Dan Rather Reminisces About That One Time He Did Heroin
It’s a public, but little-known, fact that Dan Rather once did heroin.
In his defense, as he told Andy Cohen last night on Bravo’s Watch What Happens Live!, it was 1955, he took it in a police station under police supervision, and he wrote about it, and he never did it again. We’re not sure whether that’s super, hard-core journalism right there, or it was an innocent thing that 1950’s journalists thought would make a great story, because we cannot think of anyone who would do that these days. (Can you imagine an NYT story where David Brooks tries methamphetamine for the sake of journalism? Call us morbid, but…that would be funny.)
Rather called his heroin experience “otherworldly,” but stated that it was the “one and only time” he ever did it. “It gave me a hell of a headache,” the 81-year-old chortled, before moving on to other old man reporter subjects, like how much Richard Nixon hated him.
Say what you will about Dan Rather, but he will ride the black eagle in the public interest, and journalists today are weak.
Wait. That came out wrong. Heroin is bad. Really bad. Don’t do heroin to advance your journalism career.
Watch his 60-second recap of his career below.