In 1964, my brother Carl received a black and white potable tv as a Bar Mitzvah gift. One year
later, it was appropriated for use in our kitchen to watch the CBS Evening News with Walter
Cronkite. My dad built a shelf for it. It was five feet off the floor and seven feet on a diagonal
line from where he sat.

For ten years, that little tv brought Walter’s news broadcasts and Eric Sevareid commentaries
to our dinner space everyday at 6:00 p.m. God help any of us who dared to talk when the news
was on. I can still hear my dad bark out at the offender, “I can listen to you any time.”

Without leaving the dinner table, we went on campaign trails, traveled with U.S. troops into
Haiphong harbor, the Mekong Delta, and rice paddies of Vietnam; met with foreign leaders
from around the world; tracked the harrowing return to earth of Apollo 13; watched the
analysis of the first fight between Mohamad Ali and Smokin’ Joe Frazier; and witnessed many
more historical events. Most of these stories were delivered to us by the most trusted
newscaster of his time, Walter Cronkite.

The CBS Evening News was the go-to medium our family had for news in the making. There
were three major networks, CBS, NBC and ABC, and they dominated the airwaves. Our parents
watched the news for the facts. Interpretation of these facts were left in the hands of men like
Eric Sevareid of CBS, Howard K. Smith on ABC, and Chet Huntley (Huntley-Brinkley) on NBC. If
they wanted more details, mom and dad would read our daily newspaper or weekly Time
Magazine. That was it, the whole world wrapped up in a select number of media outlets. It’s
what my generation grew up with, and we believed in almost everything they reported.

Today’s news is one-part fact, one-part sensationalism and ten parts partisan commentary.
There’s so little meat on the bone that you’re forced to pick your partisan poison. So-called,
“News” programs have become soap operas, best aligned with Shakespeare’s Macbeth, as he
cries out in anguish “A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing .
Walter Cronkite would never deliver a story with biting sarcasm or cynicism. His rawest
emotion was shedding a tear on screen upon hearing of the death of John F. Kennedy.
Likewise, his colleagues, on rival networks, maintained decorum. It was beneath them to opine
on a topic. News was to be delivered based on vetted facts. I know this because my dad would
occasionally drift over to NBC or ABC to watch as a means of changing pace.

Our world is now jammed with so many “News” sources (vetted and unvetted), one could
spend an entire day flipping from tv and radio to social media, podcasts and all stops in
between. I have to admit that I have become a junky going from tv station to station and
reading newsfeeds on my phone. I find myself sifting through information and trying to make

sense of what I am seeing, hearing or reading. My wife and kids hate it. And, they’re very vocal
about it. Usually when I get into my car after one of them has borrowed it, there’s a rock
station blasting when I press the start button; unless my son borrowed it last. Then, NPR might
be playing.

Cronkite used to end his broadcasts saying, “And, that’s the way it is.” My generation has to
face the fact that, “This is the way it is, NOW!” Cronkite, Sevareid, Smith, Reasoner, Huntley