NEW YORK — When CBS News named its panel of two independent investigators to examine the problems with its report on President Bush's Texas Air National Guard service, anchor Dan Rather learned their names on the same morning as everyone else.
It was an uncharacteristic slight given the deference with which Rather, CBS News' marquee asset for two decades, was usually treated. But it may be emblematic of the every-person-for-himself atmosphere that has engulfed the news division since Monday, when the network admitted what many outside CBS had believed: that the 1970s documents on which it based the Sept. 8 report had authenticity problems.
CBS apologized for using the documents, which alleged that Bush was given preferential treatment while in the Guard and shirked requirements. But the crisis deepened when it was disclosed that producer Mary Mapes had called the Democratic campaign in advance of the story to ask a senior advisor to presidential nominee John F. Kerry to make contact with her source.
Internally, CBS News appears to have moved from "What went wrong?" to "Who gets the blame?" With careers hanging in the balance and the reputation of the news division on the line, "the knives have come out," said one insider.
Many insiders think that Rather, who is 72 and has more than two years to run on his contract, will keep his job and that Mapes will bear much of the blame. She has not responded to requests for interviews.
But Rather's survival is not a given. Names are being bandied about in the corridors of the news division of possible interim replacements, although CBS News spokeswoman Sandy Genelius said it was "categorically false" that contingency plans had been drawn up.
Rather is fighting for his job. The anchor and CBS News President Andrew Heyward both showed up Wednesday at a party for ABC's Barbara Walters, with Rather's entrance in particular causing a frisson among the media heavyweights in the room. When Walters told Rather in front of the crowd that he had the support of the room for his stellar career, Heyward was among those applauding, according to a report in the New York Daily News.
Behind the scenes, however, fierce debates have been taking place among many of the division's top executives and reporters who appear on camera over who did what and when, and, in particular, how much blame Heyward -- as opposed to his deputies -- should shoulder, and whether he stacked the deck by selecting a panel member with seeming conflicts of interest.
