CBS Stresses Being Right on Returns

On screen, CBS anchor Dan Rather was in typical election night form -- a bit tired, perhaps, but full of his patented down-home aphorisms: “This race is hotter than a Times Square Rolex,” he said at one point as the Ohio returns came in.

The real heat was back in the packed CBS News control room, though, where producers were sweating the details of the state-by-state calls. At 10:10 p.m., Pat Shevlin, a senior producer, announced to the 30 or so people in the room that the network’s statistical model was “showing a perfect tie in Ohio.” As word trickled in that competitors had started calling Ohio for Bush, CBS held its course. And at 10:14 p.m., Rather said on the air: “We’d rather be last than be wrong here at CBS News.”

All the U.S. television networks felt the ghost of Florida 2000 -- with its premature, seesawing calls -- hovering over them on election night. But CBS had more reason than most to strive for a credible, error-free performance.

An investigation that touches on the work of some of the network’s most respected players -- including Rather, 73, and one of his longtime producers, Mary Mapes -- is underway to probe a botched Sept. 8 “60 Minutes” report on President Bush’s 1970s Texas Air National Guard service. The independent investigators retained by CBS -- former U.S. Atty. Gen. Richard L. Thornburgh and Louis Boccardi, the retired head of Associated Press -- could release their report within weeks.

What’s more, CBS -- where Walter Cronkite had the top-rated newscast during the 1960s and ‘70s -- has for many years been unable to shake its No. 3 ranking. It appears that election night 2004 did nothing to alter the pattern. According to preliminary ratings from Nielsen Media Research, CBS attracted an average 9.5 million viewers during the 5-8 p.m. PST hours -- behind NBC, which had an average 15.2 million and ABC, with 13.2 million. For the same hours, Fox News Channel drew 8.05 million viewers, CNN had 6.2 million and MSNBC 2.8 million.

If the network’s travails were on anyone’s mind election night, it wasn’t apparent in the controlled chaos of the control room, where the data flowed in steadily and producers juggled interviews with guests and incoming news from correspondents in the field. Out in the studio, where the dozen people on the “decision desk” were wedged behind the cameras, working in stage whispers under the hot studio lights just in front of Rather, the approach was, in fact, “cautiously aggressive,” said Linda Mason, a vice president responsible for making sure the calls were right.

At key points during the night, CBS was out in front of its rivals in projecting some state winners.

The objective was to chart their own course, not get caught up in the competitive frenzy, said Marcy McGinnis, senior vice president for news coverage. “We’re relying on ourselves,” she said, “not being caught up in what the others are doing.”