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Obama's Balancing Act Abroad In The Middle East, Obama Juggles Troop And Territory Issues That Are Delicate And Potentially Explosive AMMAN, Jordan, July 21, 2008 (CBS) This week is more than a series of photo ops. Barack Obama hopes to convince voters back home that he's comfortable on the world stage and can juggle a number of delicate and potentially explosive foreign-policy issues, CBS News anchor Katie Couric reports. During the primaries, Obama built his candidacy on the premise that he believed the Iraq War was a mistake he opposed all along. As he said: "a war that never should have...

The three network anchors will travel to Europe and the Middle East next week for Barack Obama's trip, adding their high-wattage spotlight to what is already shaping up as a major media extravaganza. Lured by an offer of interviews with the Democratic presidential candidate, Brian Williams, Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric will make the overseas trek, meaning that the NBC, ABC and CBS evening newscasts will originate from stops along the route and undoubtedly give it big play.

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:...

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...

Network news is old news as far as politics is concerned. According Gerald Seib, an assistant managing editor and the executive Washington editor of The Wall Street Journal, ABC’s “World News,” the “CBS Evening News” and the “NBC Nightly News” just aren’t important in the grand scheme of Washington politics, and that’s part of the changing culture of the news media. “This is a shakeout period for the press in general and the Washington press in particular,” Seib explained. “There’s an interesting passage in the book, also interesting, which bears this point – which is – we talked to Elliott...

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.

It's not about Katie Couric's liberal bias today; it's her sheer fatuousness. Couric has been accorded rare access for extended interviews with the women involved in the presidential race. MRC's Brent Baker has detailed how Couric squandered part of her interview of Hillary Clinton, aired on this past Sunday's 60 Minutes, on silly talk. This morning's Early Show featured excerpts from Couric's interview of Michelle Obama. No huge headlines, but once again Couric wasted time with obvious and trivial questions. The CBS anchor literally apologized to Obama, for example, for posing the much-asked question of what her personal cause as...

Is Sen. Hillary Clinton feeling any doubts about winning the Democratic nomination for president? Not at all. "It will be me," Clinton tells Katie Couric in an interview to air Monday on the "CBS Evening News With Katie Couric." The broadcast airs at 6:30 p.m. on WKMG-Channel 6. Couric also asked if Clinton is concerned that Oprah Winfrey could boost Sen. Barack Obama by campaigning for him in three key states. "No, at the end of the day," Clinton says. "I'm proud to have my husband support me ... with his knowledge, experience and incredible ability to vouch for me."

COURIC SCORES INTERVIEW WITH HILLARY FOR 'CBS EVENING NEWS'... DEVELOPING...

(CBS) Valerie Plame Wilson chides President Bush for not firing anyone for the leaking of her covert CIA identity, which caused a national scandal and an investigation resulting in a perjury and obstruction of justice conviction against Vice President Richard Cheney's chief of staff. She also tells Katie Couric that she has learned of the damage that the leaking of her identity caused agents of the clandestine service and it is serious. Plame Wilson and her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accuse the Bush administration of leaking her identity to the press as retaliation for her husband's public charge that...

October 03, 2007, 0:00 a.m. Cosmo Girl Couric's America"We" little problems. By Jonah Goldberg In a recent speech at the National Press Club, Katie Couric expressed somber disapproval of the jingoistic excesses after 9/11. Among the things that vexed her: “The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying ‘we’ when referring to the United States.� From what I can tell, nobody among the journalistic swells bothered to ask, “Who isn’t ‘we,’ Kemo Sabe?� I don’t want to revisit those supposedly Orwellian flag pins, which sat so heavily on so many journalistic lapels. But it’s worth recalling...

In a recent speech at the National Press Club, Katie Couric expressed somber disapproval of the jingoistic excesses after 9/11. Among the things that vexed her: "The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying 'we' when referring to the United States." From what I can tell, nobody among the journalistic swells bothered to ask, "Who isn't 'we,' Kemo Sabe?" I don't want to revisit those supposedly Orwellian flag pins, which sat so heavily on so many journalistic lapels. But it's worth recalling that during World War II, civilian correspondent Walter Cronkite -- whose anchor job Couric now...

The former “Today” show anchor traced her discomfort with the administration’s march to war back to the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. “The whole culture of wearing flags on our lapel and saying ‘we’ when referring to the United States and, even the ‘shock and awe’ of the initial stages, it was just too jubilant and just a little uncomfortable. And I remember feeling, when I was anchoring the ‘Today’ show, this inevitable march towards war and kind of feeling like, ‘Will anybody put the brakes on this?’ And is this really being properly challenged by the right people?...

With Katie Couric in Iraq, the CBS Evening News on Wednesday allowed viewers to hear directly from U.S. soldiers who regretted how people back home don't hear more about “the good things soldiers do for the Iraqis” and warned that a pullout by the U.S. would lead to “mayhem.” Couric asked a small group of soldiers: “What would you like people to know that you don't think they're hearing back home?”Army Sergeant Jamie Wall answered: “The good things that happen out here, the good things that soldiers do for the Iraqis and how the Iraqis react to us.” Sergeant Brady...

August 30, 2007, 6:00 a.m. Iraqi Information DeficitAs Katie Couric makes plan to report from Iraq, frontlines war journalism is hard to find. By Jeff Emanuel Baghdad, Iraq — The recent headline-grabbing announcement that CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric will be coming to Iraq for 12 days in September has caused, as it should, new attention to be cast on combat-zone journalism. Amidst all of the hubbub and hoopla about the “danger� of her trip to Iraq, it is important to draw a distinction between what Couric and the majority of her colleagues in the mainstream media are...

I had great expectations when Ana Marie Cox turned up on the "Morning Joe" panel, confident the tart-tongued former Wonkette would produce plenty of grist for our NB mill. But over the course of the week, Cox has been disappointingly subdued, leaving it to the congenial Tamron Hall to produce our headlines. Perhaps Ana Marie's new gig at staid "Time" magazine has caused her to hide her acerbic light under a barrel. But the strain of being restrained was maybe too much for Ana Marie, for she began this morning's show with a catty swipe at Katie Couric. Host Joe...

CBS sending Couric to Iraq 'Evening News' anchor sets Mideast trip By MICHAEL LEARMONTH Get ready for Katie Couric -- Phase II. One year after Couric jumped from NBC's "Today" to CBS in a big-money talent deal, the "Evening News" anchor is embarking on a high-risk tour of Iraq and Syria to revive the broadcast. Announcement comes just days after an Iraqi translator working for CBS was killed in Baghdad. CBS said Monday the translator had been found dead following his abduction just hours after leaving work at CBS News' Baghdad bureau. Couric has never been to Iraq, and she...

Red Sox sultan Tom Werner broke Katie Couric’s heart when he dumped her via e-mail - a blow the CBS anchorgal “never fully recovered from,” according to a new book. “Katie was upset that Tom didn’t have the nerve to break up with her in person - or even over the phone,” a “close source” told Edward Klein, the author of “Katie: The Real Story.” “It was embarrassing and humiliating for her.” Klein, who has written a series of sensational bios of prominent celebs including Hillary Clinton, the Kennedys and Jackie O. - and who writes Parade maggie’s popular “Personality...

Two years ago CBS News anchor Dan Rather used falsified documents in his ill-fated Texas National Guard story. For that miscue they ran him out of Dodge and took away his six-shooter. A mere 10 months after she took over, Katie Couric now faces a similar fate. When Katie made her debut on September 5, over 13 million people tuned in. Now, she's lucky if she can pull in 6 million on a given night, leaving CBS News a distant third behind ABC's Charles Gibson and NBC's Brian Williams. "I've gone through a bit of a feeding frenzy and there's...

CBS News president Sean McManus Thursday dismissed talk that Katie Couric may leave as CBS Evening News anchor, saying he expected her to be on the job through her five-year contract. A candid Couric interview in New York magazine this week renewed questions about Couric's future, leading a prominent blogger to start speculating about who might replace her. "She has a five-year contract with CBS to anchor the evening news," McManus said. "All of us, including Katie, expect her to be anchoring the evening news in her fifth year." Couric began anchoring the evening news last September and the ratings...

CBS EVENING NEWS anchor Katie Couric is being accused of slapping an editor -- after he injected a word she detested into a script! "The stress has caused her to blow up at her staff for small infractions on the set," charges NEW YORK magazine reporter Joe Hagan, in a story set for publication on Monday. "During the tuberculosis story in June, Couric got angry with news editor Jerry Cipriano for using a word she detested— 'sputum' —and the staff grew tense when she began slapping him 'over and over and over again' on the arm, according to a source...

I hate what’s happening to Katie Couric. If, for instance, you’ve been in a supermarket checkout line recently, you’ve seen her face plastered on the cover of the National Enquirer, next to a headline that declares that bad ratings and backstabbing have demoralized her so much she wants out. True or not, such Enquirer stories are indicators in their own way (of someone’s wish fulfillment, if not necessarily hers). You can’t call Couric blameless for the rain of ill-will she’s now enduring. She’s been in media all her adult life and she knows full well that few worlds fulminate with...

This past Memorial Day I was visiting my parents. For most of the day, I was just lounging around as is typical on my visits and catching up on the stack of New Yorker magazines that piled up since I had been there previously. I was also enjoying the "World's Deadliest Catch" on the Discovery Channel which is a fascinating show about the Alaskan King Crab fishermen. During one of the commercials early in the evening, I went back into the kitchen to grab a cup of coffee and when I returned my father was sitting in front of...

On her blog, CBS anchor Katie Couric is once again offering her love and kisses to Jimmy Carter. In a "Katie Couric's Notebook" video (which airs on some CBS affiliates as an Evening News promo), Couric used the occasion of Carter being awarded an honorary doctorate of civil law from Oxford to demand of viewers that "you have to respect him for sticking to his principles." Tell that to President Bush. She began by citing another Carter cheerleader:

If television news were covered the same way the media covered Iraq, Katie Couric would surely be out of a job by now. I can imagine the New York Times lede: The news just keeps getting worse for the administration. After spending millions of dollars and manpower to sell a leadership transition, the situation continues to deteriorate. External critics are stepping up their attacks and cracks within the administration's iron-clad discipline are beginning to show as dissenters leak secrets, express discontent and demand an exit strategy to an eager press. That, of course is not a lede you'll ever see...

When The Stiletto spotted this headline in The Billings (MT) Gazette, "Anchor Failure Blamed For Deaths," she thought, "Wow. Katie Couric’s dismal ratings must have finally pushed some executives at CBS News to hurl themselves off the roof of Black Rock.Yes, it really is that bad – and worse: A Gallup Poll finds that 29 percent of Americans "just don’t like" Couric. Negative ratings for NBC’s Brian Williams and ABC’s Charles Gibson were significantly smaller (18 percent and 16 percent, respectively). Couric’s positive ratings (51 percent) also lag, as compared to Williams (59 percent) and Gibson (62 percent). The Associated...

There's been a lot of talk about how badly CBS is doing with its high priced ($15 million a year) Katie Couric as anchor of the "CBS Evening News." Back in 1976, ABC News made a big splash into the ratings tank by hiring (at the then unheard of $1 million a year) Barbara Walters to co-anchor its evening news with Harry Reasoner. Like Couric, Walters was then co-anchor of NBC's "Today" show where she had built up a reputation as an aggressive, go-getter and in the minds of some, a prima donna b***h. As a teenager, I remembered Walters...

I only hope, dear readers, that you aren't as sick of reading about Katie Couric, the beleaguered anchor of the "CBS Evening News," as I am of writing about her. But the taint of plagiarism sweeping through CBS News was, quite possibly, the low point of Couric's seven-month tenure. That's saying a lot. Yes, here's yet one more column about the shooting star of the television-news business. I can take it if you can. Earlier this month, CBS put a video commentary on the Internet in which Couric lamented that children take less interest in using libraries than they used...

NEW YORK — A CBS News producer was fired and the network apologized after a Katie Couric video essay on libraries was found to be plagiarized from the Wall Street Journal. The essay was removed from the CBS Web site and an editor's note was posted saying the item should have credited Jeffrey Zaslow of the Journal, the network said Tuesday. The essays are carried regularly on Couric & Co., the anchor's blog on the CBS News Web site. Couric and producers meet once a week to decide on topics and the producers write them for Couric to read on...

Who are these people? Katie Couric used to be on the Today Show, then she fell off the map. You’ve never heard of Becky Johnson? Allow me to help. Becky Johnson is a Staff Reporter for the Smoky Mountain News. I know both Becky and her editor, Scott McLeod, and respect their work. If you’re not familiar with the SMN, it covers Haywood, Jackson, Macon and Swain Counties in western North Carolina. Becky could teach Katie a thing or two about reporting. Case in point: Becky wrote a story in the February 21 issue of SMN, which is a near...

New York (AP) -- After months of whispers that she was too soft for the evening news, now Katie Couric is being criticized for being too tough on John and Elizabeth Edwards during a "60 Minutes" interview. Can Couric ever win? It's a stunning turnabout for Couric, once America's sweetheart on NBC's "Today" show and now going through hard times as anchor for an evening newscast last in the ratings. Couric's high-profile assignment on CBS'"60 Minutes" Sunday suddenly turned into a referendum on her. In questioning Edwards' decision to continue his presidential campaign despite the recurrence of his wife's cancer,...

To mark yesterday's fourth-anniversary of the war in Iraq, CBS News requested an interview with U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad. The ambassador took time from a hectic war-time schedule to speak with Katie Couric from Baghdad, and in the course of the interview provided a first-hand view of how the new surge strategy is working. But when last night's Evening News aired, lo and behold, the interview never ran. It was instead relegated to an obscure corner of Katie's online blog. CBS apparently determined that Ambassador Khalilzad's comments weren't "newsworthy." Katie & Co. did find time for Bob Woodward...

After his comments this morning, if Don Imus ever gets invited to a party on the terrace of Katie Couric's midtown apartment overlooking Central Park, he would be well advised not to get too close to the ledge. Chatting with Imus on MSNBC at 8:45 ET this morning about the travails of the CBS Evening News and the advent of Rick Kaplan as executive producer, media maven Howard Kurtz observed: "I don't know if this is attributable to Rick, but it seems to me that in the last week the show has a little bit of a harder edge,...

The Associated Press NEW YORK — CBS News today fired the executive producer of Katie Couric's struggling "CBS Evening News" broadcast and appointed former CNN and MSNBC president Rick Kaplan to the job. Kaplan replaces Rome Hartman, said CBS News President Sean McManus. Hartman had held the position since before Couric began at CBS last September. The newscast has been a distant third in the ratings behind ABC and NBC. During last month's pivotal ratings "sweeps" period, Couric's average of 7.6 million viewers was 6 percent down from what Bob Schieffer recorded in February 2006. More troubling was the newscast's...

Katie Couric's brief, rocky tenure holds lessons about TV news. By ERIC DEGGANS Published March 4, 2007 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As anniversary presents go, a diamond ring probably would have been better. Instead, Katie Couric faces a jarring ratings report today, on her six-month anniversary as the lead news anchor and star of the CBS Evening News. Despite the millions poured into her transition to the Evening News Sept. 5, it's ABC's Charlie Gibson who deposed NBC's Brian Williams as top-rated evening news anchor in February's "sweeps" period, winning audiences with a traditional and surprisingly female-friendly broadcast. "I think in some ways...

  Katie Couric WASHINGTON – Oh, the things multimillion-dollar news readers worry about … In her CBS blog, the day after the Oscars, anchorwoman Katie Couric frets that Hollywood's overwhelming embrace of Al Gore and the politics of global warming might prove to be a political setback with the hicks in the sticks. "But as the throngs of celebrities greeted Al Gore as a secular saint, I wondered if this might usher in a backlash against environmentalists," she speculated. "It wasn't too long ago, afterall, (sic) that environmentalists were decried as tree-huggers, and former President Bush rallied against them –...

Along with millions of other people, I was watching the Oscars last night, checking out the dresses. (Personally, I found Penelope Cruz’s the most beautiful and tasteful of the night...) But as the throngs of celebrities greeted Al Gore as a secular saint, I wondered if this might usher in a backlash against environmentalists. It wasn’t too long ago, afterall, that environmentalists were decried as tree-huggers, and former President Bush railed against them — trying to say it was the spotted owl against logging interests and jobs in the West. Gore has repeatedly said the environment is not a Democratic...

The ratings book has been published and the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric didn’t do very well. The evening news broadcast came in 3rd among the big three. As the golden chairs at CBS scramble to effect job security in the face of these dismal ratings we are being told that their failure is our fault. It would seem that we are biased against poor Katie Couric. According to CBS News chief Sean McManus, we, the viewing public, are shallow, unenlightened chauvinists who simply aren’t progressive enough to accept a female news anchor.

Pasadena -- Katie Couric's going to the Super Bowl. The "CBS Evening News" anchor will contribute a feature to CBS' four-hour Super Bowl pregame show on Feb. 4, the network said on Thursday. She will also anchor the evening news from Miami, the site of the big game, on the Friday before the game. There's precedent at other networks for the news anchors to be involved in sports coverage, including Brian Williams and Couric during NBC's Olympic broadcasts, said Sean McManus, president of CBS News and Sports. "It is the biggest event of the day and it makes sense for...

One week ago, Katie sat down for a briefing at the White House, and noticed something unusual. _______________________________________________________ Last Wednesday, President Bush gave his address to the country about “the new way forward” for Iraq, and lots of journalists—including me, of course—were in Washington to cover it. But before the Big Speech, there was the little-known Big Meeting. The White House invited all the network anchors, and some cable anchors, along with the Sunday political show hosts to a meeting with unnamed VERY senior administration officials. (Obviously I know their names, but the agreement was that in order to attend...

Katie Couric's discouraging prospects are becoming clearer with each new disheartening television ratings update. I wonder if anyone at CBS has concluded that the time has come to move Couric back to where she belonged, all along: early-morning television. I suspect that CBS could find a place for Katie on the couch, yukking it up with Harry, Hannah and Julie. The classy Rene Syler, one of the four original co-anchors of "The Early Show" on CBS, recently exited the program, conveniently leaving an opening. A conspiracy theorist would suggest that it's merely a matter of time before Couric joined a...

Since it now seems very imminent, I decided that it was an appropriate time to start this up. Links to information and pictures (if we get them) can be posted here.

Dear Mr. McManus: I don't have to tell you that things have changed a lot since the glory days of CBS News when it sat atop the ratings and Walter Cronkite was "the most trusted man in America." Back then there were only a handful of over-the-air broadcast channels and the Big Three networks presided over something of a shared monopoly in early evening news. TV was in its adolescence and viewers were less sophisticated about the medium. Although there were fewer gadgets (not even videotape), newscasts had more substance. Today, the mix of news and entertainment leans increasingly toward...

Katie Couric: 'My God, I'm So Boring' Katie Couric says the job of anchoring the "CBS Evening News” is "a little harder than I thought it would be.” In an interview for the January issue of Esquire magazine, Couric also says she feels "in a bit of a box,” and complains that "some people out there are rooting for me to fail.” Couric noted that Esquire itself criticized her after her September debut: "You guys even take a shot at me. You have something in the November issue, something about how since I’ve become an anchor you don’t know me...

CBS EVENING NEWS RATINGS BRIEF ATTN: LISTING EDITORS December 19, 2006 "CBS EVENING NEWS WITH KATIE COURIC" RATINGS BRIEF, WEEK OF DEC. 11-15, 2006 FOR THE WEEK (12/11/06-12/15/06) --CBS is the only network that is up in A25-54 and A18-49 from the previous week. Both NBC and ABC are down. A25-54 A18-49 CBS 1.9 from 1.8, +6% 1.4 from 1.3, +8% NBC 2.2 from 2.4, -8% 1.6 from 1.8, -11% ABC 2.2 from 2.4, -8% 1.5 from 1.7, -12% FOR THE SEASON (through 13 weeks: 9/18/06-12/15/06 vs. 9/19/05-12/09/05) Important note: CBS’ season-to-date numbers do not include the first two weeks...

Maybe Katie Couric never really had a chance this year to prove herself as the anchor of "The CBS Evening News." Fans, critics, bloggers, comrades and competitors had a field day throughout 2006, breathlessly complaining about everything under the sun. When rumors initially spread that CBS wanted her, the debate began heating up and seemed to take on a life of its own: Katie Would Be a Fresh Alternative and No, Katie Would Be a Disaster. She'd Lighten Up the News and She's Too Perky for 6:30 p.m. Then, on the air, Katie was Too Serious -- no, she was...

What happened on the first feed of the CBS Evening News with Katie Couric tonight? First there was "bad tape and audio on an Elizabeth Palmer report from Baghdad," an e-mailer says. "Then there was no audio on the final kicker piece, which was supposed to start a series on 'Giving.'" Couric apologized for the audio problems and signed off prematurely. "They had to get off the air four minutes early," another e-mailer said. CBS showed Couric standing on the set while theme music played and credits rolled. ("One got the feeling that heads were going to roll, too," a...

Despite her newsmaking interview with Michael J. Fox last week, Katie Couric's goal of taking the "CBS Evening News" to the top is getting further out of reach. Her average audience of 7.3 million viewers left the "CBS Evening News" 1.1 million behind ABC's second-place "World News." It was the biggest gap between the two broadcasts since the week of Feb. 6, according to Nielsen Media Research. NBC's "Nightly News" led the way with 8.9 million viewers last week. Couric scored the attention-getting interview with Fox on Thursday after he was criticized by Rush Limbaugh for supposedly playing up symptoms...

Michael J. Fox is Right About One Thing: Pro-life Movement Must Oppose IVF However, Fox is wrong about the use of unethical embryonic stem cell research ST. LOUIS, October 30, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Actor and Parkinson's sufferer, Michael J. Fox, has responded to accusations that he either acted his symptoms or that he deliberately went off his medications for an ad supporting Democrat Senatorial candidate Clare McCaskill. In an interview with CBS' Katie Couric, Fox unloads a bombshell on the pro-life movement saying that there has been little opposition to in vitro fertilization which has created the "spare embryos" so...

IMHO (in my humble opinion) IRKED RABBLE WITHOUT A CAUSE © by Norman Liebmann In my humble opinion, a Moslem scholar will soon complete a new translation of the Koran that will make more sense to westerners. One passage reads, “Trust in Allah, but don’t forget to cut the cards”. In my humble opinion, CBS will hire a team of spelunkers to descend down into Howe’s Caverns to locate where Katie Couric's ratings finally bottomed out. In my humble opinion, Virginia Senatorial candidate James Webb’s next book of supposedly “non-sexual” acts will be called “Lady Chatterley’s Banana”. In my humble...