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SHE is known to be a brilliant war reporter, one of America's hottest TV journalists. But it was not her reporting that made her page one news for New York's tabloids. Sexy Lara Logan who had been reporting from dangerous Baghdad has been labelled a homewrecker for her tryst with an Aussie newsman and the husband of a US embassy worker. According to the New York Post, the 60 Minutes reporter and former swimsuit model apparently courted two men which led to a brawl. One of her lovers, MrJoe Burkett is an American civilian contractor. He reportedly brawled in a...

On Tuesday’s CBS "Evening News" anchor Katie Couric reported on Zimbabwe’s opposition leader dropping out of an election against the nation’s socialist dictator, Robert Mugabe, and lamented how: "The fear and danger that now pervades the streets of Zimbabwe under President Robert Mugabe is a tragic departure from the hope and promise that began with his landslide victory nearly 30 years ago." File footage of an unidentified reporter covering Mugabe’s 1980 election followed: "A self-described Marxist has won the right to form the first government of the new state of Zimbabwe." Couric continued to describe Mugabe’s promising rise to power:...

The US Navy-Marine Corps Court of Appeals has ruled that the CBS television news magazine 60 Minutes must turn over outtakes from its interview with Marine Corps Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich in which he revealed what happened at the so-called “Haditha Massacre” in Iraq more than three years ago. The three-judge appellate panel Friday directed Marine Corps military judge Lt. Col. Jeffrey G. Meeks to “conduct additional fact-finding” including an “in camera review” of the outtakes to determine whether Wuterich revealed any information the government needs to bolster its prosecution against the Marine infantryman. The ruling of the military judge...

On Monday’s CBS "Early Show," correspondent Jeff Glor did a report on "five things you should know about John McCain" and highlighted details such as: "Number four, a maverick even back in high school, John McCain was nicknamed ‘the punk’...A reputation that followed him to the naval academy." During the segment, USA Today columnist Walter Shapiro added: "John McCain graduated five slots from the bottom of the Annapolis class of 1958." Contrast those bits of information with the hard-hitting facts revealed about Barack Obama during a similar segment on last Wednesday’s show: "Number four -- in addition to enjoying basketball...

Someone please tell CBS News chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan that her reaction is precisely the reaction her peers are shooting for: "If I were to watch the news that you hear here in the United States, I would just blow my brains out because it would drive me nuts," Ms. Logan said. Logan admits here a common complaint about the kind of news reported out of Iraq for the duration of the war, which is a macabre focus on blood-soaked sensationalism to the near exclusion of any other sort of story. The newsworks (to perhaps coin a phrase) have...

Dan Rather may retire this Wednesday night as anchor of the CBS News. But before he does, the verdict on his tenure as one of America's leading anchors has already been fixed. Helping to seal that verdict is Mike Walker's new book "Rather Dumb – A Top Tabloid Reporter Tells CBS How to Do News."

CBS News sinks to new low; publishes crackpot global warming story, attributes it to Associated Press, kills it with no retraction Yesterday I posted a story from CBS News: Quake n’ Bake: Global Warming Causes More Energetic Earthquakes? The main headline was this: Seismic Activity 5 Times More Energetic Than 20 Years Ago Because Of Global Warming This drew a lot of attention because of the total lack of verifiable science associated with it. I posted some graphs of USGS data showing that the opposite was true, that recent earthquake energy was actually less that in the early 1900’s, and...

CBS News and the Associated Press were quick to regurgitate claims that global warming has increased the intensity of earthquakes fivefold in the past 20 years. But had either taken the time to investigate, they would have discovered that both the source's facts and credentials were, if you'll pardon the expression, on very tremorous ground. In a Wednesday piece -- suddenly vanished on Thursday -- attributed to the AP, CBS warned in its subtitle that a new "study" has found "Seismic Activity 5 Times More Energetic Than 20 Years Ago Because Of Global Warming." Based on a Tuesday Market Wire...

A profile of MSNBC host Keith Olbermann by Peter J. Boyer in the current edition of the New Yorker, gives us a good clue as to why the man known for his laughable impressions of Edward R. Murrow is so antagonistic towards CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric. She beat him out of a job as anchor at CBS. Yes, you read that right. In fact I had to read it twice in amazement when the article, "One Angry Man," stated that the CBS execs actually considered Olbermann for the anchor position (emphasis mine): After Rather’s unhappy departure from CBS, the...

MINNEAPOLIS -- There are thousands of journalists and others taking part in a convention in the Twin Cities this weekend. Among the major names in town is former CBS News anchor and "60 Minutes" contributor, Dan Rather. The aim of the convention is to reform the media. Attendees ultimately want to hold the media accountable for serving the public interest. "I have a lifetime of believing the red, beating heart of free and democratic people is a free and independent -- truly independent -- press," said Rather. One of their main goals is to make large national ownership groups and...

President Bush's approval rating is at its lowest level ever, according to the latest CBS News poll. Just 25% of Americans approve of the overall job Bush is doing as President. Likewise, 67% disapprove of the job Bush is doing -- the highest such figure in CBS News polls since he assumed office. Only Presidents Nixon (24%) and Truman (22%) have seen polls showing job approval ratings lower than 25% during their presidencies, according to Gallup Polls. President Carter's all-time low was 26%.

NEW YORK — The "CBS Evening News" audience has taken a noticeable dip ever since the latest round of speculation over Katie Couric's job. The broadcast averaged 5.34 million viewers last week, breaking a record low for CBS News' flagship show that had been set the week before, according to Nielsen Media Research. The "CBS Evening News" - No. 3 in a three-way competition - had nearly 2.5 million fewer viewers than No. 2. NBC's "Nightly News" led with 8.02 million viewers last week (5.5 rating, 12 share), with ABC's "World News" averaging 7.79 million (5.4, 12). CBS had a...

On Friday’s CBS "Early Show," co-host Harry Smith proclaimed: "Barack Obama took some time off from campaigning to go back to Washington, where he got the royal treatment yesterday." Correspondent Chip Reid followed with a report: "Officially this place, Capitol Hill, is Barack Obama's place of employment, but he doesn't come here very often. When he did make a rare visit yesterday he was treated like a rock star." Reid went on to describe Obama’s "rock star" tour of Congress: "Swarmed by tourists and reporters, Barack Obama slowly wound his way through the U.S. Capitol, visiting the House floor where...

First on TVNewser: Dan Rather's lawyers have served CBS with an amended complaint related to Rather's fraud case against his former employer. The complaint will be filed with the court tomorrow morning. TVNewser has learned the amended complaint contains details about Rather's last days at CBS including, we hear, particulars about that flawed National Guard Story. -snip-

After months of speculation, by everybody from E! News to The New York Times, that Katie Couric will soon end her rocky tenure as anchor of "CBS Evening News," network chief Leslie Moonves stormed into the newsroom last week and attempted to snuff out the flames. According to The Associated Press, he told the staff that Couric, the first female solo evening news anchor, isn't leaving. He was adamant. He said she's "your anchor." Unspoken but implied: So get used to it and stop whining ... for now. Seriously, Mr. Moonves, will Couric stay perched at the CBS anchor desk...

On 4/11/08, The Newseum opened its new quarters in Washington, DC. I was specifically interested in an exhibit in the Internet, TV and Radio Gallery. The exhibit was "Bias at CBS" and it featured the September 2004 "60 Minutes II" Dan Rather report aimed at discrediting President Bush's service in the Air National Guard. This 9/04 report was meant to hurt Bush's re-election chances in November, 2004. Comments among FReepers quickly exposed inconsistencies in the documents and led to bloggers on the internet exposing the report as deeply flawed, as well as using forged documents. These inconsistencies ultimately forced CBS...

As if Katie Couric didn’t already have enough problems. Weighed down by record-low ratings at the anchor desk of “CBS Evening News,� and by reports suggesting she will leave that post two years before her multimillion-dollar contract expires, Couric now has civil rights groups — mostly Hispanic — on her back. And for good reason. The CBS newscast that carries her name recently aired a one-sided and inaccurate report about illegal immigrant women who give birth to their children in the United States. The news story challenged the broader constitutional law of birthright citizenship and stated — without providing the...

The "CBS Evening News" audience has taken a noticeable dip ever since the latest round of speculation over Katie Couric's job. The broadcast averaged 5.34 million viewers last week, breaking a record low for CBS News' flagship show that had been set the week before, according to Nielsen Media Research. The "CBS Evening News" - No. 3 in a three-way competition - had nearly 2.5 million fewer viewers than No. 2. NBC's "Nightly News" led with 8.02 million viewers last week (5.5 rating, 12 share), with ABC's "World News" averaging 7.79 million (5.4, 12). CBS had a 3.7 rating and...

For the second week in a row, “The CBS Evening News With Katie Couric” has notched record low ratings. The newscast dropped some 50,000 viewers to average 5.34 million total viewers for the week of April 21, according to data from Nielsen Media Research. “Evening News” had averaged 5.39 million viewers the previous week. Finishing first in the broadcast network flagship news race for the week was “The NBC Nightly News With Brian Williams” with 8.01 million total viewers. ABC’s “World News With Charles Gibson” averaged 7.79 million viewers, a quick rebound of some 280,000 from 7.51 million viewers the...

Justice Antonin Scalia on Sunday characterized himself as a social conservative and "a law-and-order guy" whose views do not impact his interpretation of the Constitution. In an interview on CBS' "60 Minutes," Scalia addressed issues from abortion to flag-burning. Were he to approach his job differently, Scalia said, he would adopt the position of abortion opponents who interpret the Constitution to mean that a state must prohibit abortion. But the authors of the Constitution did not write about abortion, so he does not support the approach favored by abortion opponents, said the justice, who is promoting a new book, "Making...

CBS Election Night 1984 http://youtube.com/watch?v=1e4t1qKGFao&feature=related A great night. Sure to lift your spirits.

CBS Chief Executive Les Moonves gave his embattled anchor and her news division a vote of confidence yesterday, telling a staff meeting that Katie Couric "is my anchor today, tomorrow and in the future." But the public display does not change the reality that Couric is likely to relinquish the anchor chair after the election, according to two top network executives who declined to be named discussing a private meeting. Moonves asked to address the Friday staff meeting, held at the CBS News offices in New York and broadcast to network bureaus around the world, out of concern that Couric...

Katie Couric may be the least of Leslie Moonves’s worries. While the fate of Ms. Couric and the “CBS Evening News” is in the headlines, the entire CBS News division represents only a fraction of the CBS broadcast network’s revenue. More perplexing is the prime-time schedule, where no new hit has emerged this year, and as a result, CBS is likely to lose the crown of most-watched network to the Fox network. And there are concerns over other parts of the CBS Corporation. The radio division is lagging. Pressure to make a digital acquisition is intensifying. Advertising revenue is softening....

One wonders why, in its giddiness to lure in Katie Couric as its news babe, CBS threw away all common sense. Since the dawn of television, men have dominated network news for obvious reasons. Their voices are lower and they rarely display middle-aged gams. This amalgam of testosterone and primness has helped even an outright buffoon like Dan Rather to do a convincing imitation of gravitas. Even the network's trick of sending Katie to Iraq failed to rope in a single viewer. But much has been lost beyond the handsome salary. Now, putting another female into Katie's position will look...

Breaking: The judge in Dan Rather's lawsuit against CBS has issued a motion to dismiss most of the case. CBS News confirms. Developing... > More: TVNewser has learned most of issues of the lawsuit have been dismissed. What remains is the contract dispute: whether Rather was utilized appropriately in the remaining months of his deal as a correspondent on 60 Minutes. Jim Quinn, lead counsel for CBS tells TVNewser, "We're thrilled with the results. The core of the allegations of fraud and fair dealing have been thrown out. What's left is a garden variety contract dispute." In the meantime, the...

The problem with CBS and Katie Couric is not that the show isn't working. CBS Evening News is a mother on life support and Katie was just stillborn. She never had a chance. Ever since CBS lied about the Bush National Guard story, it has as much credibility as, well....a major news network that makes up news. Small disconnect in that strategy but overcomeable with time except for the fact that CBS, ABC, and NBC are running out of time. All three of the major networks have been losing evening news viewers for the past 10 years in a major...

Katie Couric and CBS News are talking for the first time about her giving up the anchor chair after the November election if her ratings don't improve, a course that could result in her leaving the network, sources familiar with the situation say. These sources say the network's top executives believe Couric is doing an excellent job on the "CBS Evening News," but that both sides have grown frustrated with a situation in which she seems mired in third place and unable to use the range of talents that made her a superstar in morning television. They stress that a...

Katie Couric's days at CBS could be numbered. Pounded by two years of anemic ratings, the first female anchorwoman of a nightly newscast is likely to split from the network as early as January, the Wall Street Journal reported. Couric, 51, replaced the iconic Dan Rather as "CBS Evening News" anchor and makes $15 million a year. Her giant five-year contract stretches to 2011. Just two years after she vowed to bring a new era to stodgy evening news - did anyone say perky? - Couric could be ready to throw in the towel. CBS and Couric denied the report...

After two years of record-low ratings, both CBS News executives and people close to Katie Couric say that the "CBS Evening News" anchor is likely to leave the network well before her contract expires in 2011 -- possibly soon after the presidential inauguration early next year.

CBS, Couric Likely to Split By REBECCA DANA April 9, 2008 7:44 p.m. After two years of record-low ratings, both CBS News executives and people close to Katie Couric say that the "CBS Evening News" anchor is likely to leave the network well before her contract expires in 2011 -- possibly soon after the presidential inauguration early next year. Ms. Couric isn't even halfway through her five-year contract with CBS, which began in June 2006 and pays an annual salary of around $15 million. But CBS executives are under pressure to cut costs and improve ratings for the broadcast, which...

CBS, the home of the most storied news division in broadcasting, has been in discussions with Time Warner about a deal to outsource some of its newsgathering operations to CNN, two executives briefed on the matter said Monday. Over the last decade, CNN has held on-again, off-again talks with both ABC News and CBS News about various joint ventures but during the last several months, talks with CBS have been revived and lately intensified, according to the executives who were granted anonymity because of the confidential nature of the negotiations. Broadly speaking, the executives described conversations about reducing CBS’s newsgathering...

CBSNEWS IN TALKS TO CONTRACT OUT MOST REPORTING TO CNN Whynot just make it up? Oh, they already do.

The CBS News/New York Times poll has both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton leading John McCain in head-to-head races by five points. According to the poll, Obama leads McCain 47% to 42%, with Clinton leading McCain 48% to 43%. As always, it is important to see how the poll's respondents break down by party -- a look which shows that those questioned self-identified 39% Dem, 28% Repub, and 33% independent in the unweighted sample. The weighted sample broke down 40% Dem, 26% Repub, and 34% independent. The unweighted sample shows an 11-point margin for the Dems, while the weighted sample...

CBS reeling from disappointing earning in the last quarter has done some layoffs, at the corporate level, and separate from that, at some local O&O stations. On corporate level, TVNewser reports that CBS News has made cuts in to editorial, technical operations and the bureaus. CBS owns 29 stations, including 16 CBS affiliates ...

(CBS) Self-avowed "P.R. agent for the planet" Al Gore says those who still doubt that global warming is caused by man - among them, Vice President Dick Cheney - are acting like the fringe groups who think the 1969 moon landing never really happened, or who once believed the world is flat. The former vice president and former presidential candidate talks to 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl in an interview to be broadcast this Sunday, March 30, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. Confronted by Stahl with the fact some prominent people, including the nation’s vice president, are not convinced that global...

(CBS) A German resident held by the U.S. for almost five years tells 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley that Americans tortured him in many ways - including hanging him from the ceiling for five days early in his captivity when he was in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Even after determining he was not a terrorist, Murat Kurnaz says the torture continued. Kurnaz tells his story for the first time on American television this Sunday, March 30, at 7 p.m. ET/PT. Kurnaz, an ethnic Turk born and raised in Germany, went to Pakistan in late 2001 at age 19 to study Islam and...

Yesterday, CBS finally ran the Hillary "I dodged sniper fire in Bosnia" story. Yes, this is the same network which tried to throw a presidential election with the Dan Rather "fake but accurate" report. Although the story has been kicking around the blogosphere for the past two weeks, what does the entire incident tell us about, Hillary, her campaign and the mainstream media? Once again, the mainstream media, in this case CBS, followed rather than broke the story. Various blogs had already pointed out the latest whopper on the part of Hillary, yet CBS just aired the damning videotape. In...

By popular demand (meaning regular commenter DEC, who writes the bizarrely riveting blog Jungle Trader), herewith the CBS News report that tags Hillary with having fabricated "sniper fire" during her trip to Bosnia back in the 1990s. It rather graphically shows that Hillary made the story up out of whole cloth. Hillary's campaign now says that she "misspoke," whatever that means. This is a perplexing gaffe, because it is so easily revealed as wrong. There were many reporters with rolling cameras following Hillary around Bosnia, and the absence of actual snipers or even sounds that might have been confused with...

The Early Show did its best this morning to help Barack Obama climb out of the hole he's dug for himself with his close association with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. In a set-up segment, CBS's Dean Reynolds rhetorically asked: "the question is whether the rhetoric is so remarkable, because in African-American churches pastors often seek to rouse their congregants to self-reliance by speaking harshly about the country's troubled racial past and the need to overcome it." Nice try, but how does accusing the US government of introducing AIDS and giving black people drugs equate to a call for self-reliance? Reynolds...

The Early Show did its best this morning to help Barack Obama dig out of the hole he's dug for himself with his close association with Jeremiah Wright. In a set-up segment, CBS's Dean Reynolds rhetorically asked: "the question is whether the rhetoric is so remarkable, because in African-American churches pastors often seek to rouse their congregants to self-reliance by speaking harshly about the country's troubled racial past and the need to overcome it." Nice try, but how does accusing the US government of introducing AIDS and giving black people drugs equate to a call for self-reliance? Reynolds concluded by...

I'm dancing on the top deck with a 71-year-old feminist and psychotherapist whom I've come to think of as the Twirler. We've spent two days attending seminars on The Nation magazine's Alaska cruise; we've talked about the Bush presidency and prison reform and single-payer health care. Now, at almost midnight, my fiercely intelligent and opinionated new friend is putting all the heady political talk behind her by bodily twirling. "If I start to get dizzy, then I twirl in the opposite direction," Charlotte tells me as the live band revs up its throbbing Motown beat. "I won't fall." "Good, please...

Everybody who is anybody in television news — with one glaring omission — showed up for last week’s twentieth-anniversary blowout for 48 Hours, which, after 60 Minutes, is CBS News’ most durable magazine program. On hand for the party in the twentieth-floor lounge at 230 Fifth Avenue were CBS chairman Leslie Moonves, CBS News president Sean McManus, 48 Hours executive producer Susan Zirinsky, former CBS president Sir Howard Stringer, and former news president Andrew Heyward. Missing was Dan Rather. The original anchor of 48 Hours — who, along with Stringer, got the show off the ground in 1986 with a...

Former CBS anchor Dan Rather has accused those he called "corporate overlords" at CBS of "working in secret collusion with the powers in Washington" to intrude into television newsrooms. Rather made the remarks as he returned to a courtroom in New York to demand that CBS release documents by a private investigator hired by the network to look into claims made in Rather's story about George W. Bush's Texas Air National Guard service. The story led to Rather's dismissal from the anchor's post and eventually from the network. CBS has claimed that the same documents will reinforce its own position...

February 24, 2008 We apologize that you missed the first segment of 60 Minutes tonight featuring "The Prosecution of Don Siegelman." It was a techincal problem with CBS out of New York. We are working with them right now to see if we can re-broadcast the segment. Please be patient with us during this time. We are doing our best to correct the problem.

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. (Map, News) - Military prosecutors say unaired footage of a CBS interview given by a Marine squad leader contains admissions of crimes in an attack that killed 24 Iraqi civilians. Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich "apparently admits in an unaired segment that he did in fact order his men to 'shoot first and ask questions later,'" Capt. Nicholas Gannon said in response to a motion filed by CBS seeking to quash a subpoena seeking the footage. CBS is set to ask a military judge Friday to throw out the subpoena during a pretrial hearing for Wuterich, who...

National Journal sets the stage for today's Senate vote on a bill banning the CIA from using torture: Supporters will need 60 votes to advance the bill, meaning they will need some Republicans to cross party lines. [Harry] Reid said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., could be a major swing vote, given his previous support for legislation against torture. But a spokeswoman for McCain, a Republican presidential candidate who has been trying to bolster support from party conservatives, did not return telephone calls and an e-mail late Tuesday seeking comment. And why was the famously anti-torture and press-friendly senator avoiding phone...

How do you make thirteen of 60 Minutes feel like an eternity? Sic Katie Couric on Senator Hillary Clinton. What struck me first about Couric’s questions Sunday night during her thirteen-minute interview of Clinton was not that they were too soft (though they weren’t particularly tough and nor were those Couric’s colleague, Steve Kroft, posed to Senator Barack Obama in his companion interview…more on all that in a second) it’s that they were, often, too…beside the point. I found myself wondering aloud, These are the things you—even you, Katie Couric—choose to ask a presidential candidate? Out of the gate, Couric...

<p>A deal has been reached with kidnappers for the release of two CBS journalists, radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's office in Basra said Wednesday.</p>

BAGHDAD — Two CBS News journalists were missing in the predominantly Shiite southern city of Basra, the network said Monday. CBS said all efforts were under way to find the journalists, who were not identified by the network. It requested "that others do not speculate on the identities of those involved" until more information was available. Iraqi police said the journalists were taken away Sunday after masked gunmen entered the Sultan Palace Hotel in central Basra. The police spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media. "CBS News has been in touch with the...

Analysis: McCain New Face Of GOP Campaign '08 Complete Coverage Super Tuesday In-Depth WASHINGTON (CBS) ― This analysis was written by CBSNews.com senior political editor Vaughn Ververs. After amassing a huge delegate lead in 21 Super Tuesday contests, John McCain is the new face of the Republican Party. Despite loud and sometimes bitter opposition from some conservative corners, the Arizona senator has edged ever closer to winning his party's presidential nomination. Both Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee pledged to fight on. But the sheer delegate deficit each must now erase to overtake McCain will make it harder by the day...