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Good Riddance to Dan Rather Lowell Ponte Dan Rather, after almost 44 years at CBS, has departed. He once had been this liberal network's choice to fill the giant shoes of anchorman Walter Cronkite, but Rather sent both CBS's ratings and credibility into a long decline. Days ago CBS refused to make any new contract with the 74-year-old journalist born, aptly enough, on Halloween 1931. Rather sealed his own fate in 2004, weeks before a presidential election, by doing a sensational story attacking Republican incumbent George W. Bush. Rather's hatchet job was based on documents that CBS's own hired experts warned could not be vouchsafed as genuine and might be fakes, as proved to be the case. This week's liberal media tributes to Dan Rather depict this memo-gate scandal as one well-meaning misstep in an otherwise-brilliant career. In fact, loose journalistic ethics and leftwing partisan reporting were evident from Rather's earliest days at CBS. "Rather would go with an item even if he didn't have it completely nailed down with verifiable facts," wrote Timothy Crouse in his best-seller "The Boys on the Bus" about presidential campaign coverage during the Nixon era. "If a rumor sounded solid to him, if he believed in his gut or had gotten it from a man who struck him as honest, he would let it rip," wrote Crouse. "The other White House reporters hated Rather for this. They knew exactly why he got away with it: being handsome as a cowboy, Rather was a star at CBS News, and that gave him the clout he needed. They could quote all his lapses from fact." During a 1974 press conference with President Richard Nixon, the president indicated that the next question belonged to an ABC reporter, but Rather butted in: "Thank you, Mr. President. Dan Rather of CBS News. Mr. President..." By now other reporters were jeering Rather's brazen, unethical behavior, prompting President Nixon to joke: "Are you running for something?" "No, sir, Mr. President," Rather replied arrogantly, "Are you?" CBS executives debated whether to fire Rather over the White House incident. But anchorman Walter Cronkite was nearing retirement, and Rather was the brightest star the "Tiffany network" had to succeed him.
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Dan Rather's first broadcast as Anchor and Managing Editor of the CBS Evening News was on March 9, 1981, only weeks after President Ronald Reagan had been sworn in. Rather's anti-Republican bias was widely recognized, but as Managing Editor Dan Rather quickly imposed his partisan slant onto all CBS reporting. On nearly every Rathercast some welfare recipient or union boss, selected for their anti-Reagan feelings, would "objectively" be covered bashing Republicans. No taxpayer was ever given a similar opportunity to thank Republicans for reducing welfare, government spending and taxes. "I think Dan is transparently liberal," Rather's CBS colleague Andy Rooney told CNN's Larry King. "I think he should be more careful." In 1988, Rather took part in a fundraiser for Democrat Ann Richards in New York City that "gathered up money in buckets" used in 1990 to elect her Texas Governor. Rather's friend Governor Richards lost her re-election bid to George W. Bush. As sycophant to both Bill and Hillary Clinton, Rather defended scandal-ridden President Clinton to Fox News Channel host Bill O'Reilly by saying: "Who among us have not lied about somebody? I think you can be an honest person and lie about any number of things."
In 2001 CBS anchor Dan Rather helped the Travis County Democratic Party in Texas raise $20,000. "Please join us for an evening with DAN RATHER" read the invitations that, as Brent Bozell of Media Research Center reported at the time, arrived with "an RSVP envelope asking for $1,000 for the Democratic Party." Liberal CBS allowed Rather's partisanship (60 Minutes's executive producer boasted that he had elected Bill Clinton). By 2004, unelected anchor Dan Rather's arrogance was so enormous that he felt entitled to attempt a media coup d'etat against an elected Republican President by using dubious documents. Twenty-six years ago Dan Rather was interviewed by journalist Cliff Jahr in the July 1980 issue of Ladies' Home Journal in an article titled "Soft Side of a Tough Anchorman." When Jahr asked if he had smoked marijuana, Rather replied: "As a reporter — and I don't want to say that that's the only context — I've tried everything. I can say to you with confidence, I know a fair amount about LSD. I've never been a social user of any of these things, but my curiosity has carried me into a lot of interesting areas." "As an example, in 1955 or '56, I had someone at the Houston police station shoot me with heroin so I could do a story about it," Rather told Jahr. "The experience was a special kind of hell. I came out understanding full well how one could be addicted to 'smack,' and quickly." As a longtime journalist, I always wanted to interview Dan Rather about this. Here, as parting shots, are a few of my questions: Mr. Rather, were you aware that if you had no proper prescription from a licensed physician authorizing such heroin use you were committing a felony punishable by long-term imprisonment in Texas? Name your police accomplices who illegally provided you this impure street heroin from a government evidence locker. Mr. Rather, when you said 'I know a fair amount about LSD,' how many times have you taken this mind-altering substance? Have you experienced 'flashbacks' while preparing or doing a newscast? What other 'interesting areas' involving drugs has your curiosity carried you into? Mr. Rather, modern research is finding that even a single use of certain powerful mind-altering drugs such as heroin, LSD or amphetamine can create new circuits, permanent new pathways in the brain. Were your perceptions or feelings changed by your drug experiences? How have drugs affected your political views? Mr. Rather, did you believe that those who tuned to CBS News and trusted you to give them and their children clear-headed, reliable information should have been informed of your reckless experimentation with mind-altering illicit drugs?
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