Couric's attempt to break the glass ceiling shatters

Instead of posting, I have been busy on other stuff including -- watching how Gail Shister's Philadelphia Inquirer column on Katie Couric's woes has played out in the media. Thanks GDAEman for commenting and noting my continuing frustration. I think that the Tribune article that appeared that same Sunday should have had a little more play, as it was her first public quotation about the plagairism issue. But the more sensational Shister column gets the press.

During the last week, the Couric case has also been discussed on WGN radio. She was interviewed later in the week by a sympathetic friend, dj Steve Cochran, as a promo for doing the news from Chicago and then appearing at a major cancer benefit on Friday. She said that she thought it was important to continue to do "good journalism" on her newscast and that that will attract viewers. She said something like "people still need someone to sort out all the news that's going on and to drill down into news stories beyond the short headlines that you get in many places." This is not a direct quote, just a paraphrase as I remember it. Anyway, how much can even a good television reporter 'drill down' (a phrase she did use) during a 22 minute newscast? Isn't that more of the role of newspapers, magazines, and now the infinite depth of the internet?

Curiously, she was joined on the interview with her new producer who was more long winded and who Couric cut off a few times, taking the conversation in a different track.

Susan Estrich also had a nasty column on Fox concerning Couric and about how women should not attack women who break through the glass ceiling. You know what? I think that women should be held to the same standards as men because only then will we have truly broken through the glass ceiling. When we are given passes because we're-women-(or minorities)-and-they-need-us-for-affirmative-action-or-related-window-dressing, then we haven't really broken through. Guys know this. Smart women know this, too.

I am beginning to think that Couric was given a wide pass on the plagairism issue because she is a woman. If she was a guy, perhaps she would have been raked over the coals. But CBS needs its peacock showcase woman and they don't think it's appropriate for the Managing Editor of the CBS Evening News to defend or apologize for mistakes on the newcast. The Managing Editor, consequently, has been demoted to a perky Talking Head.