Walter Cronkite

“History must share with reading, writing and arithmetic first rank as the most important subjects in the curriculum. Understanding the issues on which citizens of a republic are expected to vote is impossible without an understanding of the past.”

“The democratic system is challenged by the failure in television because our evening news programmes have gone for an attempt to entertain as much as to inform in the desperate fight for ratings.”

“America's health care system is neither healthy, caring, nor a system.”

“History must share with reading, writing and arithmetic first rank as the most important subjects in the curriculum. Understanding the issues on which citizens of a republic are expected to vote is impossible without an understanding of the past.”

“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.”

“There is no such thing as a little freedom. Either you are all free, or you are not free.”

“And that's the way it is. ...[reads date]. This is Walter Cronkite, CBS News; good night.”

“I regret that, in our attempt to establish some standards, we didn't make them stick. We couldn't find a way to pass them on to another generation, really.”

“Here is a bulletin from CBS News: in Dallas, Texas, three shots were fired at President Kennedy's motorcade in downtown Dallas. The first reports say that President Kennedy has been seriously wounded by this shooting.”

“More details just arrived. These details about the same as previously: President Kennedy shot today just as his motorcade left downtown Dallas; Mrs. Kennedy jumped up and grabbed Mr. Kennedy, she called 'Oh, no!'; the motorcade sped on. United Press says that the wounds for President Kennedy perhaps could be fatal.”

“The first priority of humankind in this era is to establish an effective system of world law that will assure peace with justice among the peoples of the world.”

“We cannot defer this responsibility to posterity. Time will not wait. Democracy, civilization itself, is at stake. Within the next few years we must change the basic structure of our global community from the present anarchic system of war and ever more destructive weaponry to a new system governed by a democratic UN federation.”

“What Alexander Hamilton wrote about the need for law among the 13 states applies today to the approximately 200 sovereignties in our global village: "To look for a continuation of harmony between a number of independent, unconnected sovereignties in the same neighborhood, would be to disregard the uniform course of human events, and to set at defiance the accumulated experience of ages."”

“All the European democracies have far higher election turnouts than ours, and all of them provide their candidates with extensive free airtime. In fact, of all the major nations worldwide that profess to have democracies, only seven — just seven — do not offer free time. These are Ecuador, Honduras, Malaysia, Taiwan, Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States of America. Does it make us proud to be on such a list?”

“In our country, third-party candidates throughout the years have said there is not a dime's worth of difference between the candidates from the major parties. Well, that is clearly a campaign canard. But it may appear to be true if the public's knowledge of the important differences between candidates is limited to what the public sees and hears on television. Putting it as strongly as I can, the failure to give free airtime for our political campaigns endangers our democracy.”

“This is the essential importance of the Alliance for Better Campaigns' efforts backed by Common Cause. It is our campaign to give free time to all legitimate candidates. … What our campaign asks is that the television industry yield just a tiny percentage of that windfall, less than 1 percent, to fund free airtime.”

“Objective journalism and an opinion column are about as similar as the Bible and Playboy magazine.”

“There is no such thing as a little freedom.Either you are all free,or you are not free.”

“I think it is absolutely essential in a democracy to have competition in the media,a lot of competition,and we seem to be moving away from that.”

“In seeking the truth you have to get both sides of the story.”

“Americas health care system is neither healthy,caring,nor a system.”

“I covered the Vietnam War.I remember the lies that were told,the lives that were lost-and the shock when,twenty years after the war ended,former Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara admitted he knew it was a mistake all along.”

“A journalist covering politics,most of us are aware of the necessity to try to be sure we're unbiased in our reporting.That's one of the fundamentals of good journalism.”

“With police wielding unprecedented powers to invade privacy,tap phones and conduct searches seemingly at random,our civil liberties are in a very precarious condition.”

“I have never voted a party line.I vote on the individual and the issues.”

“I simply told people what I thought about the state of the war in Vietnam,and it was that we better get out of this.”

“Court proceeding,except for certain limited situations,are open to the public.This is for the protection of the accused,to be certain to ascertain that there is a fair trial.”

“I worry that we're not getting enough of the news that we need to make informed judgments as citizens.”

“I think it'd be great if the evening news broadcast,for instance,were unsponsored and unrated.”

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

“I think the whole policy of pre-emptive war is a serious,serious mistake.”

“Perhaps if all the peoples of the world understand what war really means,we would eliminate it.”

“With all this dolling up and featuring of the news,it's getting harder and harder just to get the facts of the story.”

“Under the Constitution giving 'aid and comfort' to a wartime enemy can lead to a charge of treason.”