Peter Jennings: Day

“You can't cover the Middle East — you can't cover American politics — you can't cover America these days without finding people in one place or another taking exception to what we do. I think it goes with the territory. Keeps me, at least I hope, mindful, always that there's at least one other opinion and sometimes a dozen other opinions. And they all bear accounting for.”

Peter Jennings

Larry King Interview (8 September 2003)
Context: I think no matter what we cover, people tend to see what we cover through their own particular political or personal prisms. I always ask people to be specific what they're talking about. You can't cover the Middle East — you can't cover American politics — you can't cover America these days without finding people in one place or another taking exception to what we do. I think it goes with the territory. Keeps me, at least I hope, mindful, always that there's at least one other opinion and sometimes a dozen other opinions. And they all bear accounting for. But not everybody is right you know because somebody says, "well you did X", and you say "well, maybe X is right in some cases".

People , Hope , Thinking

“I have never spent a day in my adult life where I didn't learn something”

Peter Jennings

Interview in Saturday Evening Post, quoted by USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2005-08-07-jennings-dies_x.htm?POE=LIFISVA (7 August 2005)
Context: I have never spent a day in my adult life where I didn't learn something, and if there is a born-again quality to me, that's it.

Life , Learning

“There will be good days and bad, which means that some days I may be cranky and some days really cranky!”

Peter Jennings

Memo to his staff announcing that he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. (April 2005)

“There are a lot of people who think our job is to reassure the public every night that their home, their community and their nation is safe. I don't subscribe to that at all. I subscribe to leaving people with essentially — sorry it's a cliche — a rough draft of history. Some days it's reassuring, some days it's absolutely destructive.”

Peter Jennings

Interview in Anchoring America: The Changing Face of Network News (2003) by Jeff Alan

People , Home , History , Communication