I’ll be surprised if Rather’s farewell gave CBS much of a ratings boost last night. I remember, back in the old days when I was a geeky teen, watching Walter Cronkite’s last newscast, which really felt like the end of an era. By contrast, Rather’s farewell last night was overdue by months, a postponed end to a dreadful scandal. You could tell it was a bitter end. While Tom Brokaw’s sendoff on NBC seemed very warm and heartfelt inside 30 Rock, CBS has signaled anything but warmth in the last week. Even yesterday morning, ABC’s “Good Morning America” had warm words for Dan at 7:15, with taped interviews with Peter Jennings and others. CBS’s “The Early Show” didn’t mention Dan until 8:50, and then co-host Harry Smith overcompensated by calling Rather “the greatest television journalist whoever lived.”

In almost every radio interview we did yesterday, people made jokes about what kind of a party we were going to have to celebrate. We didn’t have one. But while it’s comforting that Rather was held accountable for the TexANG fiasco in some way, no one really believes the liberal-bias problem is immediately ameliorated at CBS by Rather checking out. It’s still going to be a regular Superfund site of toxic conservative-bashing.