Lara Logan, Activist-Journalist & New CBS Chief Foreign Correspondent
Meet award-winning journalist Lara Logan, probable replacement for faltering Katie Couric as top newswoman, and top news reporter, at the CBS network.
And it can't come a minute too soon for me.
No more namby-pamby coverage of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And no more more embarrassingly softcore girly questions of presidential candidates and the like. ("Someone told me your nickname in school was 'Miss Frigidaire' — is that true?" For more Couric gems of gaffery, see TV Guide's Couric Drops the Ball with Clinton .)
In contrast, 37-year-old Logan, who's been reporting from war zones and troubled areas for 17 years, has the hustle of an impassioned, tenacious foreign correspondent, and the fierce heart of an outspoken activist, particularly of the Iraq War.
On June 25, 2008, Lara Logan was named to the highly prestigious position of CBS Network's Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, after having held the similar title since late 2005 in the CBS News division.
Protesting her own network's undercoverage of the Iraq War, Logan complained in 2006:
"You watch your friends burn to death in front of you, and we're going to pretend this story doesn't matter anymore because people are tired of hearing about it?"
And to U.S. commanders in Iraq, who told Logan that she needs to report more "good news," she lamented:
"I tell the American commanders all the time: When we can get in our cars and drive to the opening of a store and interview people on camera without fear of being killed, or getting everyone involved with us killed, the good-news stories will be told."
Logan has appeared lately on "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart and "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno, truth-telling about the Iraq War, rather than spouting politically-correct mumbo-jumbo or painting a feel-good but disproportional portrait of "progress."
It was a relief when in October 2007, after asked by Leno about the Iraq War, Logan sighed in refreshing honesty, "We're doing extremely badly." At last! A network newsperson willing to speak truth to power.
Lara Logan's career is not without controversy, though, nor without the loud whisper of scandal. She doesn't deny that her ultra-glamorous looks have afforded her advantages as a journalist and war correspondent, but also insists that "other times, being attractive can really hurt you."
At Profile of Lara Logan, CBS Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent, read up on the activist-journalist who will, more and more, be shaping CBS's coverage of the conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and around the world.
And then pray that CBS network honchos don't attempt to muffle or mute the fearless, determined Lara Logan...
Or remake her into a Gen-X version of soft-news peddler Couric.
(Photo taken on May 28, 2008: Joe Corrigan/Getty Images)
Profile of Other Activist Journalists
Comments
You mention Lara Logan “is a network newsperson willing to speak truth to power.” Her comments about the war going “badly” is an opinion, not fact. If her comments were fact, then others that say the war is progressing and we are winning are speaking the truth as well. Hard to reconcile many truths, isn’t it?
Scott, I realize we live in a time and culture that prefers that its journalists be stenographers. But look where that got us. It’s a journalist’s responsibility to call it like she sees it. If a president makes an ass of himself during a news conference, lying through his teeth, as our current Dear Leader does with remarkable ease, then it’s the journalist’s responsibility not merely to report the lies, but to debunk them in the next paragraph. To put it in more perspective: You don’t report on the uncovering of mass graves by getting the murderers’ point of view for “balance and objectivity.” You report on the mass graves by describing them as the atrocity that they are, period. Iraq is, in effect, a mass grave still being dug, albeit in smaller plots that are much easier to dismiss (what are 700 to 800 Iraqi civilians killed last month, for instance? What sort of “progressing” and “winning” is that?). Lara Logan prefers not to dismiss the grave-digging, however cleverly disguised as “progress.” That, I think, is what Deborah White is getting at–that and the fact that Logan is the Hester Prynn of TV reporters. For once, we get one with cojones in a field of eunuchs (to say nothing of Couric’s dimple-docile parody of news). Thanks for the post Deborah.
I see by your acceptance of the need for journalists to push their opinions that you must be a huge supporter of FOX News.
Could that correct, or do you only believe that the liberal media should be able to promote their opinion?
I know, stupid question. If you wanted to be fair, you wouldn’t be a liberal.