Walter Cronkite

“Give news a little more time, and don't request that they also, in their news time, entertain. We're not entertainers. We're journalists. And we need more time to do our job well.”

“It seems to many of us that if we are to avoid the eventual catastrophic world conflict, we must strengthen the United Nations as a first step toward a world government patterned after our own government with a legislature, executive and judiciary, and police to enforce its international laws and keep the peace.”

“We the people have the strength to bring our country from our weak-kneed stumbling gait in the last ranks of reason to the leadership of the great march to environmental victory.”

“I hope that, somewhere, Mom and Dad are proud that little Walter is performing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.”

“I think that our comfort is in our history.”

“I felt that I had been driven from the temple where for nineteen years, along with other believers, I had worshiped the great god News on a daily basis.”

“You think you would react one way when a situation develops and, and when the sharp shells are flying, you don't quite stand up like you think you might.”

“I never ceased to be surprised when southern whites, at their homes or clubs, told racial jokes and spoke so derogatorily of blacks while longtime servants, for whom they quite clearly had some affection, were well within earshot.”

“I do not consider a liberal necessarily to be a leftist.”

“Sometimes a famous subject may even outlive his own obituary writer.”

“If every small nation with a border dispute believes they can go ahead and launch a pre-emptive war and that it will be approved by the greatest power, that is a very dangerous thing.”

“I've gone from the most trusted man in America to one of the most debated.”

“I want to say that probably 24 hours after I told CBS that I was stepping down at my 65th birthday, I was already regretting it. And I regretted it every day since.”

“Anybody who's spent thirteen or fourteen years in print journalism has a lot of stories he thinks were inwardly satisfying as far as preparation, understanding, and diligence.”

“And that's the way it is.”

“When I stepped down from the evening news at the age of 65, in '81, things were still going well. Immediately after that, the whole tenor of the CBS News Department changed.”

“It's always hard, after you've been in command, to take a lesser role.”

“I can't imagine a person becoming a success who doesn't give this game of life everything he's got.”

“I think cameras ought to be everywhere the reporters are allowed to go. I think, furthermore, reporters and cameras ought to be everywhere that the Constitution says the public can go.”

“We all have our likes and our dislikes. But... when we're doing news - when we're doing the front-page news, not the back page, not the op-ed pages, but when we're doing the daily news, covering politics - it is our duty to be sure that we do not permit our prejudices to show. That is simply basic journalism.”