At 59, Katie Couric is cute and perky as ever, even as her reputation in broadcasting has sunk to “high-priced failure.”
Bet you didn’t know she is “global news anchor” for Yahoo, where she works for a fellow high-priced failure, CEO Marissa Mayer, at a company that has been stumbling to find its way for years, if not decades.
Cost-cutting axes have swung again and company insiders are grumbling to the New York Post about Katie’s $10 million annual salary, much the same thing that happened at CBS when she anchored the evening news into the ground for five years at $15 mil per.
Yahoo Editor-in-chief Martha Nelson noted that Katie has snagged many interviews in this election year.
“Katie Couric brings a unique expertise and audience to Yahoo,” she told the Post. “Newsmakers want to talk to Katie. She’s interviewed almost every major presidential candidate in the race, and her video streams have more than doubled in the last year. I expect that trajectory to continue.”
Think about that. Who hasn’t interviewed every major candidate? With the exception of Trump and Hillary, they practically troll the lobbies of hotels frequented by the media, hoping somebody will stick a microphone in their face.
I prefer to remember the Katie who paid her dues behind the scenes and eventually made fools of those who refused to put her in front of a camera. The Katie who helped make “Today” a powerhouse over a 15-year period. The Katie who reported award-winning documentaries. Especially the Katie who endured family tragedies with such grace. Even the Katie who moonlighted on “60 Minutes” while her anchor job became a slow-motion train wreck.
Perhaps the lesson we can draw from “America’s Sweetheart” is that she hasn’t changed at all. But the marketplace has.
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