Redstate

By Dana R Pico Posted in Archived — Comments (1) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

When CBS had it's "Rathergate" scandal, using forged documents to try and smear President Bush before the 2004 elections, Dan Rather, who anchored the report, was given a mostly free pass, and was allowed to continue on until his already planned retirement, several months hence. Mary Mapes, the segment producer, was fired, while three others, were "asked to resign:" Senior Vice President Betsy West, who supervised CBS News primetime programs; 60 Minutes Wednesday Executive Producer Josh Howard; and Howard’s deputy, Senior Broadcast Producer Mary Murphy. Perhaps someone has a good reason why the three who were "asked to resign," which is a polite way of saying, "You're fired," were (in theory) treated differently from Miss Mapes, but that's CBS' decision.

Well, now comes this story:

Couric's Contretemps
An entry from the CBS's anchor's video 'Notebook' shares some uncomfortable similarities with a Wall Street Journal column. How musings about a library led to some embarrassing moments—and the firing of a network producer.

By Johnnie L. Roberts, Newsweek
Updated: 10:04 p.m. ET April 10, 2007

April 10, 2007 - CBS certainly got something different than it bargained for when it stole America’s Sweetheart from the “Today” show last year. Not only has Couric failed to draw her loyal fans to her new network: “CBS Evening News with Katie Couric” remains a distant third behind NBC and ABC. Now, Couric is embroiled in an embarrassing flap with The Wall Street Journal over plagiarism, the ultimate journalistic sin.

The problems began when an April 4 installment of “Katie Couric’s Notebook”—a daily essay by the anchor that appears in video and audio form on CBS News’ Web site, among other places—was uncomfortably close to musings by Wall Street Journal columnist Jeffrey Zaslow on the fading allure of library books. Opining in his March 15 “Moving On” column headlined “Of the Places You’ll Go, is the Library Still One of Them?”, Zaslow wrote of libraries’ appeal to kids: “It’s a last-ditch place to go if they need to find something out.” Couric likewise observed in her April 4 “Notebook,” “It’s a last ditch place to go if they need to find something out.” Amplifying his point, Zaslow wrote, “Sure, there are still library-loving children, but books aren’t necessarily the draw.” That also was Couric’s viewpoint, almost verbatim: “Sure, children still like libraries, but books aren’t the draw.” Couric, through a spokesperson, declined to comment. Seven other sections of "Katie Couric’s Notebook" closely matched the wording in Zaslow’s column.

Loathe as I am to defend Dan Rather, at least in the episode in question, he was simply the front man, the talking head for the piece. But when a segment is entitled "Katie Couric's Notebook," there is an implied message that, hey, Miss Couric is a real journalist, and she did this one herself. To entitle a segment "Katie Couric's Notebook" is for the anchor to take personal responsibility for that which it contains.

Well, apparently not:

In an interview with NEWSWEEK, a CBS spokeswoman acknowledged that the network fired the producer of “Notebook.” She declined to identify the producer. Couric apparently faces no repercussions, because she doesn’t actually write “Katie’s Couric's Notebook”—though many of the entries are presented in the form of first-person essays, as was the controversial piece. Addressing her audience, Couric began: “Hi everyone, I still remember when I got my first library card.”

Which tells you one thing: the pardonability of the "ultimate journalistic sin" is directly proportional to the visibility and salary of the sinners. Mary Mapes, the lowest ranking of the CBS four, was unceremoniously canned; her three superiors were allowed to resign -- not that they had any choice in the matter, but, at least semantically, it doesn't look quite as bad. Dan Rather was allowed to continue for many months, until his retirement. Now, with the same network, an unnamed segment producer is fired, but Miss Couric remains, apparently without sanction, for a segment with her name on it personally.

Now, I was never naïve enough to think that the network news anchors were really working journalists, although some of them (Dan Rather, certainly) were before they got the big job. Nor did I ever believe that the anchors wrote most of their own copy. But when you have a (purported) journalist saying, "Hi everyone, I still remember when I got my first library card," in a segment with her name attached to it, yeah, it's normal to think that she really did have something to do with it.

I guess that if you did think that, you'd have been wrong -- at least, according to CBS News.
______________________
Cross posted on Common Sense Political Thought.