Juicy Bits Surfacing in Rather Case: In 2004, CBS Considered Matt Drudge

New York Observer ^ | November 6, 2008 | Felix Gillette

[Zakeet]

Full Headline: Juicy Bits Surfacing in Rather Case: In 2004, CBS Considered Matt Drudge, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter Independent Panel

This week, Dan Rather's legal team submitted a memorandum to the judge overseeing Mr. Rather's $70 million civil lawsuit against his former employers, which for the first time made public some of the thousands of documents that CBS has already turned over in the ongoing discovery process.

The Media Mob is still making its way through the thick stack of emails, internal memos, and transcripts included in this stash. But we were kind of amazed by one document.

First the quick back story:

[bmwcyle]

CBS news is toast. America can’t support all the networks any more.

[johnny7]

CBS Considered Matt Drudge, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter...

LMAO... so naturally, they went with Katie Couric!

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Matt Drudge. CBS News might have closed in on SNL’s audience...

[icwhatudo]

Buckhead should have been on the list.

[stevem]

Then things get a little bit more conservative...CBS’s full list of "others"

I don't know who some of these people are such as: Robert Barkley, Robert Kagan, Christopher Caldwell

Others not conservative but likely fair: Bernard Goldberg, Christopher Hitchens

Then, when some wag calls a list the more conservative types you get such as: Andrew Sullivan, Fred Barnes, William Kristol. If I were Rather, I would have killed to get these people on the "panel."

[stevem]

I really can’t recall. Was Thornburgh conservative?

[SwinneySwitch]

“To err is human, but to really foul up requires a computer.” Captain Dan the Newsman

[blau993]

Unless I am particularly dense this morning, the story says these names were being considered for the investigative panel, not as on-line replacements for Rather.

The list strikes me as simply an attempt by somebody who doesn't really know much to list well-known conservatives. Interestingly, if being a lawyer was a necessary qualification, many of the names on the list would not qualify.

Dick Thornburg was a well known Republican. I would put him around the middle of the Republican spectrum -- more conservative (to use two other Pennsylvania Republicans as examples) than, say, an Arlen Specter, but certainly not as conservative as Rick Santorum. However, to a Democrat or a news executive at CBS (if that is not redundant), he would be a conservative. In any event, he has a reputation as a straight-shooter, and he was probably a good choice.

[penowa]

"CBS news is toast. America can’t support all the networks any more."

The left only needs one to dispense the propaganda. Who will be The Gov't Network? NBC?