Cronkite is an Idiot

From OpinionJournal:

Is There a Doxy in the House?
Over the weekend C-Span3 reaired an appearance by onetime CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite, who spoke at George Washington University on Sept. 22, 2002. Cronkite talked about the state of the news business, but he also weighed in on current events, 10 days after President Bush made the case at the U.N. for liberating Iraq. Even we were amazed at just how wrongheaded he was. Here are some highlights, transcribed with the help of TiVo:

Q: Do you think we still have some serious challenges ahead of us?

Cronkite: Oh, gracious. I think we have the most serious challenges ahead of us we have possibly seen in the entire 20th century--the century just passed, of course--and certainly the greatest for this century. A brand-new century dawned on us almost in the midst of this terrible Iraq crisis, this question of what we're going to do about the administration's plans to, for the first time, go into combat--begin the combat, begin a war--for defensive reasons.

This debate is going on, of course, here in your precincts in Washington, but being watched word for word around the world, because I think most of the world understands, as I hope most Americans do, that what we're talking about is launching what very well could be World War III. This whole idea of a quick and easy victory, I think most of the military people themselves would be inclined to doubt and have doubted, some of them openly. It's gonna be a much longer, more difficult--

With the entry now of Israel into the debate, with [Ariel] Sharon's announcement yesterday that Israel will defend itself if it's attacked during an Iraqi war--and that happened of course in the first war in that area, three or f--10 years ago now, whatever it is. This has aligned, officially aligned Israel with us in this campaign to have a war, or to win a war. Even if Sharon says it would be defensive on their part, this in the Arab propaganda world certainly puts us in the basket they've always claimed we were, of a mutual interest and our support of Israel regardless.

With that, it seems to me that we have almost certainly seen, to our much great discomfort, I should think, any possibility that the Arab nations are going to come in with us, in the early stages at any rate, of a war of this nature, and indeed might actually come in against us. So the story is a terrible one, and an awful crisis for us and for the world.

In the event, of course, Iraq did not attack Israel, probably because it had vowed to defend itself, unlike in 1991, when at any rate Saddam Hussein failed in his effort to turn the Gulf War into a conflict between Jerusalem and the wider Arab world.

Even if all had gone according to Cronkite's pessimistic scenario, his fears of "World War III" were absurdly overwrought. Between 1948 and 1973 Israel alone fought several wars against the combined forces of the Arab world, all of which it won quickly. Does anyone really think that had it come to it, the U.S. and Israel wouldn't have been able to vanquish the Arabs easily?

The event ended with an audience question on the International Criminal Court. Cronkite's answer, which we quote in part, was staggeringly wide-ranging and incoherent:

Cronkite: Here we are again, the United States, saying, as we have now in several treaties recently and other activities--we are saying, with considerable chutzpah, I'd say, "Well, you can have your court if you want, but we [sic] not gonna belong to it." Well, what kind of progress can we make if the United States keep saying, "We are the exception to the rule," that everybody else should belong to this organization, should obey the rule, but we're not going to have anything to do with it? Or if you want to have something to do with it, if your country wants to do with it, you've got to now tell us that if anybody is arrested in your country, you weren't [sic] turn them over to the court.

Well, special laws for the United States. I don't know, that to me doesn't sound like the democracy that I would like to think it is in debate in international society that I would like to think we would promulgate and include in our agenda--the continuing debate to make these things work rather than simply write them off because we don't like them.

The Kyoto environmental pact, for instance. All right, so it wasn't a treaty, it never was voted as a treaty. That's not the point. We made a pact. We accepted that pact. Other nations have accepted that pact to do something. We have said, this government has said, "We are not going to accept the Kyoto pact. Forget it. We're never gonna, we're never gonna, we're--because it would cost us money." My God! That's the reason that we're not going to help the world try to avoid the danger of pollution in the world, the danger of warming, all of these things? We're not going to participate in that 'cause it'd cost us money?

That's exactly the reason that those Arabs are so mad at us. We are--they see our television. I blame television for a lot of the problems we have today. Before television, they didn't know what we were like [audience laughter and applause]. But now they do. They see these riches, these riches pouring out of us. Every doxy on the air has gold and diamonds and sapphires, and they drive great big cars; we live in these magnificent houses. And they're starving to death. They're watching a television set energized by a hand--by a foot pump, one set to the village. They gather there every night. What do they see? I dunno, "Sex in the City," for heaven's sake [audience laughter].
I think if I were hungry, if I were starving, if my family were dying of AIDS or any other illness, and there was no medical help there, and I was watching this rich nation play at its own fashion, I'd be pretty damn mad. I'd be pretty damn mad [audience applause].

So I'm just saying that I'd like to see this very rich nation of ours work on the diplomatic front, the diplomatic wars if you please, fight those diplomatic wars to get this world straightened out and make it work. And I think that's going to take an international body, like the United Nations, for that to be a true world government. It means giving up sovereignty; it means a lot of sacrifices. But aren't we prepared, for heaven's sakes, to make those sacrifices in order for a better world? I would like to think so.

So, to sum up: "Those Arabs," who are at once "dying of AIDS" and "starving to death," and who by the way get their electricity from "a foot pump," are "mad at us" over the Kyoto accords and bejeweled TV "doxies." Ergo, we need "true world government." Such wisdom is the product of 65 years in the news business.

Emphasis added by me, to further highlight this senile old fart's total ineptitude and convoluted answers....good gravy, this is someone to respect?!?