RIP Walter Cronkite

Veteran news man, Walter Cronkite has died at the age of 92. Cronkite was well known for his trustworthy news reporting in the '60's and '70's and was the voice of so many of the seminal happenings of that era. He told us when President Kennedy died of gunshot wounds in 1963. He took us to the moon in 1969. And he was the one who brought the Vietnam war into our homes each and every night.

He was also the first news anchor to visibly insert his own opinion into the news. For better or for worse, he stepped over the line of neutrality regarding the Vietnam War in 1968. After visiting Vietnam himself, Cronkite opined, "To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past." Then President Lyndon Johnson, after years of trying to convince the American people, and, perhaps, himself, that the war was worth fighting and that it was going well, lamented, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America."

Never again, in my opinion, was a news anchor to reach that level of trust of the American people. After news became de facto editorializing, opinions of news anchors lost their impact and became merely subconscious manipulation of public opinion.

Here is footage of Walter Cronkite signing off the air the day of JFK's funeral. This gavel to gavel coverage of a news item was quite new at that time, and such complete, round the clock coverage was reserved for such things as the assassination of a president. Cronkite's prophetic questions about the effect of this senseless act of violence seemed to accurately predict the tumultuous time that was to follow during the next decade.

Also, notice his language level. No one in broadcasting approaches this level of linguistic complexity today.

Were these dark days the harbinger of blacker ones to come or like the black before the dawn shall they lead to some still as yet undiscernible sunrise of understanding among men that violent words, no matter their origin or motivation can lead only to violent deeds. ~Walter Cronkite

Walter Cronkite sensed that the assassination of President Kennedy marked a turning point in our nation's history. We could either become jaded and violent, or renounce violence altogether.  Sadly, Cronkite's subsequent career saw the United States split apart over the war, over politics, over generational and racial strife that has never really gone away.

My husband remembers  the affect of Cronkite's erudite reporting. "You had something to really think about in the news. It was worth listening to."

Walter Cronkite was the first person to be called a news"anchor".  Indeed, his name became the word for news anchor in Sweden and Holland.  They are called "cronkiters".