Apparently unsatisfied with his HDNet salary, Dan Rather is suing CBS and its parent company Viacom for $70 million. According to the New York Times, "Mr. Rather, 75, asserts that the network violated his contract by giving him insufficient airtime on 60 Minutes after forcing him to step down as anchor of the CBS Evening News in March 2005. He also contends that the network committed fraud by commissioning a "biased" and incomplete investigation of the flawed Guard broadcast and, in the process, "seriously damaged his reputation." If, as the Times story suggests, Rather was a passive teleprompter reader in the Guard broadcast, then why has he been such a crank in defending the story? [NYT]
