I grew up with Edward R. Murrow, and my father's reaction to Murrow nailing McCarthy's reeking hide to the wall made Murrow one of my heroes and was probably responsible for my getting into media.

It wasn't just Murrow or Trout or Cronkite. It was the whole environment at CBS which was set and defended by Dr. Frank Stanton, the soul of the network, and Bill Paley, the guy who ultimately overcame his whore's heart and protected CBS News as an independent entity at the same time he starved it financially.

The quality of news doesn't exist in a vacuum, and without a solid and protected base from which to operate, Cronkite would have been just a nice fatherly guy who told you what the news was and even Murrow would be someone who smoked too much and when he was in high dudgeon, was great fun to watch even as Keith Olbermann is today -- a teller of tales, "...full of sound and fury; signifying nothing."

The base doesn't exist without a reason -- a demand -- for what it provides, either but if it made money, hardcore solid journalism would thrive, even today. And if the audience demanded it, it would make money.

So, to steal from Shakespeare one more time, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings.”

And as intellectual underlings and slaves to a WalMart philosophy of life, we get the news we deserve. That's why there are no heirs to Cronkite's mantle.

Sorry, Joan, but no one else can emulate his truth-telling, because no one else want to hear it.

well said.

I like Maddow, too. She's spunky, and has overcome great obstacles. She's one of the smartest people on TV as well. Rhodes Scholar, Doctor of Philosophy from Oxford, etc. And she tells the truth.

work mostly in print. Very few are on TV. If we get another Cronkite, it will come from there. The following are among the best, IMO.

Glenn Greenwald, Katrina Vanden Heuvel, Bill Moyers, Dana Priest, Seymour Hersh, Ezra Klein, Naomi Klein, Dave Sirota, Matt Taibbi, Eric Alterman, Paul Krugman and Amy Goodman, to name a few. Moyers, IMO, rates above Uncle Walter. He's a national treasure. Priest and Naomi Klein rate as perhaps the bravest of the bunch, though Hersh and Taibbi are up there.

IMO, the job of the Press is to play Watchdog on Power. They aren't supposed to be "nice" to anyone. While Bush was in office, especially, I had hundreds of discussions with conservatives whose number one gripe seemed to be that reporters were apparently mean and unfair to him and were not sufficiently patriotic. They didn't think the Press should go after stories, dig deep for them, expose corruption and abuse. Well, that is, while their boys were in office.

How many times did we hear righties say that reporters should be shot for exposing lies and corruption if that exposure made Bush and the GOP look bad?

To them, the Press should put "patriotism" above the truth. It should play stenographer to power. Again, at least while the GOP holds the reins of that power.

Wrong. The Press should be the advocate for the people. They do that by making sure the government is our advocate and not the advocate of corporate America and the wealthy in general. Reporters do their jobs when they give us the information we need to make informed decisions as to our own health, safety and welfare in a democracy. They fail to do their jobs when they protect corporate interests and put money, profit and power above the interests of the American people. They fail to do their jobs when they allow government to defend, support, enable, protect and lift the rich and powerful up to more riches and more power.

We have very few of that kind of journalist working today. They're almost nonexistent in TV, and nowhere to be found in conservative TV Land. If we get another Cronkite, he or she will come from the progressive side of the dial and probably from the print side.

"No Russert was a total ass."

What a great comeback... from someone who by all measures seems to be the original total ass himself.

Russert was a prince who operated on a level people like yourself and others at salon.com are too intellectually challenged and/or biased to ever understand. You embarrass yourself by attempting to denigrate him. I feel sorry for you.

There will never be another Uncle Walter, because he came from a time when there were, perhaps, 7 regular channels and one or two UHF channels (Uncle Floyd, anyone?). Besides, he came from a time before Nixon and Lee Atwater and, paradoxically, before television and image over substance define our values and perceptions.

Rachel Maddow is close to Walter Cronkite in terms of her intelligence and honesty, but she by and large preaches to the choir. If you don't like her, you can switch to the professional liars at Fox "News." If you don't like that, you can play a video game.

It's over. The wealthy control the media, and the media control the masses. Except: Peak oil and climate change are not impressed by financial contributions. They are the ultimate reality. Let them abolish all of our folly.

No Russert was a total ass.

..of not letting Joan get away with attempting to rewrite history on just how arrogant, partisan and hackneyed Dan Rather really was (is). Joan likes to praise Cronkite for being a voice for truth while dishonestly trying to put Rather in the same league. So much for her own personal integrity, as if that ever existed. I also agree with you that the late Tim Russert was a class act. He was the last truly honest journalist who managed to put his bias aside no matter who he was interviewing. He is sorely missed. Unfortunately, we now live in a world that such behavior longer exists, and never can be expected to exist at salon.com