Politics & Power Quote by Diane Sawyer

Sawyer is quietly dismantling the old altar of journalistic gatekeeping: the idea that “real news” is a fixed category, policed by high-minded arbiters who know better than the audience. By calling her definition “liberal,” she’s not pledging allegiance to a political camp; she’s signaling elasticity. News, in her framing, is less a sacred list of civic necessities and more a living contract with attention.

The key word is “excites.” It’s both democratic and dangerous. Democratic because it admits what broadcasters have always known but rarely confess: public interest isn’t a distraction from the mission, it’s the fuel. Dangerous because “excitement” is a slippery substitute for significance, and it’s the logic that can turn a newsroom into an adrenaline economy. Sawyer’s subtext is a veteran’s pragmatism: if people don’t watch, you can’t inform them, investigate for them, or hold power to account on their behalf.

Her second sentence does the reputational work. “Sanctimonious” is a sharp choice, positioning traditional definitions of news as moral posturing rather than principle. She’s preempting the purist critique - that human-interest stories, celebrity trials, lifestyle segments, and “soft” features dilute the civic bloodstream - by suggesting that rigidity can be its own kind of vanity.

Context matters: Sawyer’s career spans the rise of 24-hour cable, the ratings wars, and the gradual merger of news and entertainment. The quote reads like a defense of broadcast-era adaptability, and an early admission of a tension we now live with daily: attention isn’t just how news travels; it’s what news becomes.