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Issue date: 9/21/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Meredith Haskins WORDS OF WISDOM: Jim Lehrer lectures at the Doubletree Hotel about his life as a journalist. Topics discussed included the current state of media, politics, his connection to San Antonio and his love of writing.

Thursday, Sept. 20, Jim Lehrer, anchor of the "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," spoke to
a sold-out crowd of over 500 people at the DoubleTree Hotel. The first speaker for the twenty seventh annual Policy Maker Breakfast Series, the lifelong journalist covered
topics ranging from his childhood, the upcoming presidential election, education, and the state of American journalism.
"We probably turned away 80 people from the Jim Lehrer breakfast," said Ann Knoebel, Director of Conferences and Special Programs at Trinity. "After last year, I didn't think it could get any better, and yet we sold this series out within three weeks."
Sell-outs have become a trend. Over the past five years, all but three of the past 20 breakfasts have been sold out. By the end of this year, the series will have brought 110 speakers, hailing from various political leanings, fields and genders, although this is the first in time in six years that the speakers are all men.
Lehrer, who has a 1956 Bachelor of Journalism degree from the University of Missouri, promised words, not wisdom. In his opinion, the upcoming election will be the most open one in years because there is no incumbent president or vice president that's considered an automatic nominee.
"It's real. The choices are real," Lehrer said. "No one has it in the bag…. Only an idiot would stand here on a September morning and tell you [who will win]. And to paraphrase Richard Nixon, 'I am not an idiot.'"
But there is one thing that will affect the election: Iraq. And, with no specific plan
of action, members of different parties have little to get together on, Lehrer said. 
"It's very clear it's going to be the next president who has to do it," Lehrer
said. "President Bush made that clear. As long as Iraq is on the table, it's the only thing on the table."
Lehrer has received numerous awards for journalism, including the 1999 National Humanities Medal, two Emmys, an induction into the Television Hall of fame and the George Foster Peabody Broadcast Award. He has served as moderator for 10 of the nationally televised debates during the past five presidential elections.

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