Letters to the Editor
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No apologies? Have you been in a coma?
Where to begin? Her inexcusable - really, vile - treatment of Elizabeth Edwards? That she would have Rush Limbaugh spewing his trademark hate on the CBS News her very first week? Her continuing deference to Bush, from her very first interview as anchor, which can only be described as Beyond Obsequious? Edward R. Murrow wept.
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Sort of wrong, sort of right.
First of all, the article is hilarious, and I think Traister nails many of the t.v. news personalities. I also think there are simple untruths:
Hagan spies Couric greeting Whoopi Goldberg with a girly-girly "call me!" gesture, it leads to the discussion of how she was a Tri Delt at the University of Virginia who made her name doing cooking segments on "Today." If a comparable male figure were spied doing stereotypically male things like playing poker and eating steak and slapping a buddy on the butt, it would presumably not lead to a discussion of his Sigma Nu brotherhood or a critical look at the fact that he used to report sports stories or that his real talent lay in "connecting with men." That's because masculinity remains the norm.
Wrong. It would likely be connected to just that, how he’s a “regular guy” and does “guy things” and that’s why he gets the world of sports. I mean, are you kidding me, Traister really doesn't get this? Dan Rather pulls that sort of rountine, along with his "I'm just ah country boy" schtick everytime he's interviewed.
Furthermore, Couric chose a traditionally feminine image (and has used the unexpected subversion of said image to her success), so it’s not surprising a piece would note that aspect of her personality. Articles that reference Sawyer or Walters don't mention baking, do they? Of course not, because those women don’t put that image out there. But Traister seems to be saying the same thing she said in the Roiphe article: there can't be different women who do things differently, who follow different models. It's all lock-step conformity en route to the feminist utopia.
It's so obvious why Couric is re-activating the cuddly image: the more serious one is flopping. She could go in a more strident direction, but does Traister think that will lead to her success as a news anchorwoman? Dan Rather could do his best to appear as a savvy intellectual who doesn't care what middle America thinks, either. Guess how well that would fly?
I wish Couric would try more of the subtle subversion she used on Today, for instance getting into the White House to do a puff piece and then grilling Bush senior the moment he arrived. It might actually speak to those women out there who consider themselves cuddly little gals, and let men take the lead, to see someone who looks so much like themselves, and with whom they've allowed themselves to identify, charging forward suddendly with a critique of the people in power. Might even change their behavior. The Couric Traister suggests she become would never accomplish that.
Anchorpersons are entertainment personalities. People want someone they like and feel comfortable with. That is not the image Traister is suggesting, and it would only cause Couric to go down that more quickly in flames.
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Why no one's watching...and why the confessionals won't help
I know that I, for one, am not "ignoring" Katie because I can't stand to get my news from a woman. I am able to accept that I'm getting "real news" from the likes of Gwen Iffel and Christiane Amanpour just fine. What appalled me was that they hired--someone--anyone--from "The Today Show" to anchor a serious news broadcast. Today is fluff, and I would naturally assume that anyone hired from there was a lightweight. Here's an analogy: imagine the entire reporting staff of the NYT suddenly quits. The Powers That Be then decide to fill the newsroom with people from USA Today (aka The McPaper). Do you think readership would decline? Regardless of the percentage of women on staff, before and after?
This was the first I'd heard of Katie's ballbusting negotiating skills, and, well, that's pretty cool. But most of us don't hear those sorts of things about TV morning show personalities. We hear about their live colonoscopies and their messy divorces, but that's about it.
Traister has it right--Katie's emotional vomiting in public is hardly going to help her. Ratings aren't going to get a boost through belated attempts at gravitas when everyone's ALREADY stopped watching. Seeing this moaning and groaning is going to make a lot of people think, "If you can't stand the heat, go back to your kitchen segments, honey."
(This is a cheap shot, but, "Katie?" Just like "Eddie" Murrow and "Danny" Rather? Gah, use an adult name in an adult job.)
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Couric Is an Anachronism
She reads news stories, like a lot of men and women on a lot of television news channels around the world. BFD.
She is not a scholar. She has no particular expertise in another culture. She has never put her life on the line to get a story.
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KaKaKaKatie
Sorry, girlfriend, but CBS news is unwatchable. Far from offering hard news, I feel Miss Debbie from Romper Room is reading "My Weekly Reader" in an effort to calm us down after recess. The slooowww delivery, the 4th grade vocabulary, and the "feel good" reports are worthy not so much of Ed Murrow than Ted Baxter.
The NY Magazine article talks about Couric's eagerness to do more work on "60 Minutes". (That article further goes on to say that the long-standing reporters at that show, including Leslie Stahl, Morley Safer and the late Ed Bradley had to take huge salary cuts in order to accommodate Couric's salary demands.)If Couric's interview with Senator and Mrs. Edwards is any preview, then we're seeing a really scary side of Miss Debbie. Pointlessly mean-spirited and journalistically bankrupt ("some people are saying. . ."), it produced the trifecta: It demeaned the journalist, the subject and the network.
Couric can couch her ratings decline any way she likes, of course. But while she's blaming the audience for not being smart enough, old enough, young enough, female-friendly enough, or anything else, maybe she ought to take a little look in Miss Debbie's magic mirror.