Reporting live

the long version

When she first started out in network television, Lesley Stahl was 30 years old and the men she shared the newsroom with were already legendary. In the ensuing 25 years and counting, Stahl has covered every major story and has become one of the most highly regarded reporters in the country. In this celebrity-filled, anecdote-packed memoir, Lesley Stahl tells how she has kept her focus - and her sense of humor - through all of this success. While Stahl cut her teeth on Washington political reporting, cultivating sources and gradually building a reputation as a "scoopster," she learned to overcome the stigma of affirmative action. She went on to cover the next three presidents, witnessing the disintegration of the Jimmy Carter presidency, the rise and fall and rise again of Ronald Reagan's, and the unfocused regular-guyness of George Bush's. She offers sharp and nuanced portraits of these presidents and their wives as well as of many of her guests on Face the Nation, which she moderated for eight years. Stahl also describes the ups and downs of network television news as competition from cable began to siphon off the audience.