As a TV critic who has logged millions of hours of viewing to help save one of my three favorite commercial networks, I decided to volunteer my services to the Save CBS Campaign. Here's what I would do: First, I would dump the Walter Cronkite school of reporting, of which Katie Couric is the latest practitioner. The objective that's-the-way-it-is style they use at all the network evening news shows is so old, so over.

What the evening news shows need is less "objectivity" and more analysis…In short, what CBS (and all the others) need is a new Ed Murrow. Good news! There's already one out there on the launchpad who has demonstrated his qualifications. I'm talking about Keith Olbermann of MSNBC. He has the journalistic chops and the mind, heart, instincts and courage.

–Excerpted from Marvin Kittman's piece in The Nation entitled, "Olbermann the New Ed Murrow?" (We're thinking it's a rhetorical question).

There’s a new old face for retirement: Walter Cronkite. The 91 year-old former CBS anchor is in talks to host a weekly news segment for Retirement Living TV. The station is aimed at the 55 plus set, and airs shows like “Bargain Retirement Places.”

Presumably, Retirement Living TV will not ask for a multi-year contract.

[NYT]

Retirement Living TV is currently in talks with renowned anchorman Walter Cronkite, in an attempt to "lure America's most trusted man back to television." Cronkite is said to be considering the offer, but somewhat reticent to accept on the basis that he's already dead happily retired. [TVNewser]

ON SEPT. 24, Ted Koppel, formerly of ABC's "Nightline," will be saluted at the News and Documentary Emmy awards.

But in a recent interview with Variety, where Koppel was pooh-poohing such awards, did he really mean to say the following: "OK, so we've got a lifetime achievement award. Cronkite's dead, and we gave it to Rather. What about Koppel, is he still alive?"

Well, I'm not so sure about Koppel, but Walter Cronkite most definitely is not dead. He's still alive and kicking at age 90. He even has a devoted girlfriend.

–Excerpted from Liz Smith's column in today's New York Post

Even before Katie Couric's ascension to the anchor chair, CBS has maintained a storied past with the press. Part of it has to do with the tenure of chief mouthpiece Gil Schwartz, some to do with Katie's personal publicist Matt Hiltzik. Today, we're in one of those interesting cruxes where we're witness to the spin machine at its finest: a mostly blowjob-y piece on one end, a hatchet job on the other.

Let's start with the good news: Katie is hitting softballs with the Philadelphia Inquirer, answering the questions of Ellen Gray (and not, it's quite worth mentioning, noted anti-Katie Inquirer TV scribe Gail Shister). Katie is in Philly, officially, to "help mark the official opening of CBS-owned KYW's new high-definition studios at 15th and Spring Garden streets." But she's also in a familiar role, playing damage control, and given plenty of freedom to do so.

Statements like, "But it was always, I think, a pretty serious and hard-hitting newscast," aren't exactly challenged; Gray only "suggests" some things might not be as they appear.

But over at the New York Sun, CBS's press machine looks tired, weary, and entirely ineffective.

CONTINUED »

Terri Schwab, the women who spent nine summers in Martha's Vinyard as Walter Cronkite's cook, quit her less-than-quaint job at the Cronkite manor in August. Of course she is now writing a "tell-all" book about how horrible it was working for the acclaimed news anchor and how much she suffered under his wrath. Schwab claims she was "mentally tortured."

"He's a very difficult man. It's all about Walter. It always was, it always will be. It's dinner for four at 6:30, then it turns into dinner for six, then dinner for eight. Yes sir, yes sir, yes sir, that's the answer . . .

Not that we have any particular affection towards Walter Cronkite or anything, but, isn't that what maids and cooks and servants to rich people … like, do? Call their boss sir? Plus, this must have been some late onsetting "mental torture" for it to have gone on for nine years while she summered at the Vinyard. Mental torture. Psha.

She should try being a sous chef at Per Se or a cook on the Upper East Side for a bunch of middle schoolers. Just to get a little perspective.

CHEF DISHES ON UNCLE WALTER [Page Six]

• How long did it take Lizzie Grubman's intern to want a complete change of career? About three months. Too bad she didn't discover bloggers first. [Gawker]

• We wish were alive back when condoms were called scumbags. Whispering, "hey, you have a scumbag, right?" would just be awesome. [Slate]

• Sounds like Jessica Cutler may actually not get screwed. For once. [Wonkette]

• Walter Cronkite isn't the only one with a Katie Couric crush. We even think Jim Romenesko might have a chance. [NYO]

• Do people have to really, really, try to get into Harvard? Yes. They also need about 40 grand worth of "preparation services." [NYT]

• And just when you though perfume couldn't get any better than smelling like Britney Spears or Paris Hilton, Mariah Carey graces us with her shower spray. [Pop Sugar]

• Walter Cronkite speaks on Katie Couric's move to CBS. To sum up: she's not only talented, she's also pretty hot. [CNN]

• Apparently there aren't too many celebrities jumping with too much joy over the idea of celebrating Bonnie Fuller's book launch. Is it because she calls them all fat? [WWD]

• Gregg LaGambina leaves Filter magazine for greener pastures. Was it really only four years ago when LaGambina was backstage on his knees at a Weezer show trying to make the mag look good? [Fishbowl NY]

• In more "the administration sucks" news from the objective media, David Brooks thinks the House of Representatives is one big pack of drooling idiots. [Media Mob]

• David Pogue keeps trying to get free swag. He might score, too, if he would just stop asking for it. (It's guys like that who never get laid.) [SFW via Romenesko]

• Walter Cronkite loves Jim Lehrer. Now, if only he could just remember what channel he's on. [Texas Monthly]

• Emily Davies just accidentally made all that shit up. [WWD]

• Too bad Duane Swierczynski's article didn't reach her sooner. Oh, yeah, and does this mean that journalism school is not pointless anymore? [PCP]

• Steven Colbert's word "truthiness" wins the American Dialect Society's "word of the year." Damn, we were so hoping it would be PopoZao! [Gothamist]

• So, Judith Miller doesn't really have time to talk right now. Unlike everyone else in this industry, she has reporting to do, so if you bitches could all just back the fuck off. [Observer]

• Why can't Jack Shafer and Martin Peretz just play nice? [Slate]

• Really, those boys better bury the hatchet — or they're going to end up like Walter Cronkite and Alan Abel. [Page Six]

• A newbie joins Jann Wenner's staff. Here's to hoping he knows how to organize his pencils just so. [Revolving Door]

• So, Michael Leeden thinks Osama Bin Laden is dead, and nobody noticed but Wonkette? [NRO, Wonkette]

• What is fabulosity? Even better, who freakin' cares? [Kirkus Reviews]

• Fellow Elaine's patron Elaine Kaufman and Beatte Telle, the model at the center of this all, claim Roman Polanski did none of the thigh massaging Harper's editor Lewis Lapham claimed in a 2002 Vanity Fair article and again on the stand during the libel lawsuit.

• Walter Cronkite is boinking Carly Simon's sister Joanna. That's all we're going to say, because it makes us as ill as you are at this very moment.

• Melissa Gilbert is through with the Screen Actors Guild, actually admitting her decision not to seek a third term as president stemmed from internal fighting.

• New York mag continues exhibiting its personality disorder, finding the show critics hate (The Comeback) and defending it as a guilty pleasure.

• Upon learning even New York magazine staffers get denied from trendy nightspots, we don't feel so bad about the disastrous results trying to name drop Jossip at PM.

• When they're not taking over the radio waves with ubiquitous Top 40, Clear Channel is loading up on the Queer Channel, a new GLBT program debuting August 7. Which is sure to please their conservative investors.

• Jane Fonda gets up on her high war horse again, this time targetting the Iraqi war. You know, since her Vietnam efforts won't so well in the 70s.

• Whee, the teen fashion mags go back to school. This year's challenge: Making 15-year-old girls look more whorish.

• It doesn't take much, but somehow Kathy Griffin continually reminds us why she stays on the D-list.

• Lil Kim lies on the stand — and in her documentary.