CBS considered Limbaugh, Coulter to investigate Rathergate

Discovery in Dan Rather's lawsuit against his old network reveals that CBS thought about appointing some very conservative figures to its panel.

Published November 7, 2008 5:24PM (EST)

From the moment Dan Rather filed his lawsuit against his old employers at CBS, it was clear that this was the kind of thing that could lead to some juicy insider gossip being spilled. Friday, courtesy of the New York Observer's Felix Gillette, that's what happened.

Rather contends, among other things, that the panel that looked into the story he and his team did on President Bush's military service was stacked against him by the appointment of former Attorney General Dick Thornburgh. That may or may not be true, but a list of other potential members of the investigative team shows that things could have been much worse for Rather. If some of the people on this list were on the panel, the resulting investigation would probably have looked like something out of "Reservoir Dogs":

  • William Buckley
  • Robert Novak
  • Kate O’Beirne
  • Nicholas Von Hoffman
  • Tucker Carlson
  • Pat Buchanan
  • George Will
  • Lou Dobbs
  • Matt Drudge
  • Robert Barkley
  • Robert Kagan
  • Fred Barnes
  • William Kristol
  • John Podhoretz
  • David Brooks
  • William Safire
  • Bernard Goldberg
  • Ann Coulter
  • Andrew Sullivan
  • Christopher Hitchens
  • PJ O’Rourke
  • Christopher Caldwell
  • Elliott Abrams
  • Charles Krauthammer
  • William Bennett
  • Rush Limbaugh

By Alex Koppelman

Alex Koppelman is a staff writer for Salon.

MORE FROM Alex Koppelman


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