Dan Rather also has a few words for his former employers at CBS: According to CBS News’ editorial standards, moderators Norah O’Donnell, anchor of the “CBS Evening News,” and Margaret Brennan, host of “Face the Nation,” are there to ask questions and enforce the rules. They are not fact-checkers. CBS says it is up to the candidates to fact-check, though “the moderators will facilitate those opportunities” during rebuttal time. While both fact-checking (ABC during the Harris-Trump debate) and not fact-checking (CNN during the Biden-Trump debate) have drawn criticism this year, for the most part, the criticism was unsurprisingly partisan. CBS is not abdicating completely. In a live blog and on social media, CBS News’ misinformation unit will provide real-time fact-checking. So, the audience is expected to watch the debate and simultaneously monitor a blog? Simply put, this “rule,” imposed by CBS, incentivizes lying. It invites the participants to bend the truth, since their opponent then has to spend his rebuttal time calling out the lie, rather than giving an opposing view. And the calling out of a lie by an opponent rather than an impartial moderator is less credible. Angie Drobnic Holan, the director of the International Fact-Checking Network at the Poynter Institute, told the Associated Press, “You’re basically off-loading one of your journalistic responsibilities onto the candidates themselves, so I don’t think that it’s ideal. It takes journalistic courage to be willing to fact-check the candidates, because the candidates are absolutely going to complain about it. I don’t think…