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Cronkite Coverage That Might Make Cronkite Cringe

by Dan Abrams | 12:32 pm, July 18th, 2009

» 4 comments

dan_abrams_x200 It’s hard to believe that Walter Cronkite has not been a staple on the air for over 28 years. Through all that time, he has achieved something few in this age of information overload could do when removed from the spotlight for so long. He remained the standard bearer, the person so many journalists wished they could be. His name is not just synonymous with industry greatness, but with an industry that no longer exists. And so many believe his passing represents more than the end of a television news icon, but the end of iconic news television.

For anyone in the news business, just the name “Cronkite” conjures up images of a bygone era when journalists covered, and could at times impact, the most important stories of the day, rather than the most “compelling” or salacious. Redford and Hoffman’s “All The Presidents Men” was the big screen image of journalists rather than Will Ferrell’s “Anchorman.”

Even if that memory has been glorified a bit, it’s for that reason that every major journalist is now vying to be part of the Cronkite coverage (including, I suppose, this one). No question so many grew up watching Cronkite’s masterful work over the years — from war zones to the White House. And those who knew him well have offered moving tributes to Cronkite the man. But showing one’s respect for Walter Cronkite also means paying homage to what the Cronkite name has come to represent –a time when it would have been unthinkable to cover Michael Jackson’s death day after day. When the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would still be front and center rather than the vicissitudes of the hottest reality show. As some in media speak wistfully about the Cronkite days, they are also making decisions that would make Cronkite cringe. To watch a rerun of a Cronkite news program today is to see something more akin to a current PBS broadcast than much of what appears on network news.

Actions speak louder than words. Even in reporting on his death many journalists have violated one of Cronkite’s basic tenets: report the news don’t become it. How many times this weekend have we heard top journalists memorializing Cronkite with sentences beginning with the word I. “I met Cronkite in. . .” or “I remember seeing him. . .”

Let’s be honest, the Cronkite era passed long before his death. Financial pressures, the demand of ratings, the changing tastes of the American public all led to new decisions in newsrooms about what to cover and how. Having reported on many of the most notorious trials of the past two decades (including that of Michael Jackson) I have no claim to Cronkiteian journalistic purity.

The same applies, however, to some of my colleagues now attempting to tether themselves to Cronkite’s legacy. I am confident Cronkite would have frowned on that too.

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cornycob

I don’t recall your MSNBC show being the paragon of news, Dan. Or MSNBC while you were in charge of it.
apparently

Cronkite was a very good journalist, but I was somewhat surprised at the wall to wall coverage starting on Friday night. In defense of the tethering, as you call it, it may have been a result of network/cable pressure to jump on the, now usual, death of a celebrity bandwagon. Prior to the death of Princess Diana, three day death coverage was limited to heads of state (selected ones at that) and Popes. Maybe some of the journalists you are criticizing are simply wistful for a day when on air stories were more varied and newsworthy rather than celebrity obits and freeway speed chases. Cronkite represents the days of ‘hard news’ not 24 hour filler stories.

Yes, rating demands and public taste has changed but largely due to the type news shows we’re provided. Hopefully, Cronkite cringed as much as I do at Keith Olberman, Chris Matthews, Anderson Cooper, et al.
James

Well, Dan, Walter Cronkite was a giant of your profession. It is more true than you know that his era has long passed. Television news today is steeped in mediocrity.

To blame that mediocrity on “financial pressures, the demand of ratings, the changing tastes of the American public” is to absolve yourself and your colleagues of any responsibility. I think that is dishonest. What do those three elements have to do with the lack of standards in reporting? Financial pressures prevent you from asking the tough questions, from following up on assertions made? How? The demand of ratings prevent you and your colleagues from reporting on momentous, important stories that the (prior) administration wanted suppressed? How does that work? How does the “changing tastes” of the public figure in to this? I think that’s bull. People want excellent news reporting. You are lying to yourself if you think otherwise.

The truth is that it is YOU and your fellow broadcast “journalists” that have put the scare quotes around that term. Your colleagues have become too cozy and too comfortable with the people they are supposed to cover. You have forgotten, or never knew, that you are supposed to be reporting TO your audience, not transmitting spin FOR the people you cover. There’s where you and Walter Cronkite differ.