Dan Rather

RTNDA1993

Dan Rather addresses attendees of RTNDA1993, in Miami Beach, Fla.� Dan Rather was the anchor and managing editor of CBS Evening News as well as contributing to 60 Minutes.

The speech Ed Murrow gave at the 1958 RTNDA convention in Chicago was a risky speech, and he knew it. It was a bold shot, and he knew it. That was part of the Murrow style, and part of what has made the Murrow mystique: the bold, brave shot.

He began that speech with the modest speculation that, and I quote, "This just might do nobody any good." I don't think Ed Murrow believed that. It was a call to arms--the most quoted line is the one about "wires and lights in a box," but the more important line is "the weapon of television." Ed Murrow had seen all kinds of battles, and if he lifted his voice in a battle cry, surely some of his own colleagues would hear him and heed him.

As with many broadcast newspeople of my generation, that speech has crisscrossed over the backroads of my memory through a lifetime in the business.

I wasn't in Chicago that night. I was in Houston, serving my apprenticeship in news, a beginner in radio and television. I hadn't met Murrow yet. I could only read about his speech in newspapers, but I absorbed every word. In my own little Texas bayou and pine-tree world of journalism dreams, Murrow became protean, titanic, huge. (I still think that.) There were other great ones: William L. Shirer, Eric Sevareid and Charles Collingwood and Douglas Edwards; and later Walter Cronkite--men of courage and accomplishment, of great skill and great intelligence. But Murrow was their leader.

As he had been for many others, Murrow had been my hero when I was just a boy. Across the radio, across the Atlantic and across half the United States, his voice came, the deep rumble and the dramatic pause just when he said, "THIS ... is London." I never got that voice out of my head. It was like a piece of music that has never stopped playing for me. Murrow told me tales of bravery, in time of war, tales more thrilling than "Captain Midnight" or "Jack Armstrong" because these were true.

He talked about the bravery of soldiers and citizens. He never made a big fuss about his own bravery. But even as a little boy, I knew it took bravery to stand on that rooftop, with the bombs raining down thunder and lightning all around him--or to go up in that plane--'D for Dog'--with odds he'd never get down alive. And I never forgot that Murrow did all this because he wanted me and my family, and all of us back home in America, to know the truth. For that, for our knowledge of the truth, he risked his life.

In my mind, then and now, neither Achilles nor King Arthur--not Pecos Bill or Davy Crockett--surpassed a hero like that.

The Murrow I met years later--person to person, if you will--the real Ed Murrow was everything I wanted that hero to be. He was a quiet man: tall, strong, steady-eyed, not afraid of silence.

What separated Ed Murrow from the rest of the pack was courage.

I've gotten in trouble before for using that word. Probably deserved it. Maybe I used it inappropriately. Maybe I am a poor person to talk about it because I have so little myself. But I want to hear the word. I want to hear it praised, and the men and women who have courage elevated.

Ed Murrow had courage. He had the physical courage to face the Blitzkrieg in London and to ride "D for Dog." He had the professional courage to tell the truth about McCarthyism. And he had courage to stand before RTNDA, and say some things those good people didn't want to hear, but needed to hear.

In our comfort and complacency, in our cowardice, we, none of us, want to hear the battle cry. Murrow had the courage to sound it anyway. And 35 years later, however uncomfortable, it's worth pausing to ask-how goes the battle?

In the constant scratching and scrambling for ever-better ratings and money and the boss' praise and a better job, it is worth pausing to ask--how goes the real war, the really important battle of our professional lives? How goes the battle for quality, for truth, and justice, for programs worthy of the best within ourselves and the audience? How goes the battle against "ignorance, intolerance, and indifference"? The battle not to be merely "wires and lights in a box," the battle to make television not just entertaining but also, at least some little of the time, useful for higher, better things? How goes the battle?

The answer, we know, is, "Not very well." In too many important ways, we have allowed this great instrument, this resource, this weapon for good, to be squandered and cheapened. About this, the best among us hang their heads in embarrassment, even shame. We all should be ashamed of what we have and have not done, measured against what we could do--ashamed of many of the things we have allowed our craft, our profession, our life's work to become.

Our reputations have been reduced, our credibility cracked, justifiably. This has happened because too often for too long we have answered to the worst not the best within ourselves and within our audience. We are less because of this, our audience is less, and so is our country.

Ed Murrow had faith in our country, and in our country's decision to emphasize, from the beginning, commercial broadcasting. He recognized commercial broadcastings potential, and its superiority over other possibilities. But even as he believed in the strength of market values and the freedom of commercial broadcasting, Ed Murrow feared the rise of a cult that worshipped at the shrine of implacable idle Ratings. He feared that the drive to sell, sell--and nothing but sell--was overwhelming the potential for service of radio and television.

He decried the hours of prime time as being full of "decadence, escapism and insulation from the realities of the world in which we live." As you let that sink in, let's remember that he was talking about programs like "I Love Lucy" and "The Honeymooners," that are esteemed on a par with the comedies of Plautus and Moliere; Murrow singled out the Ed Sullivan Show, which is now studied and praised as a modern-day School of Athens, peopled by all the best minds and talents of the time. These are the programs that had Ed Murrow worried.

He wasn't worried about, didn't live to see "Full House" or "America's Funniest Home Videos" or "Fish Police." He wasn't worried about, didn't live to see the glut of inanities now in "access" time. He never lived to see the cynicism and greed that go into the decisions to put on much of that garbage.

In 1958, Murrow was worried because he saw a trend setting in--avoiding the unpleasant or controversial or challenging. He saw the networks shortening news broadcasts, or jamming them with ever-increasing numbers of commercials--throwing out background, context and analysis, relying just on headlines, and going for entertainment values over the values of good journalism. All in the belief that the public must be shielded and wouldn't accept anything other than the safe, the serene and the self-evident.

Murrow knew that belief was wrong, and contrary to the principles on which this country was founded. He'd seen how honest, mature and responsible American listeners and viewers could be when programming itself was honest, mature and responsible. Reducing the amount of real-world reality on television, Murrow argued, was unconscionable.

But Murrow did not just offer criticism. He also offered solutions. Importantly, Murrow proposed that news divisions and departments not be held to the same standards of ratings and profits as entertainment and sports. He recognized that news operations couldn't be ran as philanthropies. But he added "I can find nothing in the Bill of Rights or the Communications Act which says that [news divisions] must increase their net profit each year, lest the Republic collapse."

Murrow saw turmoil, danger, and opportunity in the world; and the best means, of communicating the realities to the public--the communications innovation called television--was increasingly ignoring the realities. And those few Americans who had been given the privilege of owning and operating TV stations and networks, the privilege of making great wealth from them, were beginning to reduce if not downright eliminate their responsibilities to public service.

Private profit from television is fine, but there should be a responsibility to news and public service that goes with it; this was the core of Murrow's case.

These were words which needed to be heard. Then, and now. It's a hell of a speech. Much of it is more true, more dire, more needed than it was when Murrow said it.

When Murrow spoke to your predecessors at RTNDA, he knew that they were not his problem. The people he wanted most to hear and heed his speech were not in that Chicago ballroom. They worked in boardrooms, not newsrooms. Murrow's Chicago speech was a brave, bold bid to persuade corporate executives, both at stations and networks and at the advertising agencies and corporate sponsors.

He failed. Not long afterwards, his position inside his own network was diminished. And not long after that, he was out.

Little has changed since Murrow gave that 1958 report from the battlefield and issued that call to arms. And much of what has changed has not been for the better. More people in television now than then are doing things that deny the public service of television, that ensure that the mighty weapon of television remains nothing more than wires and lights in a box.

Even the best among decision-makers in television freely take an hour that might have been used for a documentary and hand it over to an "entertainment special" about the discovery of Noah's Ark--that turns out to be a 100 percent hoax.

And the worst among the decision-makers have got us all so afraid of our own independence and integrity that at least one news director actually planned to have all his new hirings reviewed by radical ideological and highly partisan political groups.

They've got another news director telling his staff that he didn't want stories on the Pope's visit. He wanted stories on Madonna's "Sex" book. It's the ratings, stupid, don't you know?

And they've got us putting more and more "fuzz and wuzz" on the air, cop-shop stuff, so as to compete not with other news programs but with entertainment programs (including those posing as news programs) for dead bodies, mayhem and lurid tales.

They tell us international news doesn't get ratings, doesn't sell, and, besides, it's too expensive. "Foreign news" is considered an expletive best deleted in most local station newsrooms and has fallen from favor even among networks.

Thoughtfully written analysis is out, "live pops" are in. "Action Jackson!' is the cry. Hire lookers, not writers. Do powder-puff, not probing interviews. Stay away from controversial subjects. Kiss ass, move with the mass, and for heaven's and the ratings' sake don't make anybody mad--certainly not anybody that you're covering, and especially not the mayor, the governor, the senator, the President or Vice President or anybody in a position of power. Make nice, not news.

This has become the new mantra. These have become the new rules. The post-Murrow generation of owners and managers have made them so. These people are, in some cases, our friends. They are, in all cases, our bosses. They aren't venal. They're afraid, They've got education and taste and good sense, they care about their country, but you'd never know it from the things that fear makes them do--from the things that fear makes them make us do.

It is fear of ratings slippage if not failure, fear that this quarter's bottom line will not be better than last quarter's--and a whole lot better than the same quarter's a year ago.

A climate of fear, at all levels, has been created, without a fight. We--you and I--have allowed them to do it, and even helped them to do it.

The climate is now such that, when a few people at one news organization rig the results of a test to get better pictures--and are caught and rightly criticized--there's no rejoicing that a terrible, unusual journalistic practice has been caught, punished and eradicated. Because we all know that, with only a slight relaxation of vigilance and a slight increase of fear, those journalistic sins could be visited upon us. We know that, as honorable and sensible as we, our friends and our colleagues try to be, it could happen to us.

Now you would be absolutely justified in saying to me right now --"Excuse me, Mister Big Shot Anchor Man, but what the hell do you expect me to do about it? If I go to my boss and talk about TV as a weapon, and why don't you take 'Current Affair' or 'Hard Copy' or 'Inside Edition' off the air next week and let me put on a tell-it-like-it-is documentary about race relations--I know they're gonna put me on the unemployment line, and I'll be lucky if they don't put me on the funny farm."

None of us is immune to self-preservation and opportunities for advancement. I'm not asking you for the kind of courage that risks your job, much less your whole career.

Ed Murrow had that kind of courage, and took that kind of risk several times. But you and I, reaching deep inside ourselves, are unlikely to muster that kind of courage often, if ever.

But there are specific things we can do. They won't cost us our jobs. But they will make a difference--a start--a warning shot that the battle is about to be joined.

Number one: Make a little noise. At least question (though protest would be better) when something, anything incompatible with your journalistic conscience is proposed. When it comes to ethics and the practice of journalism, silence is a killer.

No, you won't always be heeded or heard. And yes, even to question may be a risk. But it is a wee, small risk, and a tiny price to pay to be worthy of the name "American journalist." To be a journalist is to ask questions. All the time. Even of the people we work for.

Number two: In any showdown between quality and substance on the one hand, and sleaze and glitz on the other, go with quality and substance. You know the difference. Every one of us in this room knows the difference because we've been there. We've all succumbed to the Hollywoodization of news because we were afraid not to. We trivialize important subjects. We put video through a Cuisinart trying to come up with high-speed, MTV-style cross-cuts. And just to cover our asses, we give the best slots to gossip and prurience.

We can say, "No more." We can fight the fear that leads to "Showbizzification." Act on your knowledge. You know that serious news--local and regional, national and international--doesn't have to be dull, not for one second. People will watch serious news, well-written and well-produced. The proof--it's all around, but I'll give you two examples. Look at "Sunday Morning" and "Nightline." No glitz, no gossip. Just compelling information. You can produce your own "Nightline" or "Sunday Morning"--all that's required of you is determination and thought, taste and imagination.

Number three: Try harder to get and keep minorities on the air and in off-camera, decision-making jobs. Try--and be determined and succeed.

There are market survey researchers who will bring you confusing numbers and tell you they add up to one thing: your audience wants to see "Ken and Barbie" anchors and reporters, and not see minorities, gays and lesbians or older Americans or Americans with disabilities on-air. So we give our audience plenty of Ken and Barbie, and we make the minorities we have hired so uncomfortable that they hold back on the perspective, the experience, the intelligence, the talent that they could have offered to make us wiser and stronger.

Those market researchers, with their surveys and focus groups, are playing games with us and with this entire country. We actually pay them money to fool us--money that I submit to you could be better spent on news coverage. Their so-called samples of opinion are no more accurate or reliable than my grandmother's big toe was when it came to predicting the weather. Your own knowledge of news and human nature, your own idealism and professionalism will guide you more surely than any market researcher ever will. But the market researchers will keep getting away with their games so long as you and I and the people we work for, let them.

If we change the voice and the face of broadcasting, honestly and fairly, on the basis of excellence and ethics, talent and intelligence, we can shatter false and cheap notions about news, we can prove that our audience wants electronic journalism that is ethical, responsible, and of high quality--and that is as diverse, as different, as dynamic as America itself.

There is another thing we all can do, a difference we can make. One word: More.

Let's do more to think more. Let's bring all the brilliance and imagination this industry has to bear. That's what Ed Murrow was talking about. Let's phase out fear. If we've got an idea, let's not hide it out of fear--the fear of doing things differently, the fear that says, "they can't fire you if they don't know you're there." That fear runs rampant through the corridors of broadcasting today.

The people we work for are more fearful than we are. Fear leads them to depend on thoughtless, lifeless numbers to tell them what fear convinces them are facts. "American audiences won't put up with news from other countries. Americans won't put up with economic news. Americans won't put up with serious, substantive news of any kind."

Bull feathers. We've gone on too long believing this nonsense. We've bought the lie that Information Is Bad for News. We are told, and we are afraid to disbelieve, that people want to be entertained. And we have gone so far down the Info-Tainment Route that we'll be a long time getting back to where we started.

But as long as the people we work for believe this kind of nonsense, the less inclined we have been to prove them wrong. We go about our days, going along to get along. The fear factor freezes us.

The greatest shortage on every beat, in every newsroom in America is courage.

I believe, as Ed Murrow did, that the vast majority of the owners and executives and managers we work for are good people, responsible citizens and patriotic Americans. I believe that the vast majority of the people in this room also fit that description. We all know what's at stake. We know that our beloved United States of America depends on the decisions we make in our newsrooms every day.

In the end, Murrow could not bring himself to believe that the battle about which he spoke so eloquently could be won. He left the electronic journalism he helped to create--believing that most if not all, was already lost, that electronic news in America was doomed to be completely and forever overwhelmed by commercialism and entertainment values.

About that, I believe Murrow was wrong. What is happening to us and our chosen field of work does not have to continue happening. The battle is dark and odds-against. But it is not irreversible, not--not yet. To prevent it from being so requires courage.

A few, just a few, good men and women with courage--the courage to practice the idealism that attracted most of us to the craft in the first place--can make a decisive difference. We need a few good men and women--with the courage of their convictions--to turn it around. We can be those men and women. If the people in this room tonight simply agreed, starting tomorrow, to turn it around--we would turn it around. All we need is courage.

I don't have to tell you, you already know, but it is important for me to say it to you anyway. I haven't always had that courage.

I said earlier that to talk about Ed Murrow before you tonight was humbling. And perhaps that's true most of all in this respect: it is humbling to realize how little courage I have, compared to Murrow who had so much, and how many opportunities I have already wasted.

But tomorrow is a new day. We toil and are happy in this craft, because of the way Edward R. Murrow brought it into being. We can be worthy of him--we can share his courage--or we can continue to work in complacency and fear.

Let us remember the words that inspired Murrow himself at the end of a famous broadcast: "Cassius was right: 'Men at some times are masters of their fates; The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves….'"

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