Carole Simpson questions network decision to hire Diane Sawyer

Former ABC News anchor Carole Simpson is not all that impressed by ABC's decision to hire Diane Sawyer to anchor the network's evening news broadcast.

Simpson, the first black woman to anchor an evening news program, sees ulterior motives in the belated decision of two of the major networks -- CBS and ABC -- to hire women anchors. The CBS Evening News is anchored by Katie Couric.

In a CNN.com commentary posted Tuesday called "Why I'm not delighted by Sawyer move," Simpson argues that the network producers waited "so darned long" to hire women anchors and have only done so now that the TV news programs are dying off and being replaced by new media such as the Internet.

Simpson, who started her network career in 1974, recounted the "ill-fated experiment" when ABC first chose Barbara Walters to co-anchor the evening news with Harry Reasoner in 1976. "It turned out to be a match made in hell," she writes. "Harry was so upset about sharing airtime with a woman that he refused to speak to Barbara, except on the news set." Two years later, Reasoner left "in disgust" and Walters was removed, she wrote.

Simpson also cites CBS's failed effort to pair Connie Chung with Dan Rather on its evening news broadcast in the 1990s. But even with Couric and Sawyer in place as sole anchors, Simpson is suspicious:

"It took almost 40 years for this unique state of affairs. Why are women getting these opportunities now?" she asks. "The reason is that broadcast television news is dying." Simpson goes on to say: "I don't believe the evening network newscasts, nor Katie and Diane as the anchors, will be around for very long."