alter, kite -- walter cronkite is a wanted to be. i had not been to cbs news long that walter off camera is the exact same way as on camera. i have to say that is not always the case. he is a wonderful guy, a great mentor, a great booster of mind when he did not have to be. he was when it was really important. i just love him and there is no one in journalism i admire more than walter cronkite. host: what do you think that the cbs news, abc news, the other networks will look like 10 years from now? guest: we are in a technological revolution and just try to keep up with the technology. we put a story on television shot on one of these little cameras, and it is only this big. it is about that thick, only the size of your cellular telephone. you can record on that on hd for 60 minutes. just the fact that you can do that, think about and the old days when you saw the national conventions and the cameraman would have this thing that weighed 80 pounds on his back. the sound man to hold the sound equipment. now you can do all that with thi

firing line starts in 1966, and walter cronkite and johnny carson, the edgy as things in mainstream television. firing line is like from another galaxy, it starts with the brandenburg concerto, bill's mannerisms and accents' and the content of what he is saying. and one of the interesting anecdotes that came my way, i was in a new school that afterwards, an old man came to me and said do you see mr. buckley? yes, i do. pc dirksen senate office building you thank him for me? i am a man of the left and firing line is the only place in the late 60s were leftwingers could get to say their views at length. bill let them say that so he could do it out with them. the media has changed, it is all a teaser. if jesus came back he would not get an hour of television, he simply one. so bill was suited for his time. what are bills to they going to do? they will be have to be suited for their time and also people are unique. a lot of conservatives are saying where is the next reagan? there will not be a next reagan. there will be somebody else. where is the next buckley? not going to be one. there will be s

we've not had time to about your bob dylan interview or your book on cronkite. will have to do it later. >> thank you. outback. -- i will be back. thank you, brian. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2008] [birds chirping] [sound of a babbling brook] >> dhunna is next sunday to the second part of our conversation with historian douglas brinkley on his upcoming book "if the wilderness warrior" about your roosevelt. sunday night at 8:00 eastern and pacific on c-span. >> next, your calls and comments on "washington journal." also starting at 10:00, the former crown prince of iran discusses the situation in that country. at 2:00 this live coverage of the senate republican conference meeting on energy, nuclear plants, and cab and trade. -- cap and trade. >> the sec should be a model for transparency, openness, and fairness. >> tonight a discussion on president obama's choice to lead the federal communications commission. .

it's walter cronkite and johnny carson, and huntley brinkley are the edgiest things in mainstream television, and firing line is from a different galaxy. it starts with a concerto, and it's the content of what he is saying, and one of the very interesting anecdotes, years ago i was on an panel, and afterwards an old man came up to me and said, do you see mr. buckfully will you thank him for me. i'm a man of the left, but firing line was the only place in the late 60s where left-wingers could get to say their views at length. and i -- there's some truth to that. now, bill let them say that so he could duke it out with them. but he let them say that. and the media has changed. the media has moved on. it's just like, you know, it's like it's all a trailer. it's all a teaser. it's this, this, this. if jesus came back now he would not get an hour of television. he simply wouldn't. so, bill was suited for his time. what are bills today going to do? they will have to be suited to their time, and also people, you know, are unique. a lot of consecutives are saying, where is the next reagan? not going

it's walter cronkite and johnny carson and, you know, huntley brinkley are sort of the edgiest things in mainstream television and "firing line" is like from another galaxy. it starts with a brand of concerto. it's bill mannerisms and accent and whatnot and also the content of what he's saying. and one of the very interesting anecdotes that came my way, this was years ago, i was on some sort of panel at the new school and afterwards an old man came up to me and he said do you see mr. buckley? i said yes, i do. he said will you thank him from me. i'm a man of the left but "firing line" was the only place in the late '60s where left wingers could get to say their views at length. and, you know, there's some truth to that. now, bill let them say that so he could duke it out with them. but he let them say that. and, you know, the media has changed. the media has moved on. it's just like -- you know, it's like it's all a trailer. it's all a teaser. it's this, this, this. if jesus came back now, he would not get an hour of television. [laughter] >> he simply wouldn't. so, you know, bill was

i would have to go home at night and over here walter cronkite talking about vietnam or watergate. i did not want to do that. and i could have checked out i would have. i could have text message all night, i could have found out what was going on at the party last weekend instead of having to be exposed to adult matters, having to listen to my parents talk about the household of money, current events. i did not like them into not want to talk with them, but i did not have another place to go. and i am better for it for just having to be exposed to adult matters, it helps to grow up. >> what worries you most about this generation getting older? >> i think that we have to remember that high school and college our precious years. this is the only time when you are going to for the most have the opportunity to read a great works, difficult works, to encounter great ideas and great art and have a circumstance where you can talk with people about them, you can talk with experts. and that during those years in your leisure time that is when you go to museums, that is when you go to art ga

the dictator of the shaw with his american bodies and they took the throne and in a grand walter cronkite voice you hear "and once again, we'll flows freely to the west." and all my life i've heard that kind of stuff and i thought well, amen. it's vital to our national security interest. actually it's vital to our accustomed lifestyle, that's more honest but it's odd that we don't think very much how odd that is. now we put in the shaw those people lived with the shaw from 53 to 79, and the shaw might have done some good things but he had a lot of enemies and iran and because he was so extreme this way i believe they went to the opposite extreme that we and threw him out and brought something to the other side which was a theocracy from by ayatollah khomeini. to a 70 million iranians are born after the islamic revolution meaning they are products of the islamic revolution and this is really -- you learn the textbooks, the professors, everything is working with that system. so, it shapes people's outlook. the theocracy as everywhere. what on the street on every street corner there is a box

grappling with a bit, with their 24-hour news cycle there was a time not that long ago when walter cronkite would say, and that's the way it is. that is what we talked about. that group collective understanding of the state of the world until the next news cycle and now is being continuously refreshed. >> you know, there is a mission statement here at the newseum that i think is one of the most important statements anyone has written about america or democracy. it said that a free press must have, and i don't know the wording exactly, but a free press must provide the means for people to be outrageous, but it also has the responsibility to provide fairness, something of that nature. if you go in this newseum-- newseum there is a section of the berlin wall, which tells you all you need to know about societies and how they ought to be run. this section is about as wide as the studio and you walk in there and you walk in on one side, the western side in here on this wall is graffiti. some of it is obscene, some of it is funny, some of that is silly, but it is just covered with all of this graf

it was -- cronkite lost. it was a way to get people in the store, it was a way to give cache to the entire network and this is a network that about to put the "beverly hillbillies" on, so we could have used some cache. one of the worst things that ever happened to the quality of journalism, was that moment or those series of moments when the accountants went down to the editorial offices and said, look, we can tell the "times" for even more than we're selling it for now. the evening news can make money. from that point on, things started to change, and will never change back again, in terms of that principle. that's up to them. i'm happy to sign. it's up to you to you provide them to sign. thank you for the questions. i appreciated them. [applause] >> eric burns is the former host of "fox news watch," the author of several books, including inif a miss scribblers ." >> joseph sohm explores themes of dempsey, through his photography collection, "visions of america," it spans 30 years of his career and spans all