I’m sure that’s going to cause her to lose oh so many nights of sleep.
I used to like Katie Couric. This may have been due to the fact that throughout the 90s—I have no idea when she first became a well-known television personality, nor when she first came across my radar, although I suspect the former was several years before the latter—I saw, I’d guess, maybe an hour of her per year. For the first five or so years of that decade, I didn’t have a television set, so I wasn’t really likely to spend much time watching television. And even once I did get a set, it was old and small and the power button had to be taped down to keep the damn thing turned on, [insert joke here] so watching wasn’t a regular occurrence to me. And even after we got a nice new set (thanks Diane and Murray!), I never, ever turned it on in the mornings. [insert joke here]
So, you know, Katie and I weren’t all that well-acquainted. But what wasn’t to like? She was cute as a button and pert and perky and I've always been fond of her first name. Didn’t know her well, but what I knew, I liked.
Yeah, not so much no more. Here's a bit of her interview with Elizabeth and John Edwards:
Katie Couric: Your decision to stay in this race has been analyzed, and quite frankly judged by a lot of people. And some say, what you're doing is courageous, others say it's callous. Some say, "Isn't it wonderful they care for something greater than themselves?" And others say, "It's a case of insatiable ambition." You say?
Katie Couric: Some people watching this would say, "I would put my family first always, and my job second." And you're doing the exact opposite. You're putting your work first, and your family second.
I’m not the world’s biggest John Edwards fan, although most of the stuff about him that makes me uneasy is markedly different from most the criticisms I've heard of him.
But this one? You gotta be kidding me.
First of all, this is her decision, not his, so whenever anyone talks about him using his wife's illness for political gain, the immediate response should be a very polite, “shut up, you mindless idiot.”
What the hell do people expect Elizabeth to do? Go lower the blinds, close the curtains, climb in bed, and lay there in the dark until she dies?
She’s got cancer. She’s had it before, so she knows what it means. One of the things it means is that her life is going to be more difficult than before—probably quite a bit. But it’s not over, not yet and hopefully not for a very long time. And to that end, studies have shown that keeping active, in fact, is tremendously beneficial for your health whilst undergoing treatment.
And you know what? When you’ve got cancer, life goes on. You still have to pay your bills and clean the house and run errands. You get up and get dressed and brush your teeth and go to work and come home and maybe watch some TV and go to bed and do it again. And in there you’ve got chemo or radiation or surgery or some combination of all three. But the laundry still needs to be done. Maybe it’s harder to do it, or it needs to be done more often, or you get the laundromat to do it, but somehow, you need to get the clothes cleaned. Even when you have cancer.
So. Her job is helping her husband get elected president since she clearly believes he’s the best possible candidate. Will she succeed? I don’t know and right now I don’t particularly care. But she’s doing it because it’s her job and it’s what she believes in and what parent wouldn’t want the best possible candidate to be the President of the United States? In that sense, she is unquestionably putting her family first.
Here’s my question for you, Katie: I know enough about you to know you’ve got at least one kid and maybe more. I also know enough to know that when you were on the Today show for ten years or whatever, you had to be at work at something like six o’clock in the morning.
So who got your kid up for school? Who fixed him or her breakfast and got him or her dressed and make sure he or she got on the bus on time? Because clearly it wasn’t you.
Because you were already at work.
Because you chose work over your family.
Right? Isn’t that your point?
And in the end, it doesn’t matter whether that’s what you really think Elizabeth Edwards is doing or whether you’re just parroting repulsive talking points that started being bandied about within minutes of Elizabeth's announcement. Either way, you’re uniquely unsuited to do anything but defend those kinds of reprehensible smears. And if you can’t do that, you’d be much better just shutting the hell up.
Amen. Thanks for pointing out the hypocracy in her comments. I used to like Katie Couric when I was in my early to mid-twenties in the early to mid-nineties. But now, she annoys the ever loving daylights out of me. Shouldn't it be a prerequisite for a journalist to actually know how to, like, interview people?
Posted by: shannon | Monday, March 26, 2007 at 10:39 AM
Picked this nugget up somewhere on the nets today...don't remember where, and it likely doesn't matter because it's spreading fast:
Why did Katie Couric keep pressing John and Elizabeth Edwards on 60 Minutes last night about their decision to continue his presidential campaign when she didn't give up her job as host of the Today Show when her husband was diagnosed with cancer?
Posted by: Tom E. | Monday, March 26, 2007 at 10:47 AM
Do you know that Katie's husband died of cancer?
So she knows a bit about it.
Posted by: | Monday, March 26, 2007 at 10:50 AM
I'm thinking she should get some slack on this. Her husband died of cancer when her two girls were quite small (around 4 & 6 I want to say but I haven't looked it up) so she does understand that life has to go on. I don't think she was being critical herself, what she asked *is* exactly what a lot of people are thinking. This gave the Edwards' a chance to answer/explain their thoughts on it.
This is the full transcript
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/24/60minutes/main2605038.shtml
On page 4 Katie gives Elizabeth the window to make the same point you did, that she thinks her husband is the best one to run the country and she doesn't want to stop that
Katie Couric:
Here you're staring at possible death...
Elizabeth Edwards:
Aren't we all though.
Katie Couric:
And you're thinking, "I don't want to deprive the country of having my husband lead us."
Elizabeth Edwards:
That would be my legacy wouldn't it, Katie. That I'd... that I'd... that I'd... that I'd taken out this fine man from the possibility of giving a great service. I mean, I don't want that to be my legacy.
Posted by: Hooly | Monday, March 26, 2007 at 11:19 AM
But the fact that Katie Couric's husband died of cancer should have made her sensitive enough to know better than to imply Elizabeth Edwards is somehow using her illness as some form of career opportunism for her husband. The CBS anchor is a smart woman and should have known better.
Particularly since nothing smacks more of opportunism than CBS promoting this interview all week long (those who watched NCAA basketball saw the promo done ad nauseum) as the "first exclusive interview with John and Elizabeth Edwards" since her announcement. More than a touch hypocritical, I would say, on the part of Ms. Couric and the Columbia Broadcast System.
Sadly it's typical of where so much of our media is today. Promote the hell out of an "exclusive" interview, ask the sensational questions designed to titillate and do little else, and hide behind those always-unidentified "some people say" as your factual basis for asking the sensational questions. Shoddy as hell.
Posted by: DT | Monday, March 26, 2007 at 02:08 PM
First, I am a BIG John Edwards supporter.
I didn't see the interview with Katie when it was on. I did read the transcripts later. My husband watched it and told me I would gone ballistic on Katie for her questions.
I stopped watching Katie in 2002?? She was interviewing one the astronauts family, from the Columbia disaster. She asked him how he felt about his child dying? The man refused and started crying and Katie just kept on egging him on to answer. Well HELL.......the dumbest question ever asked.
Also, that Anne Cury makes me so mad, I could scream. She was on the Rosie Show. She told Rosie that her sister had breast cancer. Rosie then said, oh, I bet you can find her the best treatments.
Meaning, you can use your celebrity status to help your sister. And Ann Cury replies, "Oh , no I would never do that, use my celebrity to help my sister.
I thought I would shatter my TV. I mean, I'm a poor church mouse, but I would go to the ends of the earth, use anything I could to help my sister get the best treatment.
I have to say, I have not watched the CBS evening news since Katie began anchoring.
So thank you, Scott, for saying out loud what I've had in my mind for years.
Posted by: Mary | Tuesday, March 27, 2007 at 07:14 AM