American Newsreel

Memo to CBS. Next time you’re looking for a news anchor, hire one on the basis of news experience, not a big smile and fair legs.

Ratings for the CBS Evening News continue to head south, even below Dan Rather’s dismal numbers in his waning days.

Writes David Bauder of the The Associated Press:

It surely wasn’t what CBS dreamed about when Katie Couric was hired: the “CBS Evening News” last week recorded its smallest audience since 1987, and probably many years before that.

It also didn’t help that the average of 6.05 million viewers came at the beginning of the important May ratings “sweeps.”

Meanwhile, ABC’s “World News” recorded its widest advantage in viewership over NBC’s “Nightly News” since the week Peter Jennings died in August 2005. The victory, ABC’s ninth in 13 weeks over NBC, adds to the sense that Charles Gibson is eclipsing Brian Williams as the nation’s favorite network news anchor.

“World News” averaged 8.1 million viewers last week (5.7 rating, 12 share). NBC’s “Nightly News” had 7.5 million viewers, its fourth-lowest figure since at least 1987 (5.3, 12), and CBS had a 4.3 rating and 9 share. The year 1987 is a benchmark because that’s when Nielsen began using its “people meter” technology.

Those are worrisome numbers for networks heading forward, since news viewership normally drops off in the summer. Major news events, of course, could dramatically change things.

Wow. Britney Spears can’t even catnap without it becoming a national story.

Reports The Associated Press:

Britney Spears finally appears to be acting like a new mom. The pop princess, who recently made headlines for a rash of less-than-motherly hard partying, fell asleep in a Las Vegas nightclub early Monday shortly after leading the New Year’s Eve countdown, her manager said.

“By about one o’clock, she was just done, so we took her out,” Spears’ manager, Larry Rudolph, told The Associated Press Monday. “She was not drunk. She was just tired and falling asleep.”

Wonder if she was wearing underwear?

The Washington, DC Area Film Critics Association picked United 93 as their choice for best film of the year.

No, this is not a joke.

The Judith Miller debacle at The New York Times shows just how easily the Bush Administration manipulated the press in the buildup to the invasion of Iraq Her departure from what was once the nation’s newspaper of record shows just how badly the whole affair hurt the paper’s already damaged reputation.

Miller can keep spinning the story anyway she wants but she allowed herself to be used as a pawn of an administration that lied to the world about its reasons for invading a country that posed no threat to the United States. And the Times, already hurt by the Jayson Blair scandal, cannot escape responsibility for allowing a loose cannon like Miller to run amuck.

Sad day for journalism. Even sadder one for America.

Seems like the good old boys at Fox News Network just can’t leave the girls alone.

First network loudmouth Bill O’Reilly got caught making dirty phone calls to a female producer. Now the network’s VP of advertising and promotions, Joe Chillemi is under investigation by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for a “pattern of subjected female employees to sexual harassment and a hostile work environment.”

According to the EEOC complaint, Chillemi “routinely used gross obscenities and vulgarities when describing women or their body parts” and “routinely cursed at and otherwise denigrated women employees and treated them in a demeaning way.” Three women have reported being harassed by Chillemi.

Like many others in the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast, newspapers feel the effect of tragedy. In Biloxi, the Sun-Herald reports that 30 percent of its staff is still missing after Katrina devastated the city last week.

In New Orleans some wonder is the venerable Times-Picayune will continue publishing, prompting the publisher to issue a public letter saying the paper will survive, no matter what. Others are not so sure.

This message from New Orleans Times-Picayune Editor Peter Kovacs was published this morning on Romenesko’s Media News.

The Times-Picayune has lost contact with Leslie Williams, a reporter who was to cover the hurricane on the Mississippi Coast. Because our phones failed in New Orleans, we were unable to communicate with Leslie and he may not know that we are in Baton Rouge at LSU. If anyone ran across Leslie, please contact me at 225-578-9880. My cellphone is 504-352-5550 but it is still balky. My email is kovacs70003@yahoo.com. Leslie is experienced at covering hurricanes and is a native of the Mississippi coast. His mother still lives there and he sometimes stays with her.

A cameraman for Reuters News Service, wounded more than 24 hours ago, is being held captive by U.S. forces in Iraq. Reuters, understandably, is demanding his release.

However, the military says it is “still investigating” and won’t say where they are holding the Iraqi who works for Reuters.

“Reuters demands the immediate release of Haider Kadhem,” Global Managing Editor David Schlesinger said. “We fail to understand what reason there can be for his continued detention more than a day after he was the innocent victim of an incident in which his colleague was killed.”

Soundman Waleed Khaled was buried on Monday after he was hit several times in the head and chest while driving his car, an ordinary passenger vehicle, on the assignment in western Baghdad. Haider Kadhem was wounded in the back.

Yet another black eye for the American military forces in a conflict where FUBAR rules.

Ever notice how much of so-called “news” on network news shows are really just plugs for shows on that network’s entertainment division?

When the fall season starts and the “reality” shows hit the airwaves for new seasons, networks will devote much of the “newscasts” to people who have nothing to do with real news but have a lot to do with those shows.

Castoffs from the CBS “Survivor” series will be interviewed on that network’s morning news program. NBC does the same thing with shows like “The Apprentice,” Donald Trump’s latest fling. So does ABC and Fox with their shows.

In the coming weeks, all networks will parade stars of their new fall series across the screen for interviews during what is laughingly called “news” segments. Even the flagship evening newscasts are not immune. Each night’s newscasts features plugs for the upcoming season.

I watched the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams the other night and the 30-minute newscasts included plugs, in one form or another, for nine shows on the fall schedule. Only seven of the 30 minutes actually dealt with the day’s news.

Want the news behind the news? Try reading the blogs of some of TV’s news personalities. NBC’s Brian Williams blogs on The Nightly Daily, an MSNBC blog that includes not only his observations but that of other newsies for NBC.

Williams is quick to admit mistakes:

On the evening of August 19th, in an attempt to show comparative gasoline prices around the world, we showed the adjusted price in U.S. dollars of a gallon of gasoline in Amsterdam (The Netherlands) and showed the flag of Norway (bad). We realized the error too late, and regret the error.

MSNBC anchor Keith Olbermann’s blog, Bloggermann is, like its author, both funny and scathing:

Understand this about (Rush) Limbaugh. He doesn’t believe half the junk he spouts. I’ve met him, and had pleasant enough conversations with him, twice - at the 1980 World Series when he was still a mid-level baseball flunky with a funny name, and once in the mid ‘90s at ESPN when he was just beginning his campaign to get a toehold there. He is a quiet, almost colorless man who, if he could be guaranteed similar success in sportscasting, would sell out the sheep who follow his every word - and would do it before close of business today.

You can read about politics in NBC’s First Read or follow Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren’s thoughts on Gretawire.

Guess the newsies, tired of getting thier butts kicked by the bloggers, decided it was better to join than fight.