December 2, 2004

TIMES HUMOR: BOROWITZ REPORT

Dan Rather’s resignation based on false information

Internal CBS Memo a Phony, Anchor Reveals

Veteran CBS anchorman withdrew his resignation from the network’s evening newscast today, revealing that his decision to resign had been based on information that later turned out to be false.

Mr. Rather said that he only decided to resign after obtaining an internal CBS report blasting him for his role in the network’s recent “Memogate” scandal, but then later discovered that the report itself was a forgery.

When he made the startling discovery, Mr. Rather said, “My face was redder than my Aunt Mabel’s rhubarb pie.”

The veteran newsman indicated that he first suspected that the internal CBS report might be bogus when he saw that it had been faxed from a Kinko’s copy center in Canoga Park, Calif., and was typed on Holiday Inn stationery.

But the embattled anchor’s attempt to reclaim his nightly newscast may be doomed, one network insider said, because CBS chairman Les Moonves “has already changed the locks.”

According to the insider, security personnel at CBS’ broadcast facility have been instructed to nab Mr. Rather if he attempts to enter the building and have been warned to “be on the lookout for a 73-year-old white man disguised as a Mujahideen.”

While Mr. Rather’s days in the CBS anchor chair may be at an end, associates of the newscaster believe that he may begin a new career at the Central Intelligence Agency, where his ability to gather phony information is said to be highly regarded.

Elsewhere, U.S. forces searching a bomb-making factory in Falluja over the weekend discovered the screenplay of the movie “Alexander.”


For more from Andy Borowitz, go to: www.borowitzreport.com. The critics are raving about THE BOROWITZ REPORT: THE BIG BOOK OF SHOCKERS. The book is available for $9.95 at Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/ exec/obidos/ASIN/0743262778)