberal as a socialist. But as far as libs appearing on The DR Show who are opponents of wars, how about
Katrina Van Den Heuval
David Corn
Howard Zinn
How did that last caller get through? Somebody must have screwed up. Would have loved to hear more from her but I guess the show had to move on.
I was quibbling with your grammar, just for fun. Your comment had so many holes in it that it really wasn't worth attacking otherwise, but I find it hard to resist a good grammar quibble.
I'm so tired of hearing people use 'socialism' and 'socialist' incorrectly. Socialism does not exist in this country since we do not OWN the banks, health care providers except for the VA and some local/state government health care clinics for the poor or uninsured, the utilities, or airlines. Those are private enterprises even if taxpayers dollars were used to prevent them from declaring bankruptcy. So, please stop displaying your ignorance of the definition of socialism in your attempt to discredit President Obama. And, by the way, it was President George W. Bush who bailed out the banks not President Obama. It was President George W. Bush who allowed his Treasury Secretary to give the banks and bankers a free pass when they nearly sent the global economy into a depression. President Obama made the decision to NOT let the auto industry fail because of what it would have done to our entire economy and he attached strings to the auto industry bailout unlike President Bush who allowed the bankers to reward their failures with huge compensation packages taxed as a whooping 15%.
It's sad - very, very sad - to see a man of such intelligence, eloquence, and accomplishment - reduced to a level of defensive embitterment. One of his contemporaries - Tom Brokaw - was just in STL for the Speakers Series. In Brokaw, you see someone that is able to look back upon his career with a sense of perspective. Rather is incapable of doing so. He looks back upon his career and can only see HIS perspective. He is the quintessential embittered narcissist.
I, too, sometimes wonder what people think real socialists look like. If I were a socialist in this country, I would be irritated at how often my name was being taken in vain.
Marcus, I think, it's evident from my comments that I don't define true liberals as socialists though yes, I am unapolegetically one. But you are right about the anti-war voices. I do often forget to specify that my claims of bias are mostly directed towards the major flagship news shows such as All Things Considered, Morn. Ed and the weekend Morning Shows.
Diane, I usually appreciate your show but you sure let Dan off the hook on an issue that is critical to the media -- whether news media can be held accountability for telling the truth. You had an opportunity to demonstrate objectivity and you blew it. It's not enough to say "I'm not perfect" and you know it.
I listened to the show on Thursday; and Mr. Rather sounds as out-of-touch as he ever has; a simple mouthpiece for big media/popular culture - the end of his career would arrive someday. All things popular must pass - and we all must move-on, and as he became of less use to CBS and the audience; it was simply time for him to go.
I find it sad reading some of the comments here. Regarding the Bush National Guard matter, why is the focus on the documents alone and not also on whether or not the story is true? I never heard George W. Bush deny the story. Some might feel that wasn't necessary, but I expect a president to set an example - if someone attacks his record I would like him to stand up and respond. Regarding the Iraq war we have the nonexistent WMD, the lie about the connection between 911/Al Qaeda and Sadam Hussein, the lie about "yellow cake" uranium (and the "outing" of CIA operative Valerie Plame), the despicable events at the Abu Ghraib prison, etc - all this happened on GW Bushes' watch. Is there really nothing here that the Bush administration should have been held accountable for? Isn't it appropriate to find out the truth about these matters instead of attacking those who ask the questions?
Perhaps the real mistake that Dan Rather made was believing he would be supported by his own network when calling into question Bush's performance in the National Guard? It was already clear that the Bush administration would tolerate no serious criticism and that reprisals were guaranteed. At a time when few people in the press had the courage to speak up he did and I respect him for it. I regret that the legitimacy of the documents wasn't fully researched. Clearly that was a mistake, but the question remains is the story true? I believe the public deserves to know.
The notion that proportional spacing of typewriters did not exist in 1972 is wrong!! I personally worked to repair old IBM typewriters in 1976. Wang Labs also used the IBM below on its 1200 WP system.
In 1966, IBM released the Selectric Composer. This highly modified Selectric produced camera-ready justified copy using proportional fonts in a variety of font styles from 8pt to 14pt. Material prepared on a properly adjusted machine by a skilful operator and printed onto baryta (barium sulfate-coated) paper "would take an expert to tell ...was not the product of a Linotype or Monotype machine".
Characters were proportionally spaced, being from 3 to 9 units wide, with the size of a unit being selectable as either 1/72", 1/84", or 1/96", to allow for different sizes of type. Tab stops could only be positioned at intervals of one-sixth of an inch, or one pica. To support backspacing over previously typed characters, the spacing code for the last 40 or so characters typed was mechanically stored by small sliding plates in a carrier wheel.
Those memos in 1972 were real--not fakes!!!
In those days, it was not unusual for IBM and Wang Labs to lend or lease machines to government agencies--this was one way to increase sales.
As Dan Rather's mom was a "pal" of LBJ's he got the "scoop" to help dupe the American People about Bush's father's and Nixon's running the Roman Catholic, Knight of Malta CIA assassination of our president to send us to die for papal Vietnam and to restore Rome's Fifth Column's Rockefeller bankers to their illegal money franchise JFK's EO11,110 had ended - by being the witting vehicle for the lie that President Kennedy had been shot from behind...six weeks after his NSAM263 had ordered our military withdrawal from Rome's S.E. Asian latifundial estate.
Karl Rove did a job on Rather with the Texas ANG gambit. Marian Carr Knox, with a mind like a steel trap, confirmed the truth of the content of the typewritten documents, but Rove had obviously retyped them on an anachronistic typewriter to dupe the American People. Pure genius...of evil, just like his complicity in Bush's and Cheney's 9/11 treason after the whole crew of homosexual psychopaths was cheated into office by only the SCOTUS' treasonous Roman Catholic bloc, same as the 'Citizens United' abomination.
Mox nix. G-d is not mocked: Death for Treason
Our Nation's Capitol, run by ambitious hicks for Earthly Evil. Great place to be FROM.
The comments here are probably the most honest and in-depth I've found so far on the quality of this book and I appreciate that since most of the reviews of the material have just been lukewarm at best. I was considering the audio book for my grandfather as gift since I can remember him constantly watching Dan Rather's take on the day's news when I was a kid -- not that I would be interested to read it myself. There's actual a review of the audio text being aired next Saturday on WMAL here in DC on The Book Report literary show -- Elaine Charles, the host, is pretty insightful herself so I'm looking forward to even more enlightened discussions there as well.