Dan Rather, one of the giants of American broadcast journalism, is to leave the channel he has worked at for 44 years, for a position at a little watched cable channel. CBS announced on Tuesday that Rather (74) would be leaving the channel where he hosted the evening news for 24 years until he stood down last year.
”For more than four decades, Dan Rather has approached the job of broadcast journalist with a singular passion, dedication and, always, an unwavering desire to tell the story to the American public,” said the CBS president, Leslie Moonves. ”The unique mark he has left on his craft is indelible.”
Rather has said in recent days that he was unhappy with the new role being offered him at the channel, where he has covered most of the big stories of the past 40 years, from the Kennedy assassination to the invasion of Iraq.
In September 2004, however, he introduced and subsequently defended a report questioning George Bush’s National Guard service during the Vietnam war. The report relied on documents that were revealed as fakes, and in its aftermath Rather stepped down as evening news anchor, taking a reporting role on the 60 Minutes programme.
However he has been used only eight times in a year, and complained last week in an interview with the New York Times that he had been given nothing to do for six weeks. Relations with the network appear to have deteriorated when he was offered a contract that included an office and an assistant but no affiliation with any programme.
Rather brought a patrician presence to the nightly news, delivering the great stories of the day to the masses in an era when television became the primary source for news. Dubbed the ”reporter’s reporter”, he found fame as the journalist who confirmed that John F Kennedy had been assassinated in Dallas in 1963.
But 40 years later Rather’s style appeared to be outmoded, not least to the president of CBS, who said he wanted to do away with the ”voice of God” format.
Rather, who is in negotiations with the HDNet channel to front a weekly interview programme, has spent much of his recent downtime watching the film Good Night and Good Luck, George Clooney’s tribute to Ed Murrow and the groundbreaking television reporting of the 50s. He is said to have seen it five times. – Guardian Unlimited Â