CBS to Re-Air Rather Special: 'Liberal' an Epithet to 'Intimidate' Him, Targets MRC

Change font size:  A |  A

Tonight (Friday) at 9pm EDT/PDT, CBS will re-air its special, Dan Rather: A Reporter Remembers, that first ran on Wednesday March 9, 2005. The program showed the MRC's logo on screen at one point as Rather, dismissing a series of efforts to "intimidate" him, drew a line from being called "an 'N-lover'" during the civil rights movement to the Vietnam war years when critics tagged him with a "bad name: 'anti-military, anti-American, anti-war,'" and "then, when Watergate came into being was the first time I began to hear this word 'liberal' as an epithet thrown my way." Viewers then saw a montage of video clips and shots of Web sites with text accusing Rather and CBS of being "liberal," including the Media Research Center's logo and a headline over an MRC page on Rather. Without addressing evidence of his liberal tilt on policy, Rather charged that "people who have very strong biases of their own, they come at you with a story: 'If you won't report it the way I want it reported, then you're biased.'" On the Memogate affair, the CBS special touted how the review panel found "no political agenda."

Video clip with Rather's claims about "intimidation" with the MRC's Web site featured on screen (1:30): Real (2.6 MB), Windows Media (3 MB) plus MP3 audio (450 KB)

The airing tonight may include some new material, but it probably won't be changed too much from what ran in 2005 since the CBS.com schedule page listing links to the page for it put up back in March of 2005, just after Rather's last night as anchor.

For much more on what aired on March 9, 2005, and likely will again tonight, check the Thursday March 10, 2005 MRC CyberAlert article, "Rather Draws Line from Being Called 'N-Lover' to a 'Liberal'"

For the MRC's compilation of Rather's bias from over the years, with many video clips, go to "The Dan Rather File: Decades of Liberal Media Bias.”