Poor Katie.  She doesn’t get it.  She tries to explain why her ratings are so bad.  It’s not about her, its about us (the people).  “I think the one thing that I realized, looking back at it and analyzing it, is people are very unforgiving and very resistant to change,” says Couric. “The biggest mistake we made is we tried new things.”  No, Katie, maybe you tried the wrong things. 

“I think I underestimated the feeling that some might have that I was a morning show personality and not a credible news person. Which I, quite frankly, think is patently unfair.” And then there was the embarrassing plagiarism scandal.  An online producer copied a Wall Street Journal editorial for an online video essay known as Katie Couric’s Notebook, which gives the impression of being written by her.  It wasn’t.  She tried to explain (correctly) that Peggy Noonan used to write Dan Rather’s commentary. 

 ”I think that bugs people even more that I’m not a woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown. It’s probably disappointing to some people. Because in the arc of the story, that’s what they want to see. I’ve gone through a bit of a feeding frenzy and there’s blood in the water and I’ve got some vulnerabilities. This person who’s been successful isn’t so great, and finally she’s been put in her place—that kind of mentality. I think it’s fairly primal.”

 The stress has caused her to blow up at her staff for small infractions on the set. During the tuberculosis story in June, Couric got angry with news editor Jerry Cipriano for using a word she detested—“sputum”—and the staff grew tense when she began slapping him “over and over and over again” on the arm, according to a source familiar with the scene. It had seemed like a joke at first, but it quickly became clear that she wasn’t kidding.

“I sort of slapped him around,” Couric admits. “I got mad at him and said, ‘You can’t do this to me. You have to tell me when you’re going to use a word like that.’ I was aggravated, there’s no question about that.”  Gee.  What would they have done at CBS if Dan Rather slapped around a woman news editor.  Laugh about it?  I don’t think so.  Is there a different standard for Katie. 

New York Magazine

Share This