Mike Wallace (60 Minutes) is a big fucking loser

Normally the interviewee says something indicating that they want their comments "off the record" -- which any respectable journalist would comply with. This time Mike initiates this "off the record" dialogue by saying "between you and me." Yes, he using it as a means of coercing information that the interviewee didn't necessarily want to give, but the phrase "between you and me" means BETWEEN YOU AND ME, not BETWEEN YOU AND ME AND 260 MILLION OTHER PEOPLE. Therefore, the interviewee had perfect reason to assume that his comments were going to be off the record. For Wallace to say that the phrase is meaningless is unethical at best. What a fucking douche.

http://www.gothamist.com/archives/2004/08/11/when_86_yearold_newsmen_attack.php

no it doesn't. wallace has done this for years, and i don't think there's very many people unwilling to talk to "60 Minutes," even when they're the "villains" of a given story

I doubt it.

If Mike Wallace is a douchebag, then so is Leah Garchick.

Huk OTM ... what kind of journalist just wants to know because he's curious?

THAT'S what I was thinking of! Thank you, Anthony.

A journalist can use this information to dig up more information, without having to link it to a specific person.

She's asking about THE TITLE OF HIS BOOK. He *invited* this shitstorm.

EWWWWWWWWW

Sources are an important resource and need to know they can trust me to deal with them honestly.
It's up to the journalist to decide when to use a resource to get another resource and when to use it as a story in itself.

If you value your source, "off the record" that STAYS off the record is fine -- otherwise, who cares? Anything anyone tells a journalist (if he/she knows they're a journalist) is fair game.

I've got to say, this doesn't seem like very good journalism to me either.

Oh maybe he is a big fucking loser: "Meanwhile, veteran CBS "60 Minutes" correspondent Mike Wallace said Monday on NBC's "Today" show that Dan Rather should have resigned in wake of the discredited report. Rather was the report's narrator; he stepped down as "CBS Evening News" anchor in March and is now Wallace's colleague at "60 Minutes."

Rather was traveling on Monday and was not immediately available for comment, a spokeswoman said."

Or he can report it. Whichever is more valuable to him in getting the story out. There should be no presumption that anything is off the record.

Those who do will then be *known* as such, and not be sought out by other important figures that want something out but don't want to directly bring that upon. Keeping stuff said off record off record isn't just a question of ethics (frankly in many cases ethics don't really come into it much), it's about keeping yr doors open for future info.

This seemed as good as a place to post this as any. I just stumbled on this ancient clip of young Mike Wallace interviewing young Kirk Douglas c. 1957. Aside from the cigarette shilling, I was shocked by how hardcore and in-depth the interview style is, esp. by contemporary celebrity interview standards. Douglas does really well under the microscope, considering what Wallace is tossing at him:

http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/multimedia/video/2008/wallace/douglas_kirk.html

Douchebag or not, pretty incredible stuff.

http://abcnews.go.com/US/mike-wallace-dies-60-minutes-correspondent-93/story?id=16096195

I forgot about that article linked at top; she is completely wrong, BTW, and Wallace was in the right, IMO. RIP.

regularly swatted women in the office on the ass

take it back

I WONDER WHAT THSI BUMP COULD POSSIBLY BE ABOUT ??

Lotta CBS drama right now, straight out of "The Insider."

This is today's New York Times. In it is the whole sordid story of what went on inside our shop. And in the editorial...It accuses us of betraying the legacy of Edward R. Murrow.

Yup.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pe2vBnfKCC4

Unpopular opinion: Christopher Plummer isn't very good as Mike Wallace.

Ha, I think he's great.

Me too, it's probably my favorite performance in the film. I still like the movie, but when I revisited it again several years ago, it lost some of its luster for inflating Lowell Bergman into some kind of super hero. (It was easier to buy into that as someone who had zero experience in the adult/professional world.)

At his laziest Plummer has a habit of saying lines without thought or feeling. Most of the movie's worst scenes have him in them, and Mann paints a target on him from the get-go. That monologue in the 60 Minutes editorial meeting ("They've got no right to hide behind a corporate agreement! Pass the milk"); the "Who are these people? smugness after Wigand reveals he hasn't told his wife he's going on the show; the spin-on-a-dime moment when he realizes Gina Gershon has fucked him over. It's so damn facile compared to the rest of the excellent movie.

His "mad scene" in King Lear at Stratford was so stunningly half-hearted it's erased everything else from the whole play in my mind.

yeah there is nothing remotely mad about Plummer

I don't know what Wallace was like in private, but as uncharitable as those moments may be, they're nowhere near as bad as what's been reported about so many big name news anchors nowadays. (tbf, that probably says more about the sad state of television journalism)

oh in 1999 we knew he already knew he was a horse's ass; I'm talking dramaturgy.

That initial interview that kicked off the thread is pretty funny, imo! Someone being an asshole to Mike Wallace by using his own shtick is pretty great, I don't get why the conversation became whether or not Garchik was in the wrong when she was obviously doing a bit.

I had put a marker on Page 64, and I called the passage to his attention. He had written about "guests who happily appear on '60 Minutes' to plug their latest book (or whatever) and then are angered when we stray from that subject." This seemed relevant to our conversation.

got his ass

So of course all sorts of shit going on. Last I read, Bill Whitaker, Lesley Stahl, and Jon Wertheim - the three remaining anchors - met to decide next steps, but really, I dunno, it's all pretty fucked up. If they resign, Weiss keeps "60 Minutes" and turns it into another crypto-conservative propaganda mill. If they don't, they'll have to align with her bullshit, which will likely lead to firing/quitting anyway. It's fucked, which tracks, because we're all fucked.