Video: That time Dan Rather did heroin

Well, I’ll give him this. It’s more interesting by a damn sight than the thought leaders’ boring parade of pot stories the other day.

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.

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Hey, Dan Rather’s allowed to do heroin. David Gregory’s allowed to have a high-capacity magazine in Washington, D.C. It’s all fun and games as long as you’re simply reporting on the menaces you think society should ban.

Also, can we reflect on the delicious indignity of Rather playing a parlor game— I call it that because I imagine that’s what Dan would call it— with Andy Cohen on Bravo? This is the man who almost brought down George W. Bush with his mythic, magical 1970s typewriter that created documents like 21st-century Microsoft Word! Are we sure it just the one time, Dan? Eh, who needs heroin when you’re chasing the Fake But Accurate dragon?

Rather declares Nixon the president who hated him most, but it’s gotta be a tough competition.

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