PR Straight Talk

Walter Cronkite passed away last week.  I’ll admit it.  I hate to use the word “died.”  He was so much a part of our culture.  So much an anchor for us as this nation moved through tumultuous times:  World War II, Korea, the Cold War, Civil Rights, the Moon landing, the assassinations of JFK, Martin Luther King Jr., and Bobby Kennedy, the elections of American presidents, the Vietnam War…and so much more.  He had an avuncular style, he was centered as the anchorman of the CBS Evening News, he exhuded confidence and concern.  I would say even more, he conveyed the sense that he cared.  He cared about our country, the principles and values upon which it stood, its journey through time and its history.  His patriotism was genuine but not in any way jingoistic.  One had the sense with Walter that he viewed the American experience as an ongoing narrative with meaning, with some kind of unfolding purpose that had no end point - and that he viewed our nation as a positive force in the world.  Having said that, one could sense his disappointment and even pain when things did not go well.  Vietnam, which he eventually saw as a failure (and which brought Lyndon Johnson to say, “If I’ve lost Walter, I’ve lost middle America”).  The assassinations of JFK, Martin Luther King and Bobby, and more.  And he exulted with joy and ebullience when we landed a man on the Moon.

Walter Cronkite brought a sense of comfort and stability to the American psyche.  Whatever the news of the day, with its ups and downs, Walter conveyed reassurance that the Republic was moving forward.  He conveyed a sense of hope in the future because he embodied the American story and the American dream.  He was a kind of glue that held things together - that held us together.

In my view, he was the greatest news anchor in American television news history.  He carried a Spirit that was contained in his very energy. There was no one like him.  And though he may have politically leaned on the liberal side in his personal views - I think he was probably a moderate - he really never showed it on-the-air.  And yet, more than 20 years after his retirement, he is known to have expressed the view that we were missing something in the war on terrorism.   He in no way condoned the ferocity and cruelty of Islamic extremism - for he was a witness to many ferocious ideologies - from Nazism in Germany to the Kmer Rouge in Cambodia - but he was deeply concerned that as an affluent country we were not sensitive enough to the plight of the poor in the developing world.  I saw and heard him say that if he was a parent ensnared in the trap of deeply entrenched poverty in one of those countries, seeing his children hungry and feeling frustrated and anguished about being unable to help them, that he would feel resentment towards those in the West whose prosperity was so self-evident on the television shows and movies that came from America.  He talked about the poor being fodder for the terrorists’ agendas. 

What fascinated me about this is that it confirmed for me that Walter had empathy for people, even with the objectivity he presented as a news anchor and reporter.  He cared.  He cared about America and the American people - but his caring reached out to people and peoples everywhere.   He had seen the Earthrise from the videos that came back from the Appollo missions.  We were one planet - and our species, the human species, was one species.  Walter’s vision was global, and that global vision was not inconsistent with his love for his country as real and deep.  As a great observer of events, he saw connections - he saw the relationships between those events. 

The greatness about Walter Cronkite was that as a professional he was objective.  As a human being, he cared.  He gave a damn.

Walter had a commentator on the CBS Evening News - Eric Sevareid.  Eric was a giant too, for like Walter his view was wide and deep.  He saw the little things, but like Walter, he also saw the larger picture.

There is no one on television today of the stature of Walter Cronkite and Eric Sevareid.  The void is real, and hopefully it will not take too many years for that void to be filled.