The Return of Darth Rather
He could have retired quietly, with at least the illusion of dignity, surrounded by a cocoon of wealth and stature among politically like-minded friends and family. He could have re-lived his experiences covering the Vietnam war and the '68 convention, spinning those yarns again and again about the glory days of American journalism in the early days of television. He could have regaled his grandchildren with all of those bewildering Texas aphorisms about alligators and courage and dogs in the desert sun.
But instead Dan Rather wants vindication, delivered by the U.S. justice system, in the form of a ruling against his former employer, CBS. He thinks he was made a scapegoat when it was revealed that the documents that supposedly proved that George W. Bush was avoided service during his time in the National Guard were completely fabricated and fraudulent.
Because, you see, Dan Rather still thinks this story is true, even if the "facts" are false. He's willing to stand by this news item, even while everybody else knows, beyond dispute, that he was suckered into a sham by people with a political axe to grind. If Dan's going down, heck, he's taking a few others in the executive suite with him. He's one tough old Texas armadillo that won't go quietly into the night.
It's sad that he's willing to look so foolish and aloof, so unaware of a media environment that has long since changed radically from the days when news organizations could deliver their wares unchallenged. And his last shreds of dignity of disappearing for two reasons: One, he's reminding us with this lawsuit that he certainly wasn't the top dog at CBS - the buck didn't stop with Dan Rather. In the end he was a guy in a suit reading the news. And he's also telling us, whether he likes it or not, that "standards" and "integrity" are an illusion. CBS and company are easy foils when it comes to their partisan bias - and susceptible to the most facile "c'mon, you just know it's true" assumptions.
Darth Rather, mean until the end, won't be redeemed.
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posted by Superfly @ 7:59 AM
2 Comments
2 Comments:
On what basis do you say that Dan rather 'still thinks the story is true'?
It seems like the whole thrust of his lawsuit is that his statements were true, but the basis for the story was false and he was hung out to dry for it.
As for your assault on his dignity:
I don't recall Dan Rather ever claiming to be in charge of CBS or the news. Cronkite wasn't in charge of the news before him, so I don't know why you have the perception that people expect an anchorman to head the news program. Saying that he loses dignity by showing that he wasn't in charge of an organization that no one could reasonably expect him to be in charge of is asinine.
Further, why would showing 'CBS and company are easy foils' hurt his dignity at all? His point is that he was doing his job, CBS dropped the ball when they fed him bad facts, and then blamed him. The whole point is that CBS messed up. Proving that would vindicate him and restore dignity.
Um, Rather didn't BREAK this story, btw, the Boston Globe did in 2000! Bush is a deserter, and it's a well-known fact.
We live a fascist state in which those in power lie and deny historical facts.
We don't have a liberal media. We have a fascist media.
Freedom is dead.
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