CAMPAIGN FINANCE MEDIA EMPOWERMENT REFORM:

Cronkite, the 'Newspaperman,' Lays Down His Pen (Reuters, 8/16/2004)

In his final column in a year-long stint writing for the King Features Syndicate, Cronkite, 87, calls his decades as the nightly news anchor for broadcast network CBS "rewarding," but "not entirely satisfactory" due to time limitations that prevented deep reporting of any one story.

"We're talking about covering one of the most complicated and important nations of the world ... and it's patently impossible to do an adequate job of covering the major stories of the day, around the world, in 17 minutes," Cronkite recently told Reuters, alluding to the on-air time in any half-hour news telecast....

In the case of presidential elections, Cronkite said the TV industry should be forced to give away air time to candidates to avoid multi-million dollar TV ad campaigns and keep offices from being up-for-sale to the candidate who raised the most money....

"I am dumbfounded that there hasn't been a crackdown with the libel and slander laws on some of these would-be writers and reporters on the Internet. I expect that to develop in the fairly near future," he said.

So 17 minute blocks are not enough for the media, but 30-second spots are just right for candidates? And those who turn to the Internet for more in-depth information should be frustrated, because the media's new competitors should be sued out of existence?

Posted by Paul Jaminet at August 17, 2004 9:39 AM