Walter Cronkite

The man once trusted the most is dead.

The talking heads will blather all weekend. All will opine as to his trail blazing. Most will cover his early career during WWII and his memorable reporting when Kennedy was killed. The press then, as it is now, was heavily invested in the President and it was only later that we learned of things that, if reported, most likely would have elected Nixon, and changed the course of history for the better.

Certainly the Bay of Pigs, if pursued at all, would have been prosecuted successfully, the Cuban missile crisis would not have occurred and Kennedy would not have needed to reestablish his strength and resolve to fight Communism by becoming more involved in South Vietnam.

But none will mention that.

A few will note his now infamous remarks that we had lost in Vietnam when we had not. His ignorance and hubris then was so striking and so bold that no one recognized it. It is, of course, a day labor's job today, as common as an Ivy League professor condemning America and a new Democratic administration preparing to lose the War On Terror.

That Walter was wrong is barely known and is rapidly dying with him. Few students are made to read such as this WSJ interview with Bui Tin, a former colonel in the North Vietnamese army.

Q: Was the American antiwar movement important to Hanoi's victory?

A: It was essential to our strategy. Support of the war from our rear was completely secure while the American rear was vulnerable. Every day our leadership would listen to world news over the radio at 9 a.m. to follow the growth of the American antiwar movement. Visits to Hanoi by people like Jane Fonda, and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and ministers gave us confidence that we should hold on in the face of battlefield reverses. We were elated when Jane Fonda, wearing a red Vietnamese dress, said at a press conference that she was ashamed of American actions in the war and that she would struggle along with us.

Q: Did the Politburo pay attention to these visits?

A: Keenly.

Q: Why?

A: Those people represented the conscience of America. The conscience of America was part of its war-making capability, and we were turning that power in our favor. America lost because of its democracy; through dissent and protest it lost the ability to mobilize a will to win.

So his career isn't to be celebrated. Some times men do things that are so terrible they wipe out all that went before. The best I can do for Cronkite is to quote Shakespeare.

The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones

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