Comments on: The Public Eye Chat With…Linda Mason

[k-sozer]

"I think that CBSNews.com is trying to put forth the whole story."

You've got to be kidding. Even people who like CBS News don't believe this.

When Katie fails, it won't be because she's a woman, it will be because she's not delivering a product that we want. We won't accept that inferior product simply because it's coming from a woman.

Blame the viewers--how has that strategy worked for your entertainment shows?

[sixdemonbag1]

"If I want objective reporting of the news, realistically, these days I go to the Fox News Station."

I lol'd.

[beloml]

This comment left at Captain's Quarters also sums it up nicely:

"CBS still doesn't get it. Mary Mapes was considered "brilliant" by her "peers", but under scrutiny revealed herself to be a stupid partisan hack. Her book makes it even worse - its up to the skeptics to verify the accuracy of her story, not the other way around? This is what they teach at journalism school? And if someone as dumb and unethical as Mapes could climb that far into CBS, how many others are still there?

And look beyond the forged docs - whats more revealing is the arrogant and clumsy way CBS pushed and then defend them. People who cheat usually get caught because they grow complacent - over time, the husband stops investing energy in the deception, stops showering at the gym after his trysts, stops checking his collar for lipstick, etc. He's been cheating for so long that he gets lazy. As with CBS - we basically caught our spouse audaciously cheating in our own bedroom, and we're supposed to believe this is the first time?

No, the arrogance and carelessness of Mapes and Rather revealed that CBS has been cheating us for a very long time. Couric is fluff, an innane lightweight, but CBS's is tanking because they have lost all credibility. Perkiness is not going to bring us back."

[beloml]

Ummm . . . Jessica Savitch? Barbara Walters 20 years ago? Diane Sawyer? No one watches Katie Couric because she's not very good and because MSM hard news is lacking both in quantity and credibility, so people get their news from the web.

[mouse6824]

"Katie is and always will be a good and intelligent on air person but hard news is hard news, not recipes and celebety interviews. She needs to get out of the studio"

Oh please. Katie has done plenty of hard news. Just because she was good at the softer stuff on Today, doesn't mean she wasn't also good at the hard news. She worked the Pentagon beat before she went to Today for goodness sakes - that's hardly a soft news beat!

I've also seen Katie overseas interviewing plenty of world leaders, including in the Middle East, over the years.

Has anyone actually stopped to think that the reason Katie is "ratings challenged" at the moment is because the media is so busy beating up on her, including those with long term agendas against her like Alessandra Stanley, for whom Katie is a regular punching bag, that people are starting to believe what they say, just because it is repeated so often?

I watch both the CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News regularly online(I live in Australia) and these days the Evening News is just as full of hard news, if not more so some nights, but unlike much of the US audience sitting down in front of their TV each night, I haven't been brainwashed into believing Katie is bad at her job by sections of the media who have an agenda.

[kendrawilder]

Unfortunately, Ms. Couric is so blatantly liberal/progressive in her presentations of the news, it is not possible for me to watch her pretend to present the news objectively.

If I want opinions, I go to The View. If I want objective reporting of the news, realistically, these days I go to the Fox News Station.

[jdubs63]

I tried several times to watch the news with Katie.... but can't she just does not have the bonding with viewers. I Watch Charlie and he is wonderful and I am neither a white old male or a young white male..I am caucasin tho ... We still use WHITE?

[ridingwoman]

I do not think the fact of being a woman is what is keeping Katie Couric from "catching on." Surely the fact that she has no street cred as a reporter or journalist in behind this. Women who get out of the studio, cover wars, disasters, police calls or city council meetings are, at the minimum, learnig the skills to bring the news to a camera. Look at Christian Amanpour as the gold standard for female reporters. She too has a family and yet there is no one else I would completely believe in a reporting situation. Katie is and always will be a good and intelligent on air person but hard news is hard news, not recipes and celebety interviews. She needs to get out of the studio. And drop the perky "Hi everyone." It's a little too baby girlish for a news reporter with all the things that face the world today.

[bethwatson-2009]

And I am amazed at how many women are unsupportive of Katie Couric in her role as the first female solo anchor of the Evening News. What happened to the women's movement? Didn't we all want these kind of advances so that our daughters and their daughters would benefit? I'm not looking for strictly gender-based approval either. Ms. Couric is doing a great job delivering the news - as well as her competitors - but is held to a higher standard because she is judged on her clothes, hair, makeup, and the manner in which she sits, stands, or holds her hands. Unfortunately, history will report that she had a "tough time being accepted by the public" because she is a woman. We still have so far to go.

[bethwatson-2009]

And I am amazed at how many women are unsupportive of Katie Couric in her role as the first female solo anchor of the Evening News. What happened to the women's movement? Didn't we all want these kind of advances so that our daughters and their daughters would benefit? I'm not looking for strictly gender-based approval either. Ms. Couric is doing a great job delivering the news - as well as her competitors - but is held to a higher standard because she is judged on her clothes, hair, makeup, and the manner in which she sits, stands, or holds her hands. Unfortunately, history will report that she had a "tough time being accepted by the public" because she is a woman. We still have so far to go.

[memekiller]

I think you miss what motivates the blogosphere. The "reality-based" community wants to provide a corrective for the factual relativism that has taken hold of the MSM. It was the blogs, not the media, who insisted on the historical account of Kerry's military record. It was the blogs, not the media, who were skeptical of claims about WMD. Compare what Atrios wrote with the New York Times, and tell me who saw more clearly.

During the Pelosi flap, who reported the Sergeant-at-Arms admission he requested the larger plane? The blogs. I had been trying for two straight days to post the Sergeant's statement on Jake Tapper's moderated blog as he pushed this story, but only posts without the statement and/or link survived. They even went so far as to edit out the press release from one post. The whole thing was documented by Mike Stark here: http://www.callingallwingnuts.com/2007/02/15/386/

Tapper wasn't the only one playing dumb, he just got caught. Tapper and John Solomon's dishonesty make Josh Marshall and Duncan Black necessary. It is the latter whom history will see as demanding facts trump ideology.

[memekiller]

I think you miss what motivates the blogosphere. The "reality-based" community wants to provide a corrective for the factual relativism that has taken hold of the MSM. It was the blogs, not the media, who insisted on the historical account of Kerry's military record. It was the blogs, not the media, who were skeptical of claims about WMD. Compare what Atrios wrote with the New York Times, and tell me who saw more clearly.

During the Pelosi flap, who reported the Sergeant-at-Arms admission he requested the larger plane? The blogs. I had been trying for two straight days to post the Sergeant's statement on Jake Tapper's moderated blog as he pushed this story, but only posts without the statement and/or link survived. They even went so far as to edit out the press release from one post. The whole thing was documented by Mike Stark here: http://www.callingallwingnuts.com/2007/02/15/386/

Tapper wasn't the only one playing dumb, he just got caught. Tapper and John Solomon's dishonesty make Josh Marshall and Duncan Black necessary. It is the latter whom history will see as demanding facts trump ideology.