Ted Koppel Quotes (38 Quotes)

The challenge over the years, and the challenge now, is to keep changing the program without altering it,

My function is, as objectively and accurately as I can, to present reality to people out there, and doing that as quickly as we do is quite difficult enough, thank you.

He and I joked the last time I went up to visit just a few days ago that between the two of us we'd put in 83 years at ABC News. ... He was a warm and loving and surprisingly sentimental man.

Nightline's Ted Koppel seemed astounded on Thursday when Michael Brown, Federal Emergency Management Agency chief, said his organization had just learned of death and depredation in refugee centers in New Orleans. Don't you watch television ... Don't you listen to the radio

Jennings, ABC's chief news anchor for more than 20 years, was also famously attracted to women, ... Even so, he only married four of them.

There's harmony and inner peace to be found in following a moral compass that points in the same direction, regardless of fashion or trend.

Jennings, a high school dropout known for his handsome face and urbane delivery on World News Tonight , was always self-conscious about his good looks and his lack of education, ... He spent his adult life soaking up knowledge.

The responsibility that I feel is to do as good a job as a journalist as I can possibly do.

He was a student for the rest of his life, even though he had dropped out (of school) so early not even,' because he had dropped out so early. I think if there was one message he would like to leave with young people today it is, 'Don't do what I did.'

History is a tool used by politicians to justify their intentions.

More than four thousand programs produced and consumed. Some of them were pretty good, a great many of them were forgettable; but a handful may even be worth a book.

He's moving 2 12 miles away into a house he's been building for about three years.

There is something very very special, universal and easily identifiable among all Jews; it is beyond territory, it is something we all have in common.

I think there is a tendency on the part of some of the cable networks to be in a desperate race to be first with the obvious. Can you imagine going to any one of those people and saying, 'Give us three hours of prime time' It wouldn't happen.

I have been an unabashed fan of NPR for many years, and have stolen untold excellent ideas from its programming.

Emotions get in the way but they don't pay me to start crying at the loss of 269 lives. They pay me to put some perspective on the situation.

And 2000's close campaign has put both candidates in straitjackets, he said. I think it's kind of sad that we've come to a point now that presidential candidates when they get this close to the election have to be so careful about what they say, ... They have to weigh each syllable so carefully that the thought of delivering an unscripted line is anathema to them, they feel as though they're walking through a mine field and they cannot afford to tick anybody off between now and Election Day.

In the days of Caesar, kings had fools and jesters. Now network presidents have anchormen.

I don't know if everyone will give you a fair amount of time, but I promise you I will.

My mother was born in the year 1899 and I was sitting there on New Year's Day in 1999 saying, 'God, I wish my grandfather had written a book about life in his time,' ... And then I thought, well, maybe I'll try and do it, and initially I sat down to do it more for the family than anything else.

He and I joked...that between the two of us, we'd put in 83 years at ABC News.

There is no more respected or influential forum in the field of journalism than the New York Times. I look forward, with great anticipation, to contributing to its op-ed page.

My level of cynicism about the reasons that took us to war against Iraq remain just as well-developed as they were before I went.

What you're talking about is two very different operations. I don't want there to be hint of a suggestion that one operation is better than the other. But in the final analysis, this was a better fit.

You have lived up to every syllable of that commitment and I thank you.

The 10 of us are enormously excited to be at a place that wants nothing more than to produce the kind of television journalism that focuses on issues that matter to the largest number of people. We look forward to creating quality programming that provide

To call something an 'enhanced interrogation technique' doesn't alter the fact that we thought it was torture when the Japanese used it on American prisoners, we thought it was torture when the North Koreans used it, we thought it was torture when the Soviets used it. You know, it's almost the moral equivalent of saying that rape is an enhanced seduction technique.

I felt a certain amount of embarrassment about doing it (covering the trial) on a regular basis. Every time we did O.J., the ratings went up 10 percent.

I have the necessary lack of tact.

All networks are trying to focus on particular segments of audiences. The emphasis on especially youthful demographics is such that news divisions more and more are focusing on not necessarily less serious stories but they're staying away from some of the

People shouldn't expect the mass media to do investigative stories. That job belongs to the 'fringe' media.

At some point, it would probably be time to pull out anyway,

There were great moments very early on, great moments in the middle and great moments at the end, ... What I'm proudest of is that we've maintained high standards from beginning to end. I don't think we ever let down standards.

It's their broadcast in the final analysis, ... I've always taken the position it's our job to make the program as attractive to the audience as we could possibly make it, but there are limits. You don't bring on dancing girls.

There is nothing precipitous about this, ... It's time to give a new bunch a crack at this.

I think we're glazing eyes all across America.

Our society finds truth too strong a medicine to digest undiluted. In its purest form, truth is not a polite tap on the shoulder. It is a howling reproach.

obsession with being first with the obvious.