I don’t hear (or read) the word ‘gams’ nearly often enough these days. Thanks, Carnac.
I have tried to find the interview/quote - but a few years ago, Bryan Gumbel was being criticized for being difficult to work with in comparison to Katie Couric. I cannot find the exact quote, but Bryan shot back (and I paraphrase), “I have had the same personal assistant for 12 years, unlike some people who get in a snit, fire their personal assistants on a whim and have gone through dozens in a few short years.” Granted, Bryan Gumbel is one of the few people I find more annoying than Katie Couric, but it was an interesting bit of insight on Ms. Couric’s working relationships.
Also, it is pretty easy to get the primadonna vibe from Katie…when the on-air cast goes outside to meet the fans, check who is last to appear, first to leave and least interested in the common folk who have waited hours in the rain to see them. But whatever - maybe it is just a gut feeling, but unless she is talking to some hot looking dude/stud/star of the moment, her smile looks like it was drawn on her face with a crayon.
Sheesh, I can’t imagine how she is going to get by. 
Does anyone remember 9/11?
Sure, the networks rushed to get Brokaw, Jennings and Rather on the air. But for the first couple of hours, it was wall-to-wall Couric, Lauer, Sawyer, Gibson et al.
I don’t recall one single viewer or critic saying “Boy, for the first couple of hours, the coverage was marshmallow fluff and perky fluff at that.”
There’s no one who can do a better rant than I about how TV news has become showbiz. There’s no one who believes more strongly than I that Bob Schieffer should be the permanent anchor at CBS. But I’m going to keep an open mind about Couric.
What makes Katie Couric interesting is that it appears that many people really like her, but that the people who don’t like her absolutely hate her.
This is almost always fatal for those in positions where being liked is crucial. Howard Stern can get away with it because he can play off the hatred and make his likers feel more special. But this is exactly why many Democrats are urging Hillary Clinton not to be the party’s candidate in 2008. The percentage of people who loathe her and will never change is much too high for a successful candidacy.
Can Couric change the loathers, the ones who see her a bubbleheaded perkymeister? Can anyone imagine her as the 24 hour anchor if another 9/11 occurs and prefer her coverage over the other networks’? Can she obtain the needed gravitas? Will she even be given the chance? (No, no, no, and no are my answers.)
I don’t see this as a deathblow to network journalism, any more than the failed attempts to partner Barbara Walters and Connie Chung with male anchors were. The networks need to have the kind of anchor spectrum that CNN Headline News has successfully maintained. Couric is just the wrong person for the job. Somebody will find the right person (Elizabeth Vargas isn’t it either) and there won’t be any controversy about it.
Frankly, I’m going to miss Bob Schieffer. I found him competent and rather engaging in his own way. He probably ranks near the bottom in “Q” rating and was unlikely to develop a “personality cult” with his audience.
Personally, I liked those qualities in him. He exhibited a “comfortable” level of confidence.
A strawman courtesy of the public relations master himself, eh? 
No one is implying Couric’s CBS broadcasts will be “marshmallow fluff and perky fluff at that.” But her NBC track record is layered with layer after layer of gooey fluff and her credentials razor thin compared to anchors of past. Yes, she interviewed many major players on Today–and yes fluff is the quintessence of the Today show–but note that she always had that hidden earphone feed and canned questions/responses to lean on. Minutes later, she’d snap back to her trademark Giggle Box & Longs Legs Shtick.
I have three acquaintances of considerable accomplishment whose wives traveled to NYC and stopped by to join the Today crowd during a broadcast. (Two traveled together, the other by herself, so we’re talking two visits.) Each independently confirmed that Couric had zero interest in mingling with the masses and only turned on/off the charm the minute the broadcast started/ended. When the camera cut out, her smile faded to zero and she walked off, not even acknowledging the goodbyes.
That said, Bryant Gumbel was perhaps even more intolerable. I have a golfing buddy Gumbel interviewed twice. Said he was a complete stuffed shirt off the air.
Well, I’ve worked with Rather and Jennings. Never worked with Couric. If one peruses her bio, one finds that she did hard news, was a reporter and basically made her bones long before she got the Today gig. Just as the other folks made their bones doing hard news before taking The Desk.
She’s a reporter. Doing CBS Evening News, where she will be Managing Editor as well, is not a poor move at all. She makes broadcast history. She gets to return to more “real” journalism.
Personality-wise, I find her on par with gargling with steel wool. In terms of intellectual chops, perhaps before we sling too much mud, we should do some serious Googling to see what stories she covered early on and what her rep was as a hard news reporter for local, then networks.
Cartooniverse
Where could I have possibly gotten that idea?
Or, putting it in other words. . .
Moving on…
Damn good thing working the crowd isn’t part of the Evening News anchor’s job description, isn’t it?
John Chancellor (IMHO, The Best Damn Evening News Anchor Ever) admitted he had absolutely no sense of humor. Harry Reasoner was rumored to have long liquid lunches. Charles Kuralt not only didn’t get along with his co-workers, he kept a wife in New York and a mistress in Montana. Walter Cronkite hosted an early version of the CBS morning news that featured a puppet named Charlemagne. Mike Wallace hosted quiz shows and played the lead in a Broadway play. Chet Huntley can be seen in the movie The Pride of St. Louis playing a baseball announcer. Everyone carries a ton of marshmallow baggage with them.
I’m not saying Katie Coruic will make me forget Walter Cronkite. I’m just keeping an open mind.
I’ve never much liked Katie Couric, and I hate seeing network news creeping still closer to pure “Entertainment Tonight” clones.
Still, even from a purely BUSINESS standpoint, I’m not sure this move makes much sense.
I may not like Katie, but she has a large following, especially among women, and she CAN exude a certain perky charm during celebrity interviews. But her strengths are NOT strengths that will translate well in an anchor’s chair. She’ll be just another talking head reading from a teleprompter.
She won’t be a disaster or a complete embarrassment by any means, but her new job is NOT one that will allow her to be perky or charming. Regular viewers of CBS News will probably get used to her, and eventually shrug “She’s not as horrible as I thought she’d be.” But “Today” fans will probably tune in once or twice, decide “She’s not as much fun as she used to be,” and tune out again.
A few months down the road, she’ll be just another semi-competent news anchor with tepid ratings… and CBS will wonder why they threw money at her.
It’s hard to take someone seriously once you’ve seen the inside of their ass.
And YES, I know why she did that.
Long–as opposed to short–strings of non sequiters do not make for a cogent argument.
The real eye-opening is posted just above you. Couric will likely be the managing editor as well, not just the newsreader.
Couric as managing editor of the CBS Evening News. :rolleyes:
The title don’t mean much Carnac. TV is full of meaningless titles. My own is ‘writer’, but I’m more of a supervising producer and off-air reporter.
I don’t think Couric is going to set evening news audiences on fire, but she’s not going to giggle and flash her legs either. You won’t see her holding chimps at the news desk. When she’s interviewing heads of state in her new role, she will still go into the task equipped with crib notes and suggested questions written by somebody else. And if it’s on-camera stuff, she’ll still have the hidden earpiece.
Being a news anchor is what you make it. I’ve worked with anchors who show up an hour before airtime and head straight into makeup. I’ve worked with others who show up at 8 in the morning and spend the day reading articles and asking questions to get ready. Anyone with poise and confidence can do the job. Couric will be able to do it, and yeah, people will write articles about how surprised they are that Couric is able to be serious.
[QUOTE=Carnac the Magnificent!]
Long–as opposed to short–strings of non sequiters do not make for a cogent argument.
[QUOTE]
To be fair, neither do anecdotes from three of your friends that Katie Couric has a stick up her ass.
Carnac, I suspect that if you and I prepared lists of what makes a great anchor and then we ranked a list of anchors from John Cameron Swayze and Douglas Edwards all the up to Elizabeth Vargas, we’d have a lot more similarities than differences. The only difference is that I don’t think Couric’s on-air demeanor and professional background automatically disqualifies her from being a capable, effective, credible anchor. I’m not convinced that she will succeed, but I’m not convinced she’ll fail, either.