Couric's debut was a journalistic nightmare (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™ -Your's truly quoted)

Marketwatch.com ^ | September 6, 2006 | Jon Friedman

[abb]

Commentary: CBS should shelve the cute stuff and stick to ... the news

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) - "I am very happy to be with you tonight."

With those un-momentous words Tuesday night, Katie Couric, 49, was off and running as the new anchor of "The CBS Evening News." At last the hype was over and the former star of NBC's "Today" show would have an opportunity to prove herself as a serious evening-newscaster.

She dropped the ball.

At its worst, the show reinforced all of the worries of grizzled veteran journalists. This wasn't all Couric's fault. She was, as billed, pleasant and professional. But her producer let the cuteness get way out of control. The show was silly at times, full of fluff at others and, faithfully, All About Katie.

- snip -

A READER RESPONDS (about my column Tuesday about the change at the top of Viacom: "Tom Freston's firing will make no difference to Viacom's future. Viacom's already struck the iceberg and this move is just re-arranging the deck chairs." Walter Abbott

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Friedman bucks the pary line...

[abb]

Ping

[Peach]

After she said, with her characteristic uber-coyness, "Coming up: something new for the evening news, besides me..." my Cringe Level went right off the charts.

Now I know why I didn't watch. Cringe Level doesn't begin to describe what this show sounded like.

[angkor]

Even Jane Pauley (cringe) had better reporter creds than Katie.

[TaxRelief]

Katie was quite...chatty.

[trustandobey]

Vanna White could have turned the pages better.

[Panzerlied]

"Katie was quite...chatty."

Chatty Patty Katie? That's catty!

[nascarnation]

Vanna is a heckuva lot better looking too

[babaloo]

Columnist at CBS Marketwatch takes the first in house shot at Katie. Interesting.

[abb]

Actually, Marketwatch is no longer owned by CBS. Dow Jones bought it last year...

[andyandval]

"Tom Freston's firing will make no difference to Viacom's future. Viacom's already struck the iceberg and this move is just re-arranging the deck chairs." Walter Abbott

Beautiful!!

[gridlock]

Nice job on the comment.

[abb]

time for you to put up your couric/rather pic on titanic's deck...

[Mo1]

They just never learn

[Dead Corpse]

Didn't watch. Won't watch. Don't care.

Watched the Science channel. Some show about why certain planetoidal bodies in our solar system are no longer considered "planets" and all the confusion over a proper definition.

Some times, smart people can be REALLY dumb.

I had a much better time laughing at them than I would have with Kooky Katie...

[I'm ALL Right!]

Thankfully, I didn't watch.

[MrEdd]

Couric told the audience that she had agonized over what she would say at the close of her first broadcast (and went so far as to suggest that we viewers, perhaps, were agonizing about it with her at home).

In what might have appeared, at first, to be a clever idea, the final segment explored the nightly sign-off words of some illustrious news people. Then, it offered the images of mythical buffoon newsmen Ted Baxter (Ted Knight) and Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell). That was nothing less than moronic.

Couric then invited the audience to write in and suggest an appropriate sign-off. "I know we'll have a lot of fun reading them," she smiled. (Watching on my office television set, I winced all over again.)

How about:

I'm Katie Couric, And I've Just been Fired.

[babaloo]

You are right--my mistake. How about "Former star CBS business columnist takes a shot at Katie"?

[andyandval]

I watched the first 5 minutes of this last night...

Unwatchable.

[Dilbert56]

1. She has a "dippy" voice. Good for reading stories to 1st graders but not suitable for serious news.
2. Interviewing a columnist, Tom Friedman, was different but different does not imply better (although the converse is true). His "weep"ing for the days when the world liked us was infantile. If we have to suffer thousands dead and trillions of dollars lost to get the "world" on our side I say: "No, thanks.".
3. The political commentary as WWE was pointless. This is supposed to be a news program. The mud-wrestling takes place on opinion programs like LimpBall and "The Quacktor".
4. Who the %^&* cares about Tom Cruise's kid. Really. (C)BS News has 22 minutes to inform us and they wasted time on that?
5. Get a signoff line or don't get one but spare us the audience participation kubuki dance. Maybe "Courage" could be replaced by "Vacuity".