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For broadcast networks, the evening news broadcast is a cherished part of their legacies — having brought the likes of Walter Cronkite, Tom Brokaw and Peter Jennings into living rooms over the decades.

We used to have reporters telling us of the perils of politicians and their agendas with vetted factual information from the likes of Walter Cronkite, Sam Donaldson, Helen Thomas and others.

While the ghost of Walter Cronkite was probably wretched in anticipation of the event, which studio heads boasted would feature no fact-checking from the moderators, early in the debate the journalists abandoned that vow after Vance refused to drop the obvious and dangerous lie about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio he’s propagated for weeks.

I immediately asked my then assistant to place the calls, and the first of the network persons to answer directly was Walter Cronkite.

Levin: Is it true that you also called Walter Cronkite to tell him personally that LBJ had died?