Part of this trend is due to actors and broadcasters being encouraged to "lose" their accents and practice "clear" diction and enunciation

Dan Rather is one of those broadcasters, but you can still tell that the midwestern TV accent is not his natural accent. He makes up for a loss of accent flavor with his weird Texas metaphors.

Barbara Walters is another story, though. How in the world did she get into broadcasting with that unintelligible voice?