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NOTE: as I have traditionally done, Christmas songs telling the news of the day will only be the secular songs. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 2007 DFU CHRISTMAS PARODIES: OVER THE RIVER AND THROUGH THE WOODSIT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE CHRISTMASPARADE OF THE WOODEN SOLDIERSI SAW MOMMY KISSING SANTA CLAUS GRANDMA GOT RUN OVER BY A REINDEER RUDOLPH THE RED NOSED REINDEER CHIPMUNK CHRISTMAS SONG LET IT SNOW DECK THE HALLS I'M GETTIN' NUTHIN' FOR CHRISTMAS WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN UP ON THE HOUSETOP SLEIGH RIDE TOGETHER WINTER WONDERLAND ALL I WANT FOR CHRISTMAS...

If any definitive evidence to the contrary of our story is found, we will report it. So far, there is none. — CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather There are no American infidels in Baghdad. Never! — Former Iraqi Minister of Information Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf, better known as “Baghdad Bob” A coordinated effort Outflanked by the new media tactics of the anti-Kerry veterans groups, much of the establishment media now prepared to focus with laser-like intensity on the military service, not of John Kerry, but of George W. Bush. That decision would lead to the sharpest single confrontation between the...

Dan RatherÂ’s Last Big Story Is Himself By Joe Hagan Published Nov 25, 2007 If he werenÂ’t famous, heÂ’d be mistaken for a veteran of a long-ago war: khaki safari shirt on his back, scuffed combat boots on his feet, that wiry crest of a brow, rheumy eyes under heavy lids, lower lip jutting out like an ornery fish resisting a hook. When Dan Rather sits on a bench in Central Park to tell how his 44-year career at CBS News ended in ignominy and humiliation, he is in fact still waging a war, a bitter and personal one. And...

New York magazine's Joe Hagan writes at length (5,700 words worth) about Dan Rather's lawsuit against CBS. Hagan, who also wrote about Rather's successor Katie Couric for a cover story in July, conjures up a likely "catalyst" for Rather's suit: former producer Mary Mapes' book defending the Bush/National Guard story. Hagan writes: What was in the book wasn't surprising to Rather. What was surprising was that after its publication, Mapes hired a high-powered Houston lawyer named Mark Lanier to draw up a lawsuit against CBS, and CBS responded with a settlement before she had even filed it. What was in...

Today, in New York Supreme Court, in response to Dan Rather's civil lawsuit, CBS filed a lengthy 30-page motion to dismiss the case.CBS executives also released a statement today, noting that they are "mystified" by Rather's "bizarre allegations" but will "vigorously" defend themselves in court if need be. "Dan Rather is one of the most important figures in the history of broadcast journalism, and for more than 40 years was one of our most valued colleagues," CBS said in the statement. "That is why we at CBS are mystified and saddened by the baseless and self-serving allegations and distortions...

Student has a nice chat with Rather during three-hour flight Caroline Page sat next to Dan Rather on an Austin-to-New York flight and, after thirty minutes, got up the nerve to begin a conversation. "He was candid, intelligent and spoke to me as though we weren't 54 years apart in age," she writes. "We touched on what seemed like every issue from our personal backgrounds, including relationship struggles due to the strain of reporting and the importance of a woman in the field remaining true to herself. He told me stories of young female reporters losing themselves and 'sleeping their...

NEW HOWARD KURTZ BOOK STIRS CONTROVERSY... DEVELOPING... WHITE HOUSE FROZE OUT COURIC FOR FIVE YEARS... PRESIDENT MISTAKENLY SHARED CLASSIFIED INFO WITH NEWS ANCHORS... DAN RATHER VOWED TO LEAK BUSH GUARD DOCS TO NEW YORK TIMES -- IF CBS SPIKED...

Video of Rather proving that, in the moments before taping or air, fashion not journalism is most important. Now we only need 20 minutes of him combing his hair to music, ala John Edwards

Remember when it was "the Tiffany Network"? And now ultimate company man Dan Rather is suing CBS for $70 million. I worked six years for CBS (nyse: CBS), 1981 to 1987, at its flagship station WCBS-TV doing celebrity interviews. A small cog in a huge machine. It was a great place to work with terrific people putting out a superior product. Bill Paley was still running the company from his apartment or the office in Black Rock, just west of the 21 Club, and the news and theatrical studios were across town on West 57th Street in a building that...

Drudge Teaser, "Developing"....

With a few notable exceptions such as Tom Shales, Dan Rather's $70 million lawsuit against CBS is getting almost no support from his fellow journalists in the mainstream media. The MSM attitudes towards Rather and his lawsuit range from sad to downright brutal. In the category of brutal would be a column by Tom Rutten in today's Los Angeles Times with the less than friendly title of "Dan Rather's lawsuit is an act of ego." Dan Rather took the best seat in the house that Murrow built and then left the place a ruin. Now he has returned to torch the rubble....Now, if you...

How can I put this nicely? Mary Mapes [file photo] has reality "issues." Three years after she was exposed for having perpetrated one of the worst frauds in the history of presidential-campaign journalism, she continues to paint herself as the victim of a right-wing conspiracy. And incredibly, despite a mountain of incontrovertible evidence to the contrary, she clings to the notion that the blatantly forged documents at the heart of the Memogate story were authentic. Mapes's meltdown-in-the-guise-of-a-column appeared in yesterday's Huffington Post. Excerpts from the metaphor-gone-wild "Courage for Dan Rather" [emphasis added]: [We] reaped a whirlwind of right-wing outrage and...

Dan Rather told The Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz in a telephone interview that by filing his $70-million wrongful dismissal suit against CBS, he is fighting for "the red, beating heart of our democracy," journalism.Here’s how Kurtz describes Rather’s beef in a nutshell: [H]e was made a "scapegoat" for a discredited 2004 story about President Bush's National Guard record because CBS wanted to "pacify the White House."CBS management "coerced" the veteran news anchor "into publicly apologizing and taking personal blame for alleged journalistic errors in the broadcast," says the $70 million suit, which also names Sumner Redstone, chief executive of the...

Calling the ouster of Dan Rather from CBS News in 2006 a “travesty,” newsman Ted Koppel said today that he hopes the $70 million suit filed by Mr. Rather against CBS and Viacom will bring Mr. Rather “relief from his [emotional] pain.” Mr. Koppel said he “hurt” for Mr. Rather, whom he characterized as a friend. Addressing the “60 Minutes” report about President George Bush’s National Guard service that preceded Mr. Rather’s departure from CBS, Mr. Koppel said the story was “much more correct than incorrect.” Mr. Koppel said that those responsible for the incorrect parts of the report deserved...

Former CBS News anchor and reporter Dan Rather sent shockwaves through CBS and the mainstream media with his dramatic lawsuit against his former employer. On CNN's Larry King Live last night, Rather seemed shaken and very emotional, fighting back tears on several occasions. His legal claims are even shakier. The suit involves how Rather was treated before, during and after the scandal that badly damaged the network back in 2004 and 2005 when it made explosive but false charges, based on phony documents, against President Bush just two months before the presidential election. The story backfired on the network, reconfirming...

Dan Rather took the best seat in the house that Murrow built and then left the place a ruin. Now he has returned to torch the rubble. The former "CBS Evening News" anchor has a filed a $70-million suit against the network where he worked for 44 years, alleging that the network breached his contract when it asked him to step out of the anchor's chair and pushed him into broadcast obscurity. CBS did this, the suit contends, because of his role in producing what turned out to be a wholly unsubstantiated "60 Minutes II" segment alleging that a young...

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Dan Rather said Thursday that the undue influence of the government and large corporations over newsrooms spurred his decision to file a $70 million lawsuit against CBS and its former parent company. "Somebody, sometime has got to take a stand and say democracy cannot survive, much less thrive with the level of big corporate and big government interference and intimidation in news," he said on CNN's "Larry King Live." In the suit, filed a day earlier in state Supreme Court in Manhattan, Rather claimed CBS and Viacom Inc. used him as a "scapegoat" and intentionally botched the aftermath of a...

Let's see. Dan Rather promotes a story on the air based on fake documents. To this day he still maintains they haven't been proven as fake despite the fact that the typeface used on the supposed Texas Air National Guard papers did not exist at military bases in the 1970s. As a result, CBS gets rid of Rather. So who does Dan Rather blame for basing a story on fraudulent documents? Himself? Of course not. He is suing CBS for big bucks. No sane person believes that Dan Rather's lawsuit will go anywhere but the leftwing is backing him...

It’s absolutely amazing, but Dan Rather and his lawyers are actually planning to argue in their lawsuit against CBS that the phony memos are genuine. I’m going to say this again just to go on the record: the CBS “Killian” memos are frauds. It has been proven beyond all doubt. It is simply impossible that these documents were created on any machine available in the 1970s. And for Dan Rather to continue insisting they are genuine shows either: 1) a disconnection from reality that borders on the psychotic, or 2) a blatant liar willing to go down in flames rather...