Dan Rather Quotes

Some of the press who speak loudly about the freedom of the press are themselves the enemies of freedom. Countless people dare not say a thing because they know it will be picked up and made a song of by the press. That limits freedom.

The media in America has become so cowed and compromised.

If I had my choice I would kill every reporter in the world, but I am sure we would be getting reports from Hell before breakfast.

When you read Western press, you probably get a feeling that all Russian press is censored, there's no freedom at all, we can't say whatever, which is absolutely, absolutely, completely untrue.

We need a free media, not just freedom of speech.

As far as the media is concerned, I wouldn't shoot anything down.

At Grozny TV, the line between journalism and government propaganda is traversed as often as a Manhattan crosswalk.

The thing that's been inhibiting long-form investigative reporting is fear - fear of being sued, of being unpopular, of being criticized by very powerful groups.

I can only assume that your editorial writer tripped over the First Amendment and thought it was the office cat.

The press doesn't stop publishing, by the way, in a fascist escalation; it simply watches what it says. That too can be an incremental process, and the pace at which the free press polices itself depends on how journalists are targeted.

American newspapers are so filthy and bestial that no honest man would admit one into his house for a water-closet doormat.

We journalists in America take it for granted that we are not going to be killed for our work. Unfortunately, this is not true elsewhere in the world.

A free press may be good or bad, but without freedom a press can only be bad.

We must have a free press. If we are to maintain democracxy as we know it, we must have a free and adversarial press.... That's how dictoators get power [by intimidating, restriciting and censoring the press.]

I never sue journalists. I employ journalists. I employ too many of them. I don't sue journalists.

The Congressional leaders set the agenda for journalism; it's not the other way around.

The Ecuadorean and Latin American press is not like the European or North American press, which has some professional ethics. They are used to being above the law, to blackmail, to extort.

Nobody from the administration has officially rejected my column.

It should be clear by now that my focus here is not freedom of speech or the press. This freedom is all too often an exaggeration. At the very least, blind references to freedom of speech or the press serve as a distraction from the critical examination of other communications policies.

Journalism has a special, hallowed place for stories of its practitioners' persecution.

The press is the enemy.

There are different opinions across the Middle East of Al-Jazeera. They've been kicked out of Egypt and Jordan and then let back in; they've been totally banned from Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Syria.

Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.

Perhaps the biggest problem in journalism is the cult divide between journalists and corporate owners.

The United States is paradise compared to China, Russia, Ecuador and Cuba, with regard to the press. And with regard to secrecy and transparency.