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Cronkite: Well, I think CBS was caught in the maw of the competition that increased considerably with the advent of cable. With the diversion of video tape, home entertainment. All of those things put pressure on all of the networks to compete a little more aggressively, perhaps than they had before. [I]n that effort, responsibility went out the window. Part of the problem was that the old-timers who came into the business, understanding the responsibility, because it was hammered into them by Washington. A lot of people who were very concerned about the way station licenses were being allocated and all that kind of thing. They knew that they had a responsibility to the community.
Q: RIGHT, DO YOU RESPOND TO THE WORDS OF THE COMMUNICATIONS ACT THAT RADIO, WHICH MEANS ALSO TELEVISION, SHALL ACT IN THE PUBLIC INTERESTS AND NECESSITY?
Cronkite: Yes. The wordage comes, of course from the Railroad Act, so it's a little bit skewed for that reason, but basically that's true. Certainly radio and television should act in, in public interest and public necessity is a rather crazy word.
Q: SO THAT MEANT AMONG OTHER THINGS, MAINTAINING ENOUGH STAFF IN THIS COUNTRY AND IN PARTS OF THE WORLD TO KNOW WHAT WAS GOING ON?
Cronkite: Dan, of course, that's that bottom line. There's been recent criticism -- James Fallows' book and others--about the practice of journalism today. Well, I don't think that Fallows, as keen as he is a critic of this matter, really got to the bottom line. Because the bottom line is the bottom line. The bottom line...
Q: YOU MEAN THE PROFIT LINE?
Cronkite: ....the broadcast executives are not giving their news departments adequate funding to do the job that they should be doing.
Q: AND DOES IT MATTER ALSO THAT ON TOP OF WHAT HAPPENED IN THE DAYS OF TISCH AND SO ON THAT ANOTHER LAYER OF THINGS HAS BEGUN TO HAPPEN, THAT IS, NETWORKS, ALL OF THEM, NOW, HAVE BEEN ACQUIRED BY LARGER AND LARGER CONGLOMERATES?
Cronkite: Well, this was my point a moment ago that the pioneers inherited this sense of responsibility, inherited partly because it was beaten into them, but also, I think because that was their nature. The Sarnoffs, the Goldensons, the Paleys, particularly of this world, understood that there was a responsibility in running these networks and these stations. This second and third generations have come along and they've come into an entertainment environment entirely without any appreciation at all, I think, about any sense of responsibility.
Q: NOW LET'S TURN TO 60 MINUTES. 60 MINUTES HAS A GREAT STORY THEY'RE WORKING ON--HAS TO DO WITH THE FORMER RESEARCH DIRECTOR OF A BIG TOBACCO COMPANY WHO'S OUT THERE, GIVES AN INTERVIEW AND WANTS TO TELL ALL. AND FOR A WHILE, THAT INTERVIEW IS SUPPRESSED. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT?
Cronkite: I thought that the whole initial episode when 60 Minutes did not put the program on the air under duress from the legal department, was most unfortunate. Most unfortunate. It seems to me that it sent a terrible message out to all broadcasters across the nation. Perhaps around the world. Because here is 60 Minutes, a top ten program. ......most successful program. I mean of everything. It's beaten entertainment programming that CBS has offered. For twenty years almost it's been in the top ten. Constantly. A huge money maker for the company. And the management of 60 Minutes has the power there, quite clearly, to say, I'm sorry, heh, we're doing this because we must do it. This is a journalistic imperative. We have this story and we're going with it. We've got to take whatever the legal chances are on it. Well, they didn't. They, they felt it necessary to buckle under their legal pressures. And that must send a message to every station across the country where they might have any ambitions to do investigative reporting. Hey, look, if 60 Minutes can't stand the pressure, then none of us ought to get into the kitchen at all. I mean, it's just a hopeless case.
Q: YOU'VE BEEN WILLING TO BUCK A LOT OF POWERS THAT BE ALL THE WAY BACK TO THE VIETNAM WAR. YOU'RE STILL REMEMBERED AS THE FIRST REALLY IMPORTANT PERSON WHO REALLY CALLED THE TURN ON THE WAY VIETNAM WAS GOING AFTER THE TET OFFENSIVE. HOW WOULD YOU HAVE REACTED IF YOU WERE RUNNING 60 MINUTES?
Cronkite: Well, the old business of the Indian adage, you walk in another man's moccasins. I think it's not productive to say how I would have acted, because I don't know. I really don't know. Uh, you'd...never can know all of the pressures, all of the personal problems that might be involved and one reaction or another. I know that I would have felt that my public responsibility was to put the darn thing on the air.
Q: YOU'RE WORKING ON A STORY WHICH YOU BELIEVE TO BE IN THE PUBLIC INTERESTS, CONVENIENCE, AND NECESSITY. IN FACT, IT MIGHT EVEN SAVE SOME LIVES SOMEWHERE ALONG THE LINE. AND SOMEBODY COMES TO YOU AND SAYS, THE LAWYERS ARE A LITTLE WORRIED ABOUT THIS ONE. AND YOU WOULD THEN SAY, ARE WE BEING SUED? WELL, NO, NOT YET. BUT THE LAWYERS ARE WORRIED. WHAT WOULD YOU SAY?
Cronkite: Dan, I think that with the kind of income I'd be making in that position today, in present day television, and in other words, my own financial independence had been established and the feeling of deep sense of responsibility, the journalistic responsibility and ethics involved, I would have said either I put it on the air or I will sever our relationship.
Q: I INTERVIEWED MIKE WALLACE AND I ASKED HIM WHETHER HE EVER THOUGHT OF RESIGNING OVER THAT AND HE SAID, WELL, NO, BUT HE WANTED TO STAY AND FIGHT TO GET IT ON THE AIR AND THAT WAS WHY HE STAYED.
Cronkite: Well, that is a good reason to stay. If one felt that it was possible to override the problem and eventually get it on the air, I suppose that would be a very reasonable position.
Q: I WAS JUST WONDERING, DID ANYBODY ASK YOU, CONSULT YOU, ASK YOUR VIEW AS A PERSON WHO'S GIVEN A LARGE PART OF HIS LIFE TO THIS NETWORK, ASK YOUR VIEW OF WHAT WAS GOING ON IN THOSE WEEKS WHEN 60 MINUTES WAS NOT RUNNING THAT INTERVIEW?
Cronkite: No. No. I, I'm not in that position at CBS. I'm not consulted on such imminent matters as that.
Q: BUT YOU STILL HAVE AN INDIVIDUAL VIEW OF YOUR OWN?
Cronkite: Oh, very.....indeed I do. More individual than ever. I'm not beholden to anybody today in any way.
Q: IT'S BEEN INTERESTING TO KNOW THAT YOU'VE NEVER SHIED AWAY FROM CRITICIZING TELEVISION AND WHAT IT DOES, EVEN WHEN YOU WERE ON THE BOARD. I MEAN, NOBODY SILENCES YOU.
Cronkite: Oh, indeed. I got some pressure from the boards and pressure from management when I would be critical at times. I was accused by one of the well, not accused, but I was, the reaction was strong, with one of our presidents under whom I served on the board. When I said that we were being irresponsible in the way we handle the news department. And he took it very personally that I charged him with irresponsibility. And he really came out of his chair at this board meeting and in furious saying in all my career I have never been charged with being irresponsible anywhere. How can you charge me with irresponsibility. I wasn't charging him personally. I was charging the news department and our en, entire approach to news as being irresponsible.
Q: REMEMBER THOSE GREAT DAYS? DO YOU REMEMBER WHEN PRESIDENT OF CBS INC. FRANK STANTON APPEARED BEFORE A CONGRESSIONAL COMMITTEE...
Cronkite: Indeed I do.
Q: ...WHICH WANTED SOME OUTTAKES AND HE SAID WE DON'T GIVE YOU OUTTAKES AND HE STOOD THERE AND THERE WAS THE POSSIBILITY THAT HE MIGHT HAVE BEEN SIGHTED FOR CONTEMPT OF CONGRESS AND HE WAS...
Cronkite: A really strong possibility. When the Congress voted against the charge, the indictment for refusing to testify, it surprised the attorney general of the United States who called up Stanton and said, I thought we'd be talking today under vastly different circumstances. It was almost a sure thing. Stanton was exceedingly brave.
Q: OH YES.
Cronkite: Courageous in taking that position.
Q: AND THAT'S WHAT WE LACK ISN'T IT, TODAY? BRAVERY?
Cronkite: You know the journalistic courage takes a lot of forms. A lot of forms. And one of the important forms it takes is in the corporate environment. And unfortunately, there are few people in that corporate environment, virtually none who I can cite on any network, that have any background or journalistic ethics, journalistic principles, or journalistic responsibility. They don't think in those terms. And unfortunately their news chiefs don't seem to have the clout or the determination whatever, to enforce their sense of responsibility, which I think they have, most of them. They just don't have, as I say, the power apparently to run their own shops.
Q: I BET, THE THING YOU CALL CORPORATE COURAGE, CORPORATE GUTS, I WOULD CALL IT......YOU SEE IT COMING BACK SOON?
Cronkite: Well, no quite frankly. I don't see any hint of it on the horizon. Where would you find it. I don't know where it might be. The hope can always be that with public criticism, public pressure and there's been a lot of that lately. This program itself will have some impact in that regard. And the cumulative impact of such things might eventually awaken somebody up there in the high regions of corporate operations that take action. And perhaps if one does, the others will fall in line. It just might be --the dream is that there will be this great awakening on one network, I'd like to think it was CBS and the public would flock back to CBS news broadcasts and say, that is where leadership is, that's what I want to follow. That's where I want to be when I'm watching the news. I trust that news broadcast beyond any on the air. When that happens, the others are going to begin to fall in line. And the people are capable in those news departments of doing it. They're good, they're alright.
Q: AND THEY'RE CAPABLE AT 60 MINUTES TOO.
Cronkite: Absolutely. That's a marvelous cast of characters over there. They are superb journalists. And I think they've done a superb job and they have stood up and each of those producers and each of those people on the air have stood up at one time or another and taken the licks from on high in the organization. They should still be held in high regard for that. There was this one rather serious aberration in my mind, and it's unfortunate.
Q: WELL, OLD COLLEAGUE, WE'LL TRY TO BRING BACK THE DAYS YOU TALK ABOUT, IF NOT AT CBS, SOMEWHERE ELSE. THANKS A LOT.
Cronkite: Thank you, Dan.
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