Chapter 18

It turned out that Dan Fagan did what he said he would do in his new position at the cable news network. He made it a point to talk to all the on-air personalities, the producers, and the writers of all the network shows about what his plans were for turning around and increasing the viewership of this network’s programs. The talks he gave generally covered the points he made in the conversation he had with Theo Harrington.

Dan started implementing changes by talking to Keith Tanner who was the newsreader for the six o’clock hour-long evening news program. He gave Keith videos of Paul Connors doing the news that showed Paul making comments about the news he had just reported. Dan asked Keith to develop that style when he was doing the news. It became apparent that Keith couldn’t do that type of impromptu commenting after he read a news report.

That problem was solved when Dan asked the writers for that news program to view those same videos of Paul Conners doing the news. Dan asked the writers to incorporate Connors’s types of comments in the news they were writing that was shown on the teleprompter screen for Keith to read. The writers were both surprised and excited to receive permission to incorporate those types of comments into the news. Keith did have the ability to read what was on the teleprompter screen and make it look like it was his comments and not something that had been written for him to say.

Keith received many emails, when after reading a news report on a Judge’s trial verdict he said, “I fail to understand how a Judge can give a verdict for many millions of dollars against a person when it was reported that there was no one who suffered any financial harm or loss from this man’s alleged exaggeration of his properties’ values in securing a loan. Those involved in this man securing a loan did their own checking of this man’s properties’ values and were satisfied before they gave him the loan. They also said they made money in giving him this loan and would do business with this man again. A bond for this exorbitant judgment amount must now be posted before this verdict can be appealed. For the moment, and putting aside what my thoughts are about this man, it seems to me that the Judge must have slept through his Constitutional law class in school. This Judge disregarded that part of the Eight Amendment to the Constitution that says in part, “nor excessive fines imposed.” Be aware, that if they do it to this man, they can do it to you.”

The result of Keith making these types of comments was that his news broadcast became in a few months the highest-rated cable news broadcast program in that time slot. Viewers were interested in hearing what Keith had to say about the news. Because of that interest, the three-person panel discussion at the end of that news program was eliminated.

The on-air personalities Dan discovered were a hard group for him to get to change and have them tell both sides of a story since they continued to favor one political party over the other. Dan made an effort to advise them on what they were saying and what they could have said.

He gave them examples of how they could have commented by saying, “Remember that this is the same person who falsely claimed she had an Indian heritage.” Or, “While this Senator accused the President of giving misinformation, this same Senator when running for office inferred that he served in Vietnam when it was shown that he never left the States.” Or, “This man who says everyone should pay their fair share of taxes overlooks that he has a son who did not pay his taxes.”

Dan in giving these examples to the commentators could only think that his suggestions fell on deaf ears because there weren’t any changes in their behaviors. The inflated egos of these people probably were the biggest impediment that prevented them from adjusting to Dan’s way of wanting them to report and fairly comment on the news. The low ratings their shows were getting didn’t seem to concern them.

He became agitated when a producer told him what the writers for an on-air commentator had told her. She said that comments like Dan wanted were put in the script, but this female commentator refused to read those lines.

Dan, who was a fan of baseball, applied the three-strike rule in dealing with these on-air personalities with inflated egos. He made it a point to counsel them individually on three separate occasions and point out how they could have said things better to avoid showing their bias. When he saw there wasn’t going to be any change in a person to adapt to Dan’s way of reporting the news, Dan didn’t do any more counseling. He just waited till these commentators’ employment contracts were going to expire and informed them that they weren’t going to be renewed.

The news of employment contracts not being renewed, to put it mildly, was not well received. Nor were the conditions Dan incorporated into the contracts that were renewed. One such condition contained in the employment contract was a viewership improvement measurement that affected the bonus which was a significant amount of the total compensation these on-air personalities could receive. Dan thought that if his compensation package was based in part on viewership increase, that type of measurement should also apply to these front-line on-air personalities.

While these on-air personalities didn’t like what Dan was doing as to their compensation, most of them did recognize they were fortunate to be receiving their amount of compensation when it was compared to what the average working person received. They also came to the uncomfortable realization that they were replaceable.

Dan doing that sent a message to all the people at the network that he was serious about what he was trying to do. It showed that he wouldn’t put up with people who were fighting or ignoring his efforts and that he was showing them the door. Most of these on-air commentators with contracts coming up for renewal realized that they needed to adjust to Dan’s way of wanting them to say things to attract viewers and most of them did make the adjustment. The husband and wife team surprised Dan when they did an about-face and became equally critical of both political parties which increased the number of their viewers.

An on-air female commentator whose contract wasn’t renewed hired an attorney who immediately filed suit citing in the lawsuit’s complaint several things. Among the allegations in this lawsuit’s complaint was that Dan sexually harassed this commentator. The lawsuit complaint stated that she was asking for twenty million dollars in damages.

To Dan, this was like Yogi Berra saying, “This was Déjà Vu all over again.” It was a similar situation to what Dan was once faced with at Austin, but in that instance, the matter was resolved without a lawsuit being filed. He had no recourse but to file a countersuit asking for a similar amount in damages because of the libelous accusations made in this lawsuit’s complaint. This ex-commentator also made slanderous comments in on-air interviews on a competing cable news network about her being the victim of Dan’s alleged sexual harassment. Hearing her make those comments pissed Dan off.

Needless to say, this lawsuit drew national attention in the coverage it received both on television and in the print media. Dan was constantly being asked to comment on the lawsuit. All he would say was that the accusations were slanderous and he wouldn’t comment any further. Dan’s attorney gave the standard response saying that they would vigorously defend this fraudulent lawsuit in court and Dan would be proven to be innocent.

Theo Harrington the CEO, told Dan the Board was concerned about this lawsuit and suggested that Dan might want to take a leave of absence till this matter was resolved. What wasn’t said but was inferred in this conversation was that Dan’s employment contract contained a morals clause that could lead to Dan no longer being employed by the network.

Dan asked Theo to have faith in him and to support him in this matter.

The interrogatories that the attorneys representing this former commentator filed never asked if Dan had anything to back up his side of the story. If they had asked, he would have said he did. He had video-recorded every conversation he had with people who were in his office. Besides his nanny cam that he brought from Austin, he had in addition purchased a more high-end video recorder that he used to video record these conversations. Dan did tell his attorney that he had these videos but he also said because of this unwanted and unfavorable publicity, he didn’t want it to be known that he had these videos. Dan said when the time was right he would disclose the existence of these videos.

The deposition of this ex-commentator was taken which had her go on the record as what her version was of what Dan said and did. Dan’s attorney asked the plaintiff specific questions about what Dan’s actions were when she was in his office that she answered.

Because of the publicity and the nationwide interest in this lawsuit, it had been announced that Dan was going to be interviewed on his news network by a female interviewer. This interview was going to be a one-hour news special that was being advertised as “Setting the Record Straight.” This female interviewer who was as a strong supporter of women’s rights had a reputation for taking no prisoners in doing an interview.

The ex-commentator’s attorneys delayed taking Dan’s deposition as they wanted this television interview to be done first. They were planning on using it when Dan was under oath giving his deposition to help them catch inconsistencies in Dan’s testimony. There were comments made by legal experts on competing networks that this on-air interview was not a wise thing for Dan to do.

Dan’s attorneys didn’t respond to what these legal experts were saying.

This interview program which was shown in prime time was later estimated to have been seen by eighteen million viewers.

This program started with Shelly Moore the interviewer, explaining the lawsuit that had been filed and she read the lawsuit’s complaint. She then said she would ask the most significant questions that were asked to the plaintiff when the plaintiff gave her deposition. An actress who somewhat resembled the plaintiff would answer these questions exactly as the plaintiff did in giving her deposition.

After that segment was done, Shelly asked Dan about what the plaintiff said Dan did and he denied all of it. He said none of that meeting happened as this ex-commentator said it did.

“It seems to me that what we have here is a he-said-she-said situation. Why should we believe you over her in saying that none of that happened,” asked Shelly.

“Because I have proof that makes this more than a he-said-she-said situation. I have videos of conversations that have taken place when people are in my office. The plaintiff in her deposition said it was the last meeting in my office when I said I wasn’t renewing her contract that I was sexually coming on to her. Would you like to see what happened at that meeting?”

Shelly said she did and the entire sixteen-minute video of that meeting was shown.

At the end of the video, Shelly said, “The video shows the allegations made by the plaintiff were completely false. The video showed you were correct in saying that none of what she alleged you did actually did happen. But tell me, why did you wait so long to disclose that you had these videos?”

“Because of all the publicity her lawsuit generated. I wanted to make sure this video was seen by a national audience so that my name and my reputation would be cleared. I thought this was the best way to do that.”

Congratulations and applause was given to Dan by the people in the studio after the interview program ended. While the plaintiff was a popular on-air personality, off the air her producer said she was not a nice person and wouldn’t be missed. Theo Harrington phoned Dan and congratulated him. Shelly told him that clips were going to be shown on this and the other news networks and thanked him for allowing her to do this interview.