CBS' Respect-Free Zone for Journalists

The network has come a long way since Edward R. Murrow. From the time William S. Paley backed his newspeople in unmasking Sen. Joe McCarthy to the present day when its lawyers are insulting Dan Rather in court filings for trying to nail George W. Bush's lies about his National Guard service, CBS has been in a downward spiral as steep as the ratings plunge of its nightly news.

In the new issue of New York Magazine, Rather vents his dismay over being blamed for an error in a story that was essentially right and booted out of a job he held with distinction for 24 years after being the network's lead reporter in exposing Nixon and Watergate.

Although legend rightly immortalizes Woodward and Bernstein for their Washington Post coverage leading to Nixon's downfall, CBS News was the only other media outlet that stayed with the story during a time when others held back, and it was Rather who did most of the reporting.

When he recently brought suit to vindicate himself from what Ted Koppel called the "travesty" of his firing for "a story that was much more correct than incorrect," CBS lawyers filed a contemptuous response in court papers, citing it as "a regrettable attempt" by him "to remain in the public eye, and to settle old scores and perceived slights."

At the risk of looking like the loony anchorman in "Network" shouting, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it any more," Rather is ending his public life with the signoff he used for his broadcasts: "Courage."

He has always had more than his share of that and deserves the respect that a now whorish network is trying to take away from him.

The Daily Show's Giant Head Speaks Out

For a new generation, Ted Koppel is the old guy on a huge screen behind Jon Stewart who occasionally reminds the fake-news anchor what real journalists do. Yesterday, he had some tougher things to say to future news people.

At a Fordham University forum sponsored by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, the 67-year-old Koppel weighed in on the fate of 75-year-old Dan Rather, who is suing CBS for mistreating him in the furor over George Bush’s National Guard Service and failure to serve in Vietnam.

It was a “travesty,” Koppel said, that Rather was “squeezed out” for a story that was “much more correct than incorrect.”

Expanding on the woes of journalists at TV networks owned by self-protecting conglomerates, he pointed out that, as part of the Walt Disney Company, “ABC News is a pimple on the elephant’s behind.”

Last night Koppel got a Lifetime Achievement Award from the TV Academy. Looking back, he told a TelevisionWeek reporter why could never get an interview with Bush in the White House.

When the Decider was first running in 2000, Koppel asked what qualified him and Bush cited his experience as a governor, running a baseball team, and the fact that he was a loving husband and father.

Koppel observed that those were good qualifications for a president of the Kiwanis Club, but not the United States. He could never get to see Bush again, but Koppel may have doing the Kiwanis an injustice.