Katy Out at CBS News

     Beginning in June of 2011 viewers will see
at new face at the news desk of the CBS Evening
News.. Katy Couric is at the end of her five year
contract (which pays her 15 million dollars a year)
and there is very little effort to re-sign her to a new
deal. Couric came to CBS News in 2006 after a long
stint as the morning hostess of the NBC Today Show.
In this format, she excelled at interviewing and adlibbing
with guests on the show. As a newscaster in a tightly
formatted 22 minute newscast, she is out of her league
and looked uncomfortable in her first couple of years.
CBS has lagged behind in the ratings for the evening 
news programs and now seem ready to make the change.
Rumors around the hallways in New York seem to think
that Scott Pelley would be the immediate choice to succeed
Couric in the anchor chair. Pelley, a Texan who began his

career in TV news in Lubbock, worked in Dallas at Channel 8
as a reporter and weekend anchor before moving to CBS.
He now is one of the staples on the CBS program '60 Minutes'
and has experience reporting from Iraq and Afganistan. Pelley
was also the first to interview then President-Elect George W.

Bush immediately following the election.
   I would like to submit another possibility for CBS to consider.
Harry Smith has been taken off the Early Show on CBS and now
is the fill-in for Couric when she is absent. Smith has a great voice and is the first to project that comfortable feeling that has been
absent from the CBS Evening News since Walter Cronkite was pushed out. I admit to being a bit bias on this decision as I worked
with Smith in Dallas and New York while I was with CBS News.
Harry is a good man, and he is one to work the story rather than 
just looking good on camera. It will be a choice for someone,...but
just remember CBS.... third place in the ratings !!  Smith can turn
things around for you...