Cronkite's public verdict that the 1968 Tet offensive was a "defeat" for the U.S. is widely seen as a turning point in American support for the war. He spent much of his early life in Kansas City. He did a very good job. I'd sure like to think so. Thankfully, Tennessee Sen. Howard Baker helped insert a clause in the revision of the copyright law that protected the right of libraries to record the news. What a stunning contrast to the corrosive distrust of the news business today. This is the same Cronkite who, when a new videotape from Osama bin Laden surfaced a few days before the 2004 presidential election, saw it as some nefarious plot hatched in the bowels of the Bush White House. When Bennett resigned in 1986, a national search was conducted for a new director of the school. Except for . In 1988, seven years after his retirement as anchorman of the CBS Evening News, Cronkite addressed a left-wing People for the American Way conference and denounced President Reagan for the unilateral military actions in Grenada, when the U.S. military evicted a communist gang, and Libya, when Reagan ordered a military strike in retaliation for the acts of terrorism against Americans. Although Goldwater had merely accepted an invitation to visit a U.S. Army facility there, correspondent Daniel Schorr said he was launching his campaign in "the center of Germany's right wing." Well, apparently so, he responded. He was always clearly on the liberal-left side of the political spectrum. Inscription Bearing Name of King Achashveroshs Father Discovered in Tel Lachish. Walter Cronkite Interview Walter Cronkite spoke with independent producer George Colburn about President Dwight Eisenhower 's military and political career. At each stop, he asked to see a broadcast from the previous month. He signed up with CBS News in 1962 and retired in 1981. Cronkite, "the most trusted man in America" served as anchorman and managing editor of the CBS Evening News from 1962 to 1981. Omissions? For example, although Byers initially seems well adjusted and well traveled, it turns out she's never ridden on an airplane before, primarily because she's scared to death of flying. This was duplicitous, a major breach of trust. In 1981 U.S. Pres. Together with a handful of friends, they roamed from the South Pacific to Haiti, with Cronkite snorkeling, swimming, and drinking, thanks to a friend at the airline. When he returned to Nashville, Simpson found an ally in Vanderbilt librarian Frank Grisham. And se certainly has shown that she has a literate approach to solving problems. Jenkins starts pointing out the flaws of various Kennedy family members and the conversation starts unraveling faster than a cable TV talk show. In the episode on Tet, he addressed the criticism that reporters got the story wrong . By Kenneth T. Walsh | Feb. 27, 2018, at 7:34 a.m. Cronkite's Moment American broadcast journalist. He hosted numerous documentaries for the Public Broadcasting Service and for various cable television networks; among these programs was Cronkite Remembers (1997), a miniseries chronicling the historic occasions on which he had reported. There were more serious infractions as well. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. One of Cronkites appearances, where he accepted a Global Governance award, is available on video, at an event which featured the wife of then-U.N. boss Kofi Annan and a video from then-First Lady Hillary Clinton. Cookie Settings, and Ronald Reagan officially announced his candidacy for the presidential nomination, famous 1969 speech attacking television news as biased, a clause in the revision of the copyright law, it was used by the mother of an American soldier, Dried Lake Reveals New Statue on Easter Island. Cronkite falsely claimed that the Vietcong. Walter Cronkite passed away, at age 92, on July 17, 2009. The late 20th century was a tumultuous time, crowded with many world-shaking events. Operating as they did with government licenses, they saw Agnews speech as intimidation. "". In the 1974 book, TV and National Defense, Dr. Ernest Lefever examined how CBS News programs for two years had covered national security issues and concluded that the news organization was an active advocate of several national defense positions which were frequently critical of U.S. policy, and usually from a perspective that implied or called for a lesser military commitment and lower defense expenditures.. This may sound harsh, but the fact is that Cronkite was consistently wrong about Soviet intentions, and his attitude dominated CBS News coverage of the old Soviet Union. It is generally agreed that American media coverage of the Vietnam War had a major impact on public attitudes toward the conflict. After the Soviet collapse, Irvine wrote a 1990 AIM Report about those personalities who had taken a benign or even adulatory view of communism and the Soviet Union in the years since the 1917 Bolshevik coup detat. Cronkite was on this list of doves, which also included Hanoi Jane Fonda. The terrible truth is that Walter Cronkite symbolized liberal media bias and used that bias with disastrous consequences for our nation and the world. Soon after Cronkite took over from his predecessor Douglas Edwards, the then 15-minute broadcast was expanded to 30 minutes, making it the first half-hour nightly news show on American network television. For starters, he had no problem accepting freebies. Lyndon B. Johnson told his staff, If Ive lost Cronkite, Ive lost Middle America, and some held that Johnsons decision not to run for reelection that year was a direct result of Cronkites reporting. Wake up to the day's most important news. He could almost dictate anything he wanted. I got to know Cronkite after his anchoring days as a charming, hard-of-hearing, slightly stodgy spokesman for old-fashioned news values against the encroachment of tabloid entertainment. Walter Cronkite (Born, St. Joseph, Missouri, November 4, 1916 - New York, July 17, 2009) was the chief correspondent and an anchorman for, and managing editor of, the CBS Evening News, 1962-1981. Had Cronkite pulled such stunts today, I would probably be among those calling for him to step down. Once there was a newsman named Walter Cronkite. But after covering Nixon's historic visit to China, he let loose with a night of partying in San Francisco. He complained bitterly, demanding that the section about him be removed. Thats the way it was, apparently, inside the mind of one of the most undeservedly over-hyped men of his generation. You are also agreeing to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy. It was Cronkites good fortune that his heyday came and went in the era prior to the arrival of cable news, talk radio and the Internet. During World War II, he served as a news reporter. But he was far more liberal than the public. Byers invites Jenkins to sit at her table in the crowded bar, more out of politeness than any real desire to get to know the stranger who just can't seem to keep her mouth shut. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. [8][9] [Dead link] However, Cronkite denied that he was asked. Cronkites journalism cost lives and could have cost many more, had it not been for a President named Reagan who had the courage to bypass the major media and go directly to the American people with the truth about our crumbling defenses when America was increasingly vulnerable. He died on July 17, 2009, at the age of 92. [14], http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/United_Nations/Chronkite_UN.html, FBI Files: CBS's Walter Cronkite Aided Vietnam Protestors in 1960s, https://vault.fbi.gov/walter-leland-cronkite/Walter%20Leland%20Cronkite%20Part%201%20of%201/view, https://web.archive.org/web/20100518130059/http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_ts2067, Walter Cronkite: Quintessential Liberal-Progressive, McGovern's First Crisis: The Eagleton Affair, Tilting at the Right, Leaning to the Left, Famed CBS News Anchorman Walter Cronkite Dies at 92, https://conservapedia.com/index.php?title=Walter_Cronkite&oldid=1770906, Presidential Medal of Freedom award winners, He was the first journalist that told the nation in 1963 that. On the day of John F. Kennedy's assassination, Cronkite nodded his head in thinly veiled contempt when handed a note on air that the Arizona senator had said "no comment." Antiwar Movement Grows. They all told him that they werent available they only saved their broadcasts for about two weeks because it was too expensive to preserve them. In the beginning, Mr Cronkite was an old-school, traditional, impartial journalist who seldom if ever gave an opinion about anything. They may not accept gifts, tickets, discounts, reimbursements or other benefits from individuals or organizations covered (or likely to be covered) by their newsroom. "Nobody wanted to go after Walter Cronkite," Brinkley says. He did not let his political views get in the way of his reporting. And I have a feeling that it could tilt the election a bit. It was very cozy; all that was missing were hard-hitting questions. In 1979, he gave an interview to the Soviet magazine, Literary Gazette, and told Vitaly Kobysh that the Soviet threat was most likelya myth. According to the magazine, Cronkite went on to say that I will never believe in a Soviet threat.'. This is a mostly justifiable assessment. We survived the Civil War and the strife that tore this nation apart. It was 40 years ago on March 6 that news anchor Walter Cronkite signed off "The CBS Evening News" for the final time, stating his tag line, "That's the way it is.". Suite 900 These weren't occasional drinks, but flights to remote and luxurious vacation spots around he world for him and his friends and family, courtesy of now-defunct airline Pan Am. "He did a very good job. Could a conversation like the one Byers and Jenkins take place in our highly polarized world? Cronkite even floated a trial balloon that year that he might run as independent candidate John Anderson's running mate. People could just go to Vanderbilt for it. Jason Maoz served as Senior Editor of The Jewish Press from 2001-2018. Grisham didnt share Simpsons politics but did believe that the broadcasts should be preserved. Soon afterward, writes Kurtz, Cronkite got an exclusive interview in which Kennedy left the door open for a possible run the very candidacy that the anchor had urged him to undertake. In the heated atmosphere of 1968, it was enough to fuel suspicions of media bias. Your Privacy Rights However, Irvine noted that Reagan was not deterred by the CBS News assault, but that the momentum behind his election mandate to rebuild Americas defense was weakened somewhat by the constant repetition by the media that he was spending too much on national security. Such was the modest beginning of what Rutgers University historian David Greenberg has called the preeminent video resource for scholars of TV news.. A former reporter for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, he joined the CBS Washington bureau in 1961, where he covered Congress and national politics and often subbed for Walter Cronkite until 1981.That year, CBS picked Dan Rather over Mudd as Cronkite's successor, a decision Mudd says left him in "a quiet fury." Mr. Cronkite had been with the wire service for 11 years. 75. American neurosurgeon and medical correspondent. The networks also worried that if Vanderbilt continued recording their broadcasts, they would lose the ability to repackage and resell their footage. E-mail: info@aim.org, 2022 by Accuracy in Media. On a business trip to New York in March 1968, Simpson toured each of the three networks. All Rights Reserved. For example, The New York Times' company policy states: Staff members and those on assignment for us may not accept anything that could be construed as a payment for favorable coverage or for avoiding unfavorable coverage. It helps that the women don't jump into a political conversation right at the beginning. [11] With two exceptions, Cronkite was not a political campaign contributor according to Federal Election Commission records. CNNs Chris Cuomo took issue with that characterization. He distinguished himself with his coverage of the 1952 and 1956 political conventions and as narrator of the documentary series The 20th Century. Karl Rove, anxiously pondering the latest tracking polls, puts in a call to bin Laden, hiding in a cave somewhere in scenic Afghanistan, and asks him to give Bush a boost by releasing a video. In 1935 he left college to take a full-time position with the paper. In the early 1970s, the most trusted man in America did a very untrustworthy thing. Cronkite continued in his position at CBS through the 1970s, reporting on the decades most memorable events, including the Watergate scandal, the resignation of U.S. Pres. Walter Cronkite had come a long way from the little-known World War II and Moscow correspondent whom the old United Press had tried to promote to its London bureau at the magnificent salary of $127.50 a week -- plus a cut in its overseas cost-of-living allowance. Cookie Policy He had an unflappable calmness and an uncanny ability to extemporize verbally, which made him ideal for hosting the political news show Man of the Week (195253) and for covering unpredictable events, as he did when reporting on the presidential conventions of 1952, 1956, and 1960. Although Jenkins isn't a drinker, Byers persuades her to have a glass of wine. Part of HuffPost News. Yet, his misreporting helped create the conditions for a premature U.S. military withdrawal, leading to the loss of the lives of 58,000 Americans in vain, not to mention the millions of additional deaths caused in Vietnam and Cambodia by the Communists. Simpson was shocked. Other reports from that day sound hauntingly familiar: an Israeli strike into Jordan and a violent incident at the Korean Demilitarized Zone, in which an American and North Korean soldier were killed. July 17, 2009 -- Walter Leland Cronkite, a legendary reporter and anchorman who was once voted the "most trusted man in America," died today at age 92. She explains how she and her son toured the country after the son enlisted in the military so together they would see what he would be fighting to protect. We can agree on that," Ben Carson said of longtime CBS anchor Walter Cronkite. The offensive was an attempt . Moonves was able to sleep that night, he recalled, because "Walter said it was OK.". I can give you multiple examples. To do anything else would be phony. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to guess where that leads. His health was certainly exacerbated by this terrible, terrible blow.". 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