Katie Couric rips Matt Lauer in her awkward return to Today to promote her memoir

Savannah Guthrie grilled Couric about her new book Going There, particularly about its “snark” and “brutally honest” put-downs during this morning's interview. Couric insisted the attacks have “been wildly misrepresented," except for those against Lauer, who’d been her TV partner there for nine years. “What I realized is there was the side of Matt I never really knew. And I tried to understand why he behaved the way he did — and why he was so reckless and callous and honestly abusive to other women,” she said. Now the two “have no relationship,” she said. Guthrie also grilled Couric about editing her Ruth Bader Ginsburg interview. “How did you justify that?” Guthrie asked Couric. “It violates a cardinal rule of journalism.” “I think what people don’t realize is we make editorial decisions like that all the time,” Couric responded. “And I chose to talk about this and put it in the book for a discussion.” Guthrie, though, was unmoved by Couric's response. “That’s not an occasion that you’re using that objectivity that is so important as journalists,” Guthrie said. “And the question is whether that undermines journalism at a time when reporters are under attack for bias like that. … Do you think it was wrong, now that you look at it in the light of day?” Couric added: “Yeah, ultimately, I think I should have included it. But I think it’s really important to look at what I did include. She had to make a statement afterwards saying her comments were harsh and dismissive. I still believe I used the most critically important response. But I think you’re right, it might have illuminated it even more if I had included that other statement.”