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Right wing bloggers take much of the credit for getting Dan Rather fired from CBS Evening News just before the 2004 election, when he did a story critical of George W. Bush's attendance record in the Texas Air Guard. But the bloggers had a big ally in the boardroom...none other than Sumner Redstone, Chairman and CEO of Viacom, owner of CBS.
Why did Emperor Redstone give Rather thumbs down as he struggled against the lions?
Redstone, a longtime Democrat, had told the press a few days before: "From a Viacom standpoint, the election of a Republican administration is a better deal. Because the Republican administration has stood for many things we believe in, deregulation and so on....I vote for Viacom. Viacom is my life, and I do believe that a Republican administration is better for media companies than a Democratic one."
Greg Palast writes, "It looks like Viacom needed George Bush to stay in the White House and some...journalist...wasn't going to screw it up with some cockamamie story about the Texas Air Guard."*
*Greg Palast, Armed Madhouse, Dutton, p. 274.
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