Mad as Hell

A gripping behind-the-scenes account of one of the most influential news programs in American history, featuring a foreword by veteran 60 Minutes correspondent Scott Pelley, whose recent dismissal from CBS News has renewed national attention on the fight for journalistic integrity and preserving an independent media. For almost sixty years, every Sunday night at seven o‘clock sharp, a simple ticking stopwatch made America stop what it was doing. At its peak, 60 Minutes was the most powerful hour on television, drawing as many as fifty million viewers each week. Presidents watched. CEOs braced themselves. Ordinary citizens--wronged, ignored, or silenced--found a voice. Today, amid upheaval at CBS News and renewed debate over press freedom, that voice faces an urgent test of its journalistic integrity. In Mad as Hell, a producer from the program‘s golden years takes listeners deep inside the broadcast that reshaped television journalism. Working alongside Mike Wallace, Dan Rather, Morley Safer, Ed Bradley, Diane Sawyer, Scott Pelley, and executive producer Don Hewitt for over twenty years, Harry Moses reveals how a scrappy news experiment became a national institution--and how investigative journalism at its best could hold the powerful to account. Timely and deeply informed, Mad as Hell is a reminder of why fearless journalism still matters, and what is at stake when the institutions built to defend the truth come under threat.