Name: Dan Rather Is Worried About CBS News' New Owner | David Letterman
Uploaded: 2026-01-13T16:00:35.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dan Rather Is Worried About CBS News' New Owner | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-01-13. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Dan Rather Is Worried About CBS News' New Owner | David Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2026-01-13. Transcript available.

dan how you doing welcome to the broadcast i know you're very very busy man
thank you so much for
your time we always appreciate your business i'm glad to be here david actually
i thought i'd just
dropped by i haven't been in the jeers section of tv guide for about three or
four weeks so every
time you're on the show somebody writes something nasty about you well that's
true so i you know
i sort of needed that pop we have a new ownership and uh oh god i want to get
into that in a second
now you you've been through this a couple of times here at cbs so this is your
second time going
through this the ownership change at cbs that's right yeah i've been through it
once here and
and once at the the old place well as a matter of fact as a matter of fact david
uh that uh mike
jordan who is the chairman of westinghouse that's right we call him mike no
jump shot jordan he was
over at cbs news this afternoon just before i came here what kind of a guy does
he seem to be
well among the things he said to everybody he said just call me mike and so we
already have the t-shirts
coming out tomorrow they'll be available on the front will be just call me mike
and on the back will be
yes sir mr jordan yeah you'll certainly appreciate that but we're screwed i
mean you know when the
dust settles we're screwed isn't that pretty much well you know david you have
a long time
contract and you can afford to say that but uh i did notice uh one change
already uh when
you open the door at the cbs news broadcast center now when you open the door
the light goes
uh the other thing david i wanted to say about the westinghouse thing you know
a number of people in
our building uh we're nervous about this you gotta be nervous because here's my
view of it i hate to
interrupt but i'm going to anyway it's my show uh when the smoke clears when
the dust settles these
penguins will come in here and just start cutting us back to the bone and i'm
telling you something
we're there already you know what i mean uh believe me i know what you mean yes
uh however i'm not sure
that it's all quite as bad as it might appear to be and i'll tell you why some
of our people have been
looking into the new medical plan with the new ownership you have to look into
the medical yeah you got to
check your benefits and what they find is there are some changes for example uh
under westinghouse
the rules apparently are if you get ill you must go to a westinghouse service
center
that's no good that won't work well it might but i i do hear nice things about
uh mr jordan
that this man obviously did not go to school just to eat his lunch everybody
who talks about him says
he's very very smart yeah and i hear he's yellow uh i don't hear that david i
don't hear that you know
i was taught in texas a long time ago uh something that i think we can adjust
to we can adapt to this
situation don't approach a horse from the rear yeah don't approach a bull from
the front and don't
approach a new boss from any direction yeah probably so but now you know uh we're
uh kind of speaking
with a little levity here because we're both scared silly but uh you got it andy
rooney your
colleague at cbs news went nuts the guy went nuts he said that the former
ownership of this company
had ruined the network and and compared to lawrence tish to a slumlord what's
the matter with that guy
well let me tell you he's like you are he's bulletproof yeah he's the only guy
that got absolutely
bulletproof i mean he can say those things and nothing happens to him you know
i still have kids
in college i still still have car payments i still have a house note to make
and uh you're not going
to touch me touching that line but i don't know i don't know but the thing that
interests me the abc
has sold to disney for 19 billion and cbs has sold westinghouse for 5 billion
what does that tell you
well it tells you that they're bottom feeders that's what i keep saying they're
bargain shoppers
well i you know i got to tell you david i'm so bad at prognostication that i
still had my mickey
mouse ears when they were announcing that stuff at abc uh but you know if you
stay with the network
we'll be worth 19.3 billion i'll stay with the network the question is will the
network stay with me
well that's a fair question actually yeah uh we mentioned about your singing
you always have been
very nice you come on and you sing like a train song or something i get the
sense that that's a
very important part of your background your upbringing or something you always
leave us with a little
train song and you also said that then every time you do that somebody says
well dan shouldn't be going
on tv singing songs do you have any regrets about doing that no none at all
listen i like rem i like
their music that i only regret about that day when you know i went over madison
square oh yeah you're
talking about the rem thing yeah the only you know the only thing i regretted
about that day is that
their music is special it's fairly complicated stuff i can't carry a tune in a
bucket with a lid on it
i know that but i had a bad day that day that that was my only regret about as
for the train songs
uh uh mr jordan mike yeah who by the way he definitely will not be bringing scotty
pippen with him
but uh he told me confidentially today no more tobacco chewing no more train
song running and
definitely no uh complaining about the boss oh i expect he's going to tell you
the same no no i
want this guy over and we'll fight he and i will fight any night any time right
here
and and the winner gets to keep his job and they get a complimentary westinghouse
nuclear reactor speaking of that i've been pricing them you know they're not
better they're affordable
now yeah by the way secondhand one yeah uh my main message here my main reason
for being here is to
assure you that westinghouse appliances are still very dependable and very
affordable and i promise
myself that you'll get that through oh dan as you know kissy kissy kissy kissy
well you know what we
say at home there's so much to kiss in so little time
what the hell does that mean let's uh here's uh dan rather with rem down at
madison square garden a couple of weeks ago there's
yes sir yes sir that was fine that was fine with a lot of courage i admire that
in you that you had
the courage and you took a chance and you went up there and you did it and you
know it was horrible
amen to that dan uh you know i really appreciate every little visit and thank
you for all your
considerations and help in the past good to see you again very much dan rather
ladies and gentlemen
you