Incoming anchor Katie Couric swung by the CBS newsroom for the first time Wednesday, but the right-wing attack squads have already gotten a head start in trying to Rather-ize her.
No sooner was the "Today" co-host's ascension to the "CBS Evening News" revealed this month than conservative firebrand Brent Bozell of Media Research Center opened the bomb hatch on what he called "the perky, likable, and politically liberal Katie Couric, whose biases will only reinforce CBS' reputation as a network riddled with liberally biased reporting."
"In her years on 'Today,' " Bozell added, "she's lectured Charlton Heston about the need for gun control, championed the need for campaign finance 'reform,' and even touted the wonders of France's nanny state." Said one anonymous poster on Public Eye, CBS' blog covering news issues: "Katie Couric is a perfect replacement for Dan Rather
Dan Rather: The Channel Island column in Monday's Calendar cited an argument that CBS newsman Dan Rather got into with a GOP president, referring to George H.W. Bush. That discussion took place in 1988, when Bush was vice president.
Who knows how Couric's alleged prejudices will manifest themselves on the revamped CBS newscast. But of all the criticisms leveled against her, left-wing ideologue seems the least persuasive. Unlike her predecessor Dan Rather, America's news sweetheart hasn't gotten into an on-air shouting match with one GOP president, back-sassed another and offered up dubious documents incriminating a third. She has, however, crooned with Bette Midler, clowned around with Donald Trump and costumed herself a la Marilyn Monroe, as memorialized in a gushy photo spread in the April 17 Newsweek. Much as CBS might want to burnish her hard-news bona fides (she really gave that David Duke the what for, didn't she?), the fact remains that Couric's crowning moment of political consciousness-raising came from allowing cameras to record her colonoscopy. If CBS honcho Les Moonves really coveted a tough female reporter with obvious liberal sympathies, we'd all be hailing the "Evening News" coronation of CNN's Christiane Amanpour.
But given Rather's and CBS News' history as hate magnets for the right, Couric's skimpy record of speaking truth to power may not matter. The real issue, in terms of resolving doubts about the network's credibility, isn't Couric's political orientation but whether, in the wake of the scandal over Rather's "60 Minutes" report that brandished unverified documents to question President Bush's military service record, CBS learned anything about public accountability. Available evidence suggests it has not.
- Bush parley draws anchors Nov 29, 2006
- It's a brief honeymoon for Couric Sep 13, 2006
- ABC beats NBC in evening news May 25, 2007
