that’s the way it was

Roger Mudd was a stalwart of CBS News back during its “Tiffany Network” days and he’s an unabashedly old-fashioned kinda news guy:

Mr. Mudd remained in the forefront of CBS news through the events that shaped the last century: the March on Washington in 1963, the Kennedy presidency and assassination, the King and Robert Kennedy murders, the moon landing, Vietnam, Nixon’s resignation and the administrations of Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. …

“We had no video, no Internet, no Blackberries,” he recalled. “But we also had no doubts about our values or our mission.” …

Mr. Mudd, a remarkably spry 80, minced no words: “Back then, we told the story from the beginning. There was no walking around and talking, no flapping of hands. There was just strong reporting … .

“Quality has dropped immeasurably,” he said.

True dat. Mudd also sees the evening news as something worth fighting to preserve.

  The Emmy Award-winning newsman was emphatic about the responsibility of broadcast journalism as he sees it.

“No matter what, the American people deserve a thoughtful and balanced account of what has happened in their world during the last 24 hours,” Mr. Mudd said. “I devoutly hope that the evening news will never disappear from our lives.”

Hmm. It would be good it the networks delivered real news, as the BBC World Service still does (when it is reporting rather than advocating for or militating against, that is).

It sounds to me that Mudd isn’t only lamenting the poor quality of the network news. He’s also mourning a collective social ritual that, once the evening news disappears, will never reappear in our lives—the collective experience of gathering around the electronic hearth at the same time every day that everybody else in America is doing it.

If I had my druthers, I’d work on getting families to eat dinner together every night. Then I’d worry about everybody in America sitting around and watching the “news” at the same time. But I know what he means:

Those were the days my friend
We thought they’d never end
We’d sing and dance forever and a day
We’d live the life we choose
We’d fight and never lose
For we were young and sure to have our way.

(Those Were the Days)