Dan Rather: Climate of Fear Running Through Newsrooms

by **Qutb** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 10:11 am

NEW YORK (Hollywood Reporter) - Former CBS News anchor Dan Rather said Monday that there is a climate of fear running through newsrooms stronger than he has ever seen in his more than four-decade career. (snip) Addressing the Fordham University School of Law in Manhattan, occasionally forcing back tears, he said that in the intervening years, politicians "of every persuasion" had gotten better at applying pressure on the conglomerates that own the broadcast networks. He called it a "new journalism order." He said this pressure -- along with the "dumbed-down, tarted-up" coverage, the advent of 24-hour cable competition and the chase for ratings and demographics -- has taken its toll on the news business. "All of this creates a bigger atmosphere of fear in newsrooms," Rather said. (snip) Nevin asked Rather if he felt the same type of repressive forces in the Nixon administration as in the current Bush administration. "No, I do not," Rather said. That's not to say there weren't forces trying to remove him from the White House beat while reporting on Watergate; but Rather said he felt supported by everyone above him, from Washington bureau chief Bill Small to then-news president Dick Salant and CBS chief William S. Paley. "There was a connection between the leadership and the led . . . a sense of, 'we're in this together,"' Rather said. It's not that the then-leadership of CBS wasn't interested in shareholder value and profits, Rather said, but they also saw news as a public service. Rather said he knew very little of the intense pressure to remove him in the early 1970s because of his bosses' support. <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/news/2005/09/20/MTFH18190_2005-09-20_03-11-20_FLE011365.html">www.breitbart.com/news/20...11365.html</a> <a href="http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x158145" target="top">Democratic Underground</a> Qutb means "axis," "pole," "the center," which contains the periphery or is present in it. The qutb is a spiritual being, or function, which can reside in a human being or several human beings or a moment. It is the elusive mystery of how the divine gets delegated into the manifest world and obviously cannot be defined.

by **Starman** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 1:18 pm

Middle America is politically illiterate, thanks to the avarice and betrayal of the MSM and corporate sellouts. Starman From the DU thread cited ... PART FOUR: DEMOCRACY, GENERAL ELECTRIC STYLE <a href="http://makethemaccountable.com/coverup/Part_04.htm">makethemaccountable.com/c...art_04.htm</a> THE MEDIA COVER-UP OF THE GORE VICTORY PART FOUR: DEMOCRACY, GENERAL ELECTRIC STYLE By David Podvin and Carolyn Kay Shortly after George W. Bush declared his candidacy for president in June of 1999, General Electric Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jack Welch was contacted by Bush political advisor Karl Rove. Welch later informed associates that Rove told him a Bush administration would initiate comprehensive deregulation of the broadcast industry. Rove guaranteed that deregulation would be implemented in a way that would create phenomenal profits for conglomerates with significant media holdings, like GE. Rove forcefully argued that General Electric and the other media giants had a compelling financial interest to see Bush become president. Welch told several people at GE that the conversation with Rove convinced him that a Bush presidency would ultimately result in billions of dollars of additional profits for General Electric. Welch believed that it was his responsibility to operate in the best interest of GE shareholders, and that now meant using the full power of the world’s biggest corporation to get Bush into the White House. Toward that end, Welch said that he would finally deal with a longstanding grievance of his: the ludicrous idea that news organizations should be allowed to operate in conflict with the best interests of the corporations that own them. Since the beginning of the country, it has been considered appropriate for the business community to exercise its right to aggressively support the candidate that best represented its interests. The new dimension that Welch introduced was the concept that the mainstream media should aggressively advance the political agenda of the corporations that own it. He did not see any difference between corporate journalism and corporate manufacturing or corporate service industries. Business was business, and the difference between winners and losers was profit, whether you were selling nuclear power or ads on the network news. From Welch’s perspective, it was insanity, not to mention bad business practice, for the corporate owners of the mainstream media to restrain themselves from using all of their assets to promote their financial well being. In general, he saw corporate news organizations as untapped political resources that should be freed from the burden of objectivity. Specifically, NBC News was an asset owned by the shareholders of General Electric. It existed to make profits and to serve the interests of those who owned GE stock. Period. Anything else, Welch told associates, was “liberal bullshit”. In 1988, NBC News president Lawrence Grossman insisted to Welch that news was a public trust and should not be subjected to the same pressure to make profits that was applied to other GE units. Welch fired him. ......But the mainstream media organizations did lie. Some people have expressed skepticism that at least one intrepid corporate reporter has not revealed the truth about what transpired in 2000. If the charges of the mainstream media coordinating an effort at the highest levels to skew their campaign coverage in favor of Bush were true, the skeptics contend, then certainly one reputable mainstream reporter would have gone public with the story. Daniel Schorr has been enshrined in the Hall of Fame of the Society of Professional Journalists. In 1976, he was fired by CBS News when he sent a secret congressional intelligence report to the Village Voice after CBS had refused to reveal the story to the public. According to Schorr, he was punished by network executives who had reached a deal with the White House to go easy on the administration. Schorr was fired for reporting the truth when it conflicted with the interests of his employer.

by **dbeach** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 2:10 pm

dan rather..was he not at Dallas on the date of 11/22/63??? he did very well for himself At this pt..most of the MM seems to be working for bushco interests

by * » Tue Sep 20, 2005 2:54 pm

You beat me to it, dbeach. The earlier whores see themselves in one light, and the whores that come after them in the bright light of day: the pot calling the kettle black. Like Clarence Thomas or Bushy Boy himself, the delusional lie to themselves that they "made it on their own". You lie to yourself, how can you possibly speak the truth to others?

by **Peachtree Pam** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:07 pm

Got to give it to him, he's a great actor, and he's OUR great actor, like Bill Clinton! Rather was the guy who, looking at the Zapruder film of JFK getting his brains blown out, said, "his head moved FORWARD", thus sealing his fate of upward mobility at CBS for the rest of his days. Time-Life bought the film and kept it hidden until Stone's movie, JFK, in which you saw JFK's head slamming BACKWARD, proving there was another killer shooting in front of the motorcade. Still, Rather had served his purpose, just as he did with the "fake" documents concerning DUBJA and his "military" service, all these many years later. Keep on fighting back those tears, Dan, there are still sheeple in US who will believe you.

by **FourthBase** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:13 pm

Dan Rather is a fucking slimeball. I have a feeling his "criticism" is more of an other-fulfilling prophecy. "There's an atmosphere of fear" = "Stay afraid, bitches."

by **Peachtree Pam** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:17 pm

Fourthbase, the message is keep on, keeping up the fear, if you want to keep breathing in and out, in and out....

by **antiaristo** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:17 pm

Funnily enough, Rather gave this exact same interview in Britain three years ago. He was talking about the climate post 9/11 and expressed deep fears for the future. I think it was on BBC Newsnight.

by **Peachtree Pam** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 3:24 pm

Antiaristo, I remember it well. He is a very accomplished actor, I guess because the script is always the same. No new lines to learn: "Hey Dan, get out script 4 and turn on the faucets".... I know you must have been enjoying the SAS with their pants at their ankles and their false-flag bomb car in Iraq and getting caught red-handed! Not changing the topic, this is just an aside... Pam

by **antiaristo** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 6:04 pm

In 1988, NBC News president Lawrence Grossman insisted to Welch that news was a public trust and should not be subjected to the same pressure to make profits that was applied to other GE units. Welch fired him. Starman, Why would Welch value "a public trust"? An AMERICAN public trust? Welch is British, you know. I think, but am not certain, that he has a knighthood. Job well done, I'd say (along with Rupert). Pam, Yes, it's good to see the hard evidence on display. We had to wait years in Ireland. HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=antiaristo>antiaristo</A> at: 9/20/05 4:10 pm

by **Corvidaerex** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 6:18 pm

Hooray for RI commenters! I'm so glad to see a site like this not fall for that jackass Dan Rather's playacting. (I love how he gave the same speech in England three years ago ... what a douche!) These people aren't sad about "climates of fear" or the internet or whatever -- and I've always loved how these self-professed free speech champions are the first to whine & bitch about people creating their own media, as is done here and a million other places. They're sad because the current criminals-in-charge have bypassed them. They're not a member of the Club any more, and that just breaks their elitist disinformational hearts. Karl Rove is an evil little maggot, but he is a smart little maggot, too. He figured out you don't need these people at all. Just make your *own* B.S. media, and eventually the other guys are just sadly talking to each other. Call lies truth and just make stuff up every day, hammering home the "We're right and you're a traitor" stuff, and watch the jackasses like Howell Raines & Rather suffer over phony "ethics problems." And then watch them eventually have to copy your methods, at which point they're not only totally harmless, but your enemies (about 60% of the country at this point) don't trust *them,* either. (Sure, Rove is flopping at the moment, but consider that he successfully won / stole two presidential elections with a retard as candidate and a failed war the second time around. Pretty incredible. Of course he had a little help from headquarters with that 9/11 trick.) And Rather knew so much incredible dirt from Vietnam that he never ever reported. Add that to his JFK complicity and the very likely possibility that "FontGate" or whatever it's called was a deliberate disinfo campaign that he was at least partially in on ... hang the bastard with the rest of the guilty.

by **Watchful Citizen** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 7:37 pm

When Rather cites the 'good old days' of being "supported" he leaves out that he was supported because he was doing his war-master's bidding by helping to stop the peace-mongering JFK and Nixon. "Covering hurricanes is something I know something about," he said. "It's been one of television news' finest moments," Rather said of the Katrina coverage. He likened it to the coverage of President Kennedy's assassination in 1963. "They were willing to speak truth to power," Rather said of the coverage. HA! JFK- Rather and CBS, along with the rest of the CIA-infiltrated media, did backflips to perpetuate the absurd Lone Gunman/Magic Bullet story. (Walter Cronkite was an especially egregious promoter of this cover-up.) Rather PERSONALLY lied about the direction of the gunfire and Kennedy's head motion in the Zaprueder film saying his head jerked forward, not back, to hide that shots came from in front Kennedy, especially the one that blew the back of his head off as a massive exit wound. (To clarify the film's history, it was bought up immediately by an ally of the CIA who sat on it for a long time. Several frames were reversed in order to give the appearance of JFK's head jerking forward This alteration was eventually discovered and the correct frame sequence was restored. Which might give Dan a little grace. Or not.) This sustained and repeated act of journalistic compliance with power started his meteoric rise to the top. NIXON- <a href="http://prorev.com/hoff.htm">prorev.com/hoff.htm</a> Nixon was betraying the Permanent War State by making peace overtures to China and the USSR and this caused the horrified Joint Chiefs of Staff to spy on the Oval Office. <a href="http://www.webcom.com/ctka/pr196-woodward.html">www.webcom.com/ctka/pr196-woodward.html</a> Naval Intelligence officer Bob Woodward was regularly going to the White House to brief the JCS which is where he met Mark Felt, one of several FBI 'deep throats.' <a href="http://www.freedomofthepress.net/journalismandthec...">www.freedomofthepress.net...andthec...</a> Woodward then took a job as a 'cub reporter' at the CIA media outlet called the Washington Post to cover the biggest story of the day which neutralized Nixon, Watergate. Both CIA and JCS wanted to stop Nixon's peace-mongering, something Kennedy tried and died for. Too much money to be made in war and some really believe it is the only reliable way to organize human culture. Those two groups have allied and run the US for decades. This is just another piece of history showing that the US government is an instrument of permanent war and anyone who gets in the way is neutralized the Kennedy way or the Nixon way. So Dan Rather was doing his master's bidding back then by aiding the CIA coup against JFK and then Nixon. THAT'S why he was "supported" by the bosses of the CIA-run mainstream media. AND finally sabotaged when he was outting the seamy past of their latest corporate spokesmodel, GWB. His strong personal emotions shows how conflicted he is about being first complicit, then targeted, and finally neutralized. He knows he danced with killers who are winning and now joins the Colin Powell Memorial Regret Lounge of Former Public Actors..

by **chiggerbit** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 7:37 pm

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>He said this pressure -- along with the "dumbed-down, tarted-up" coverage, the advent of 24-hour cable competition and the chase for ratings and demographics -- has taken its toll on the news business<hr></blockquote> He's right about this though. I could just about gag at the fluffiness of news these last few years. I'm surprised that they managed NOT to break into the 9/11 news with some idiotic piece on weight loss, or how to get the man of your dreams to marry you, or which star is having an affair with some other star. Arrrrgh! I had to stop watching the big news because I was spending so much time yelling at my tv. Course, Rather was always one of the pretty bobbleheads, parrotting what someone else wrote, so who is he to talk?

by **FourthBase** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 7:43 pm

I think the state of TV news is intentional.

by **Watchful Citizen** » Tue Sep 20, 2005 7:43 pm

oops. here's the rest of the truncated url on the CIA in media, Rather's old stomping ground. Stomping out truth, that is. <a href="http://www.freedomofthepress.net/journalismandtheciathemightywurlitzer.htm">www.freedomofthepress.net...litzer.htm</a>

Dan Rather: Climate of Fear Running Through Newsrooms

Dan Rather: Climate of Fear Running Through Newsrooms

Democracy, GE Style

Re: Democracy, GE Style

Re: Democracy, GE Style

Dan Rather, long-time corporate shill

Re: Dan Rather, long-time corporate shill

Too right,

Re: Dan Rather, long-time corporate shill

That's right,

Re: Democracy, GE Style

Re: Rather & his crocodile tears

Dan's right the news is cancelled. Wrong about the past.

Re: Dan Rather: Climate of Fear Running Through Newsrooms

Re: Dan Rather: Climate of Fear Running Through Newsrooms

truncated url on CIA in media from above post here.

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