A Life in JournalismThis is the second book I have read this year by former CBS reporters who worked in Washington. First Roger Mudd, and now Daniel Schorr. I'm going to have to come up with a "CBS Washington" tag before long.
Frankly, I picked this book up, because the author seemed to be kind of a jerk. That's not my normal reason for buying books, but I was curious about Schorr after reading Roger Mudd's "The Place To Be" about his time at CBS. In that book, Schorr seemed to be such a controversial figure, rather than the grandfatherly commentator who has occasionally woken me up on NPR.
Mudd's book about CBS News didn't exactly attack Schorr, but much of the CBS bureau seemed to take great offense at Schorr's aggressive behavior towards his colleagues. He was widely suspected of stealing stories from others. And when he released the classified Pike Report to the Village Voice, it was felt by many that he tried to frame the whole thing on Lesley Stahl. Stahl still seems to despise him.
Not surprisingly, Schorr doesn't seem like a jerk at all when he's the one telling the story. All his actions seem perfectly reasonable. That's what's so great about autobiographies. He doesn't sidestep any of the controversies he was involved in, but he isn't apologetic for any of them either. After reading both books, I don't even know if he should be.
Despite all this, it was exciting to read Schorr's tales of Khrushchev, the Berlin Wall, and Watergate. Famously, he was also on Nixon's enemies list and had the surreal experience of reading out his own name (#17) when he revealed the list live on television for the first time.
Interestingly, Mudd's book devotes entire sections to his colleague Daniel Schorr. Meanwhile, Schorr mentions Mudd a grand total of four times, and only once in any detail. Mudd may have been more successful at the time -- and has probably written the better book -- but Schorr, jerk or not, is by far the more interesting figure.
