Last week foreign correspondent pioneer Christiane Amanpour visited the ASU Walter Cronkite School of Journalism to accept the 2011 Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism.  During her visit she did a Q&A session for the public pertaining to her extensive career in reporting international affairs.  From interviewing Moammar Gadhafi weeks before his death to her love hate relationship with Ted Turner, she reminisced on the many moments in history she witnessed first hand. Although she has witnessed many amazing moments in time she briefly discussed witnessing casualties in times of war reporting and her own brushes with death.  Amanpour has reported on every major event from Iran, Sudan to Kuwait and after 27 years of being a foreign correspondent for CNN she now has her own show on ABC News.  When Amanpour was asked directly about her annual income she was quick to say that if you want to work in the field of Journalism to make money you might as well quit, that its a difficult, thankless job and you have to be passionate about it in order to have a successful career.  The moderator was quick to point out that Amanpour is the highest paid female correspondent since she was so bashful to mention so.  Amanpour is last of a dying breed, an investigative journalist that thoroughly reports on world issues with hard line, objective journalism.  An inspiration to the next generation of “muckrakers”

-J.G.