Where I Stand — Mike O’Callaghan: Presidential reading

Thursday, Feb. 14, 2002 | 8:28 a.m.

WHEN TAKING A BREAK from work, sometimes I read two or three books selected from the lists of best sellers. Even during the evenings and weekends of workweeks I find time to read a book every seven or eight days. All of them aren't on the lists of best sellers but their content has aroused my curiosity and they are read before being added to my library.

Several days ago, when President George W. Bush was getting on his Marine helicopter, a television reporter noted he was carrying a book titled "Bias" written by Bernard Goldberg. Because of the reporter's comments I wondered about the contents of Goldberg's book. In addition to my curiosity, I thought if it's good enough for the president to read, it's good enough for me. So, I read it two evenings ago and found it most interesting and a book the president's press secretary probably gave him with a note advising it be read. As a matter of fact, any political press secretary should have the book handy as a defense the next time the boss is skewered on national television.

The author wants his readers to know that he was "on the inside as a news correspondent for twenty-eight years" from 1972 until he left CBS in the summer of 2000. There is no doubt that Goldberg has good working press credentials. Also he insists that there was no bad blood between him and CBS anchor Dan Rather. It took only the reading of one chapter to realize that if there previously wasn't any bad blood between Rather and Goldberg, that condition has changed drastically. It's difficult for a reader to believe that Goldberg hadn't been hiding his dislike for Rather many years before becoming a guest columnist for the Wall Street Journal and later writing this book.

The book revolves around columns Goldberg wrote in the Wall Street Journal, February 13, 1996 and May 24, 2001. Actually, the media response to his first column "Networks Need A Reality Check" triggered his second column and the book.

The early column was a critique of a piece that Eric Engberg did about presidential candidate Steve Forbes's flat tax on the CBS Evening News. Engberg's comments and lack of any person defending the tax was a display of slanted reporting. I can't disagree with Goldberg concluding it was a hatchet job done on the GOP candidate and his flat tax. Goldberg writes, "If arrogance were a crime, there wouldn't be enough jail cells in the entire United States to hold all the people in TV news." Of course, Goldberg doesn't believe he displays any arrogance.

The author sees the networks loaded with liberals and Dan Rather is but one of them. Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings also were recipients of dull Goldberg needles. The overall negative response by his colleagues to his first column angered the author. Last year he came back with his second column in the WSJ, which began as follows:

"Dan Rather has been on television more than usual lately, popping up all over the place promoting his book about American success stories and along the way wearily denying that he's the left-wing devil some conservatives think he is.

"It's the same old story as far as Dan is concerned. The right thinks he's an unapologetic liberal who slants the news leftward -- not because he is, but because his critics are so hopelessly biased themselves that they wouldn't know straight news when they saw it. As another evening star, Peter Jennings, told Larry King recently, bias often is in the eye of the beholder. And since Tom Brokaw also has publicly denied a liberal bias, it's official. There is none. It's all a figment of the reactionary imagination. Case closed."

Then came "Bias," which is interesting reading because the author lets it all hang out, including his own personal frustrations and biases. I read the book because it is a subject important to any media person. It revealed more of Goldberg's view of his world than it did of Rather's view of his world. They may disagree, but both of them have much different experiences than most Americans.

Yes, I will read Goldberg's next column and tonight I'll watch Dan Rather on CBS.