All Blog Posts from Couric & Co.

Michael Wuebben is a senior producer for CBSNews.com

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Trent Lott's announcement that he'll resign from the Senate revives the 2002 controversy that cost him his position as majority leader in 2002. To refresh, Lott praised fellow Senator Strom Thurmond's run for president in 1948 as a segregationist.

Bloggers have been credited with bringing the story to light. But it was Lott's performance in an interview with Black Entertainment Television that solidified his downfall as majority leader.

I was a writer for BET Nightly News when word came down that Lott offered to come on the network to try to clear the air. In a half-hour live interview, host Ed Gordon set the tone immediately that BET would not be a vehicle to air Lott's apology unchallenged. Gordon went through a list of issues where Lott stood against the consensus in the black community, from his voting against making Martin Luther King Day a national holiday to his efforts to keep his college fraternity segregated. (You can watch part of the interview in the video link on the left.)

Perhaps the moment that ended Lott's hope of keeping his leadership role came when he claimed to be for affirmative action "across the board," saying he practiced it by hiring minorities on his staff. Gordon responded with a minimum of condescension, "you understand ... to have a black on your staff and to push legislation that would help African Americans, minorities across the board are completely different."

The tension spilled over into the commercial breaks, where the two men sat in cold, awkward silence waiting for the stage manager's cue to restart the conversation.

The GOP's convert for affirmative action announced he would step down as Senate leader four days later (coincidentally, Ed Gordon's show, "BET Tonight" was cancelled shortly after the interview.) Lott said after his 2002 resignation, he had "only himself to blame." And Ed Gordon certainly didn't save Lott from himself.

It's been nearly fives years since Boston Red Sox president Larry Lucchino labeled the Yankees an "evil empire" after losing out in the bidding war for free agent Jose Contreras (who, btw, has an ERA north of 4.50 over five seasons).

So, to paraphrase Luke Skywalker, is the dark side stronger? It doesn't take a mathematician to calculate the leader in this battle. Boston's World Series win last night puts them up 2-0 over the Yankees since dropping the evil label on the Bronx Bombers. Add to that the greatest come-from-behind victory in baseball in 2004 when the Sox beat the Yankees in four straight games after falling behind 3-0 to reach the series.

But now the tables (or should I say labels) have turned and it seems the devil wears crimson.

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Katie Couric previews tonight's CBS Evening News, which will focus on an increase in violent crimes throughout many major U.S. cities, especially New Orleans.

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As I promised on Friday, here's the speech I gave at Williams College, in Williamstown, Mass yesterday:

Thank you President Schapiro, and good morning everyone — dedicated faculty and staff, proud parents and, of course, graduates! I am honored to be a small part of this very big day.

Having heard so much about Williams and Williamstown from my brother-in-law Jim Batchelor — class of '72 — and from my sister, Clara, who left Smith to spend her junior year here (mostly because of Jim), it’s as beautiful as they’ve described. It’s no wonder Thoreau said after visiting here in 1844, “it would be no small advantage if every college were thus located at the base of a mountain.”

And after doing a little reporting, I’ve learned a lot about this school and its legitimate bragging rights as a college of firsts — the first to sponsor a scientific expedition, the first to build an astronomy observatory in America.

And Williams was the first school in the country to adopt the Oxford tradition of sporting caps and gowns at graduation — an effort to make the class more egalitarian. So it’s because of Williams that hundreds of thousands of graduates this time of year will be sporting this figure-flattering, dress-it-up, dress-it-down ensemble.

And Williams, no doubt, is the first and last school in the country to adopt a purple cow as its mascot. I’m sure this bovine bruiser instills a tremendous amount of fear on the football field.

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The war in Iraq was the main topic of debate for the 2008 Democratic presidential candidates, again. Last night's New Hampshire debate followed similar plot lines as the South Carolina debate in April, says CBSNews.com senior political editor Vaughn Ververs. But as the clock ticks closer to the primaries, candidates are turning up the intensity — especially John Edwards, who's trying to close the gap with front-runners Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Here's more from Ververs' analysis:

Just minutes into the debate, the three found themselves in a sharp exchange over the war in Iraq and terrorism when Clinton pointedly disagreed with Edwards' characterization of the war on terror as a "bumper sticker" and a mere "political slogan." Clinton not only refused to endorse that view, she came dangerously close — for a Democratic candidate — to complimenting the Bush administration. "I believe we are safer than we were" before 9/11, she said before adding: "We are not yet safe enough."

As it has been for nearly the past four years, however, it was the war that provided most of the spark and starkly demonstrated one of the major fault lines in the Democratic race.

While Clinton and Obama sought to explain their recent votes against the Iraq funding bill, Edwards struck hard, criticizing both of the senators for "quietly" opposing the administration's policy on timelines for withdrawal, insisting: "it's the difference between leading and following."

For her part, Clinton sought to cast the war as a unifying issue where Democrats have the upper hand, despite nuances in their approach. Noting that nearly all the Republican presidential candidates support the war, Clinton said: "The differences among us are minor. The differences between us and the Republicans are major."

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Katie Couric takes First Look on the road to the nation's capital. She talks to WUSA anchor Derek McGinty about what's on the 9 News Now rundown. And she previews the Evening News coverage of Dr. Kevorkian's release from prison, and a Steve Hartman feature on an Arlington Cemetery photo project.

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Making headlines this week is the case of a Georgia man suffering from a drug-resistant strain of tuberculosis now quarantined in Denver. Just how much of a risk does this virulent strain of TB pose to the general public? We asked Dr. William Schaffner, who heads the Department of Preventive Medicine at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, to help bring some perspective to the issue. He's the subject of this week's 10 Questions.

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1. First, the simplest question—what is tuberculosis exactly, and why is it so dangerous?

Tuberculosis is a bacterial disease that affects the lungs most prominently. It is spread by exhaling infectious material that then is inhaled by close contacts. Spread usually requires prolonged, close contact in a confined area, such as a room (or an airplane). Without treatment, active tuberculosis can cause a slowly progressive disease that can result in death.

2. That unidentified TB patient, who is the first federal quarantine since 1963, is carrying a particularly drug-resistant strain of the disease. How could he have contracted it?

Where the patient acquired this multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis infection is not yet known – and is a question of great interest! Most such multi-drug resistant infections occur in the developing world.

3. The man took two long-distance cross-Atlantic flights, and four shorter flights within Europe. What is the risk for the people who sat near him—or on the same plane?

The risk is quite low. First, the patient likely was not very infectious to others. Second, previous similar investigations suggest that, if there is a risk, the persons seated in his immediate vicinity are the ones needing the most attention.

4. Are the people on the shorter flights in as much danger as the people on the longer flights?

The likelihood of transmission of tuberculosis increases with increasing time of exposure. That is why the longer flights are the major focus of the public health investigation.

5. Can this man be punished for ignoring the warnings of health officials not to go on these flights?

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Anthony Mason previews tonight's stories, including an update on the tuberculosis patient and look into ground zero-related illnesses.

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Health officials are worried the patient with a rare and deadly form of tuberculosis may have spread the disease to people he came in contact with on two trans-continental flights.

CBS News producer Sarah Carter reports from Johannesburg about a similar case of drug-resistant TB two years ago that took the lives of dozens of people:

Nurses collected samples from the two very ill patients, and 43 others being treated with TB and anti-retroviral drugs, and sent them off. By the time the results came back eight weeks later, 10 of the patients were dead, including the two who had been very ill.

Of the 45 samples, 10 were resistant to all six TB drugs they tested for.
"I got a cold shiver, with such fear in my heart," Moll said. "I thought, 'This is airborne. Could I be infected? Could my staff be infected?' To go into a new realm of XDR-TB, which is basically untreatable, was almost unthinkable," he said, using the acronym for Extremely Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis.

Moll’s worst fears were eventually realized. Four of the hospital nurses died in those first few months. From that point on, the hospital began identifying more and more patients. And in almost all cases the patients with XDR-TB were dead before the lab results were back. Most die within 16 days of being identified as a possible XDR-TB case. The mortality rate of XDR-TB is 84 percent.

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Russ Mitchell previews tonight's stories, including a Georgia man with a rare form of tuberculosis and the latest on the two wayward whales in Northern California.

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