Bernard Kalb obit

Bernard Kalb, founding CNN ‘Reliable Sources’ anchor, dies at 100

 

He was not on the list.

Bernard Kalb, the long-time journalist and founding anchor of CNN’s “Reliable Sources” program, died on Sunday at his home in North Bethesda, Maryland, his family said. He was 100.

Kalb’s death was caused by complications from a recent fall, his younger brother, Marvin Kalb, told CNN by phone.

According to a CNN biography, Kalb traveled the globe for more than three decades as a correspondent covering world affairs for CBS News, NBC News and The New York Times. Kalb then became the first anchor of CNN’s “Reliable Sources” program from 1992 to 1998.

In a statement, CNN Chairman and CEO Chris Licht hailed Kalb as a pioneering journalist.

“Bernard Kalb was an important figure in journalism, and his pioneering efforts to hold our profession to account are immeasurable. Everyone at CNN is sending our deep sympathies to his wife, children and the whole Kalb family,” Licht said.

“Reliable Sources” aired in various iterations for 30 years until CNN canceled the show last year. The program reported on the business of the media industry as well as its journalistic integrity. Hosts would often examine various media outlets’ coverage decisions and debate journalism with guests.

Former CNN executive vice president of news standards and practices Rick Davis, who launched the “Reliable Sources” program with Kalb, called him a true professional.

“We were so fortunate to have Bernie host Reliable Sources from its launch and during all those years. We learned so much from him as he was a walking, talking history professor of journalism in the second half of the 21st century,” Davis told CNN.

“As he said at the start of every program, ‘welcome to Reliable Sources where we turn a critical lens on the media.’ And he meant it. On the program, Bernie was passionate about holding journalists and news organizations accountable. Bernie was a real pro, a gentleman to all the young staff and he never failed to look just right in his striped dress shirts and orange ties. Our sympathies to his wife, his daughters and his brother Marvin and whole Kalb family.”

Beyond his experience in both print and television journalism, Kalb also had the unique advantage of seeing the world from “the other side of the podium.” He served as assistant secretary of state for public affairs and as a spokesman for the State Department for two years until his resignation in October 1986.

As State Department spokesman, he was with the U.S. delegation when President Reagan held his first summit with Mikhail Gorbachev in Geneva in November 1985. As a television correspondent, he accompanied President Nixon on the opening trip to China in 1972 and traveled with presidents and secretaries of state dating back to Nixon and Kissinger on their diplomatic journeys. He received a B.A. from the City College of New York.

“We are all grateful for the many years we have been able to spend with a truly remarkable human being,” Marvin Kalb told CNN. “A great journalist, and speaking as a kid brother, the greatest older brother any kid brother could ever have.”

Kalb covered international affairs for more than three decades at CBS News, NBC News, and The New York Times. For nearly half of that time he was abroad, based in Indonesia, Hong Kong, Paris, and Saigon.

Near the end of his tenure at the Times, Kalb received a fellowship from the Council on Foreign Relations-awarded annually to a foreign correspondent-and took a leave from the newspaper for a year. He also won an Overseas Press Club Award for a 1968 documentary on the Vietcong.

Bernard Kalb and his younger brother, journalist Marvin Kalb, traveled extensively with Henry Kissinger on diplomatic missions and they later wrote a biography titled Kissinger. The brothers also co-authored The Last Ambassador, a novel about the collapse of Saigon in 1975.

In 1984, Kalb was appointed Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs and spokesman for the U.S. State Department. It was the first time that a journalist who covered the State Department had been named as its spokesperson.

Kalb quit this post two years later to protest what he called "the reported disinformation program" conducted by the Reagan Administration against the Libyan leader Col. Muammar al-Gaddafi. Kalb said, "you face a choice, as an American, as a spokesman, as a journalist, whether to allow oneself to be absorbed in the ranks of silence, whether to vanish into unopposed acquiescence or to enter a modest dissent. Faith in the word of America is the pulse beat of our democracy".

In his later career, Kalb traveled as a lecturer and moderator. He was the founding anchor and a panelist on the weekly CNN program Reliable Sources from 1993 to 1998.