"[B]y the time women get to take over something -- like Hollywood or Bush administration diplomacy -- the thing is already devalued beyond recognition."

Yeah --- kinda like a college degree. Lower standards to get more women (and minorities) in, and a huge drop in degree quality.

See, Diane Sawyer has "gravitas" and I doubt she has any balls. Judy Woodruff has gravitas even though I disagree with her often. Elizabeth Vargas maybe not as much but still more than Katie. Meredith Viera, too.

Katie doesn't have what it takes. She asks inane, uninformed questions, giggles inappropriately, flirts with guests, and doesn't ask followups. She's a terrible interviewer and as far as her "journalism" skills go - well they seem nonexistent.

So before we go defending ol' Katie as some sort of poster woman for equality and as an example of the gender bias of the word "gravitas", we need to keep in mind she just isn't qualified for the job. No more than any other bloviating sycophantic talk show host with nice legs. Balls or no.

She shouldn't be passed over just because she has a vagina, but neither should any criticism of her be dismissed as "sexist" because she does.

and it means:

grav·i·tas ( P ) Pronunciation Key (grv-täs)

n.

Substance; weightiness: a frivolous biography that lacks the gravitas of its subject.

A serious or dignified demeanor: “Our national father figure needs gravitas, [but] he's pitched himself as the kid brother” (John Leo).

gravitas

n : formality in bearing and appearance; "he behaved with great dignity" [syn: dignity, lordliness]

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[Latin gravits, heaviness, seriousness. See gravity.

So Connie Chung thinks it means balls? No, sorry not taking what someone thinks a word means over what the word actually means. It means someone who is serious, dignified and has substance as a human being. Perhaps even broaden it to people who are intelligent, well spoken and have class.

Besides what the hell does gravitas matter, people seem to not want it in their President.

So Johnny Knoxville, no gravitas, but George Clooney, sure.

So Paris Hilton, no gravitas, but Jodie Foster, sure.

The word does not have any gender bearing considering it's based on the latin word for gravity.

Katie Couric is clearly a big audience draw for daytime. But I consider the quetion of whether or not she can be taken seriously in the nighttime anchor slot a very valid one. I don't watch the show regularly but what I do recall seeing is a lot of fluff. After her husband died she seemed to take on a more serious mien that translated to her journalistic coverage, e.g. raising public awareness of colon cancer and taking the fear factor (if not the ick factor) out of colonoscopy screening.

If Dan Rather had spent much of his career doing cooking segments, soft-pedaled celebrity interviews and anagram contests (that's on the agenda for Katie and Matt on the Today website as I write this), well, I'd be questioning his gravitas as well. Gravitas means 'high seriousness' - it is not a gendered word. It's valid to look for seriousness from a candidate for the anchor slot if seriousness is what sells. Her current and past success notwithstanding, the totality of Couric's career doesn't point to one of high seriousness. I'd say the same of Matt Lauer.

I'm all for giving her the job and letting her succeed or fail. But I also think it's smart of the network to work these questions about beforehand. They aren't antifeminist or antiwoman just because the candidate in question is female - it's just good business.

If you watch Today on a regular basis, you see that unless it is a solid Dem left wing, Katie gets to watch. She's great with the Clintons, but her knee pads have to be getting worn.

She cannot hold her own with any Moderate of Republican. She is totally out classed and is slow on the rebuttal when they get up on her. Which is often.

She is cute, for her age, but her face lifts (among other lifts) are showing. I know she has to hate Campbell Brown and the other women who completely outclass her both mentally and physically. It is hell to get old. If you thought is was bad with Rather, just wait.

We laugh everyday watching her. She is SO SHALLOW.

Such a fuss over such a diminished job is sort of amusing, sort of sad. Just look at the ratings -- it's not such a big deal anymore. If Katie Couric is chosen to take over the anchor chair on CBS, it'll involve a very brief spike in ratings [which will by hyped by Broadsheet as evidence that women should have taken over these jobs many years ago], followed by a steep decline in ratings as the vast majority of Americans return to ignoring the evening news shows -- which, by the way, deserve to be ignored. [The steep decline will either be ignored by Broadsheet or, more probably, ascribed to murderous sexism.]

Just look at the numbers for these evening broadcasts. The average nightly news viewer is almost dead. The audience is old and shrinking and no Katie Couric or no gravitas-infused male is going to change that. It's over.

Sorry, just over.

If they want gravitas, they should hire Steven Colbert.

"Yeah --- kinda like a college degree. Lower standards to get more women (and minorities) in, and a huge drop in degree quality."

At the university I went to, the opposite was true. Qualified women were outnumbering men, so they lowered the admissions standards for men. It didn't work, though. It's still one of the top schools in the country - and it's still 60% female.

the meaning of "gravitas" OR "chauvinist." Why am I not surprised?

More to the point, the quality of the evening TV news has been declining for a long time. When your job is to manufacture popular consent for elite policies and the status quo, how interesting can it be? But still, a major news anchor position would be a plum for just about anyone. So tell me again; why is it that the Maureen Dowds of the world can find a way to whine about women moving up in the ranks?