Give Severino a Chance

I think the always-arch Howard Rosenberg may have overreached in his column about new CBS-TV stations chief John Severino (“Can Former KABC Boss Severino Work His Magic at KCBS?,” Sept. 3).

Let me first offload any conflict baggage. In a couple of tours of duty, I spent more than a dozen years working for CBS-owned radio and television stations. Small world though it may be, I’m not certain I’ve ever met the well-covered Mr. Severino; I’m thinking I didn’t, despite hearing many of the war stories in which he features.

In his new double function of group president and station general manager, he will succeed--or won’t--based on a raft of variables within and outside his control. If he’s good or smart or lucky, he’ll win, and CBS or some other company will give him something bigger to play with next. If he’s not good or is a dope or has bad luck, he’ll wind up as have most of his predecessors.

Given the role of happenstance in local TV news, if the next Judge Judy pops up on the CBS owned-and-operated stations in the late afternoon, and if network boss Les Moonves slides the next “ER” into the 10 p.m. slot on Channel 2 and its sister stations, Sev’s a genius again and Rosenberg can attack him again for that success.

My problem is Rosenberg’s need to return--twice--to Hitlerian metaphors. Severino is president of the CBS-owned television stations, not a Bundeskanzler who just seized power in a putsch. If a writer needed Teutonic metaphors, it would have been more accurate to compare a station manager to a World War II Wehrmacht private serving on the Eastern front, since their mortality rates are somewhat comparable.

JERRY NACHMAN

Los Angeles

One of Severino’s first moves should be to get rid of sportscaster Jim Hill and find a credible sports figure for the station’s nightly news spot. Hill is a joke. He can scarcely get a sentence out without botching it.

ERIC MARCHESE

Santa Ana