Seldom does Dan Rather publicly praise a Republican. Arizona Senator John McCain is an exception. Dan Rather, like most reporters, approves of McCain's efforts to eliminate "soft money," contributions which political parties use to motivate sympathetic voters and to promote their candidates. Rather is also a supporter of anti-tobacco bills that McCain has sponsored.

In January of 2000, the McCain campaign issued a press release that spoke negatively of George W. Bush. Nothing unusual for a campaign except that the press release consisted entirely of a statement by Dan Rather.

"When this electoral cycle started really humming, when we heard about Bush and Bradley and Gore building their war chests, things started seeming locked-in. Early. We heard the huge cash figures -- especially where the Bush campaign was concerned -- and thought to ourselves, 'This is it. With all that dough, one of these guys will have it sewn up. Early.'
   "What's more, we knew that river of money had to be flowing from somewhere. Special interests. Lobbyists and influence seekers of all stripe hedging their bets and getting their chits cashed in, we feared, at a later date. Huey Long, the 'Kingfish' of Louisiana machine politics, once laid out the cold facts about campaign cash: Early money buys you influence. Money buys you access. And late money buys you good government.
   "This election season, especially in the early going, good government has seemed a remote possibility at best." "What to do? Well, we did what any rational, thinking electorate and press would do: threw up our hands, yelled for help and looked for a White Knight to come riding into the fray and to our collective rescue."
   "To everyone's surprise, it turned out to be a bona fide race. And it provided its own White Knight in the person of John McCain, with his crusade for campaign finance reform."
--Dan Rather in "Rather's Notebook" at the CBS News Web site, February 15, 2000.

The following comment was used as a press release by the McCain campaign:
"In the Republican presidential campaign, George W. Bush has launched a negative campaign attack ad against John McCain in New Hampshire. It centers on McCain's proposal for a tax cut which is half as big as the one Bush is proposing. "McCain has called the $483 billion Bush plan a giveaway to the rich that doesn't help protect Social Security. This is the first time Bush has used a heavy-money television campaign to unload negatively on McCain."
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, January 19, 2000.
Note: What did Bush call the plan?

RATHER: "McCain says he's determined to change the way Washington works and reduce the flood of money that pours into political campaigns. But he's had no support from Bush on this and little support anywhere in Washington, especially from his party leaders, like Senator Mitch McConnell. McCain concedes McConnell has beaten him time and again, especially in his battle to regulate and tax the tobacco industry."
RATHER (to McCain): "This was a big fight for you. You, in the end, lost the fight. The tobacco industry spent an estimated $40 million to $50 million on ads against you and, at the same time, poured soft money into the Republican campaign."
"Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said, 'It's OK to vote for big tobacco because big tobacco will come to the rescue at election time with issue ads.' Soft money ads. Look corrupt to you?"
--Dan Rather interviewing John McCain on 60 Minutes II, December 21, 1999.

RATHER: Let's don't forget, John McCain really felt that he was treated exceptionally badly in the South Carolina primaries. It's all way in past now, but, while he didn't say too much about it at the time, not publicly, he seethed about that.
LETTERMAN: Is that right?
RATHER: Absolutely. And so if he did--
LETTERMAN: And what was the nature of the abuse he believes he suffered?
RATHER: Well, it was a backdoor campaign that made all kinds of scurrilous, uh, accusations about his family and, uh, I think we shouldn't repeat them. But they were really scurrilous things.
LETTERMAN: Yeah.
RATHER: And this is your classic black bag campaign. And, McCain has not forgotten that. So, he's a Republican now, likely to stay same, could switch independent, has his eye on a possible independent candidacy for the presidency, but in the meantime, he doesn't dislike it, any discomfort he can cause to the Bushes.
--Dan Rather on the Late Show with David Letterman, June 7, 2001.

"Arizona Republican Senator John McCain's drive for campaign finance reform is dead. But his chances for the Republican presidential nomination are alive and well.
  "Senate Majority leader Trent Lott of Mississippi and House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia combined to personally put the kill-shot on McCain's reform efforts.
  "So McCain's hopes for meaningful changes in the way money for politics is raised, go down in flames. Just as his Navy fighter-bomber did over North Vietnam in 1967.
  "Incredibly, McCain survived seven years in a North Vietnamese prison. Such a man does not give up. Never.
  "In the hell that was his cell, he dreamed. Dreamed of sunlight and freedom.
  "Now he dreams of leading his country as President. He doesn't say that. He doesn't have to. Anyone who knows him, knows that he now burns with a hot, hard flame to have the ultimate leadership honor -- and responsibility.
  "Presidential candidates, like pool-shooters, must constantly think of what's known around pool tables as 'shape' -- that is, the position you're going to be in after taking the shot just ahead.
  "John McCain is now playing 'shape' or 'position' pool. And playing it well.
  "McCain is now the hot tout in Washington, whose war heroics and gutsy stand for campaign finance reform have the smart money murmuring, 'Big future.'"
--Dan Rather in his syndicated column, October 8, 1997.

"Lobbying by special interest groups, at all levels, has reached a fever pitch that is seen by many as a danger to democracy." "McCain and Bradley deserve credit for focusing attention on a crucial and endangered part of the American Dream."
--Dan Rather in "Rather's Notebook" at the CBS News Web site, December 27, 1999.

"Then for [George W.] Bush there is the matter of New York. Bush's forces plan to disqualify McCain from even being on the [NY primary] ballot in at least half the state. This is legal, believe it or not, and it's happening. No wonder Gov. Bush is smiling like a deacon with four aces."
--Dan Rather in "Rather's Notebook" at the CBS News Web site, January 18, 2000.

"We'll tell you how the tax debate between Bush and McCain threatens to turn nasty, with Bush running negative ads in Michigan...and McCain asking him to stop because of the handshake deal the two candidates recently made to not go negative on one another."
--Dan Rather in an online preview of the night's Evening News, January 20, 2000.

"On the Republican side, George W. Bush has gone negative in television campaigns against John McCain and Steve Forbes now, and today he took a tougher line against abortion rights. This as his differences with McCain over who has the best tax cut plan got sharper and louder.
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, January 20, 2000.

McCain had just won the New Hampshire primary:
"Do you expect the Bush campaign to come at you in a nasty way, now?"
--Dan Rather to John McCain on 60 Minutes II, February 1, 2000.

McCain and George W. Bush were struggling to win the South Carolina primary:
"CBS's Byron Pitts has the facts on the new and nastier Bush campaign."
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, February 7, 2000.

Bush won the South Carolina primary:
"The self-described 'Religious Right' -- including conservative preachers Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson -- are part of the deep core of the Republican Party, one that runs deeper in South Carolina than perhaps anywhere else in the country. And they delivered big-time for Bush [in his defeat of John McCain in the Primary] in the Palmetto State."
"[T]hey acted partly out of self-interest, to preserve a campaign finance system that helps to keep them in powerful positions and allows them to spend freely and make their influence felt."
--Dan Rather in "Rather's Notebook" on the CBS News Web Site, February 22, 2000.

"But the party powerful weren't ready for John McCain, senator from Arizona, war hero, a scrappy fighter whose critics call him an angry maverick and a loudmouth, a man who's been criticizing his party's leaders for taking big special-interest money for years. In just a few short months McCain has upset his party's insiders' carefully laid plans to anoint George W. Bush as their candidate, and McCain's doing it without much support from the Republican powerful.
--Dan Rather on 60 Minutes II, December 21, 1999.

"The Republican presidential campaign has just got a lot nastier. One of the dirtiest secrets of political attack strategies hit the spotlight today, something called push polling. Push polling involves political pollsters who are not seeking voter opinions, but trying to sway them under the guise of polling. In this case it's reportedly a pro-Bush line of attack aimed at John McCain in South Carolina."
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, February 10, 2000.
Note: Dan Rather knows about push polling since he and CBS often engaged in it often during various Clinton Administration scandals. See also Compare and Contrast.

"Southern hostility. McCain says Bush has started using push polling in South Carolina."
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, February 10, 2000.
Note: The Associated Press reported that Bush accused McCain of doing this as well, but Rather did not report this.

IMUS: "That would be pretty exciting, a McCain, Bush, Gore campaign, wouldn't it? A three-way race -- that would be fun."
RATHER: "Oh man, we'd be having a three thousand calorie attack every minute."
IMUS: "Actually, maybe we ought to pull for that."
RATHER: "Well, I got to tell you, realistically, if you're going to pull for something -- you know, I'm not in the pulling business -- but if you're the I-man, in there with your faithful Indian companions, and you and Charles and Bernard want to pull for something, that's not something too bad to pull for."
--Dan Rather and Don Imus on Imus in the Morning, March 7, 2000.

Title of a column:
"McCain Has Targeted Political Center; Other Candidates Should Take Notice."
--Dan Rather in "Rather's Notebook" on the CBS News Web Site, February 22, 2000.

George W. Bush had captured the Republican nomination after his Super Tuesday victory. Dan Rather interviewed John McCain shortly thereafter:
RATHER (narrating): "Governor Bush hasn't been exactly gracious in victory. In an interview last week with the New York Times, Bush said he had learned nothing from and would make no concessions to McCain." "Asked about the many new voters McCain had attracted, Bush said, 'Well, then how come he didn't win?'"
RATHER: "Now that doesn't sound to me like a candidate, Governor Bush, who's in any mood whatsoever to listen to very much of anything you have to say." "In your opinion, has Bush been a classy winner?"
MCCAIN: "I think he has conducted himself well, yes."
RATHER: "Even given what he said to the Times reporters?"
RATHER (narrating): "Bush may be talking about McCain, but he's not talking to him. Even though Bush will need McCain's supporters, he hasn't telephoned since McCain returned from his vacation."
MCCAIN: "I know that he's very busy with formulating their campaign against Al Gore, so I'm sure there'll be discussions."
RATHER: "You're asking me to believe, or not, that you're not disappointed that he hasn't called you?"
MCCAIN: Oh no, I'm not disappointed. I know they've been very busy.
RATHER: "Whew! [exhaling in disbelief] You sure he gets that busy?"
RATHER: "The leadership of your own party, left to their own devices, would cut your heart out and throw your liver to the dogs."
RATHER: "In South Carolina, Bush supporters were spreading scurrilous, really scurrilous stuff, and untrue." "How do you feel about that today?" "I have to believe you were angry about it at the time."
--Dan Rather interview John McCain on 60 Minutes II, March 21, 2000.

"Tonight CBS is reporting to you in depth on a campaign finance law loophole that makes a mockery of reforms advocated by the McCain campaign."
--Dan Rather on the CBS Evening News, May 16, 2000. print_file('footer'); ?>