It's been six months since news legend Walter Cronkite died. Cronkite's voice has remained on 'CBS Evening News' for quite a while, but that is now going to change.

Morgan Freeman, the man with the smoothest voice in Hollywood, is now going to do voice-overs for CBS, replacing those previously done by Cronkite. Cronkite recorded the original voice-overs in 2006, when Katie Couric took over as the lead anchor for the show. When Cronkite died on July 17, his voice remained.

"As comforting as it is to look back on the great career that Walter had, we're looking forward now, and we just felt it was the right time to make the move that at some point had to be made," said CBS News and Sports President Sean McManus. "This seemed like the appropriate time since Walter's passing to make the move."

Freeman's presence on the team now gives CBS more flexibility to record intros that are specific to the events being covered or when Couric is on location.

I applaud the move by CBS, given that it's always nice to see a greater African American presence in media. It is my greatest hope that CBS and other media outlets also continue the quest to put more meaningful African American voices on the air, since there is still no major news show being hosted by any African American on CNN, Fox, MSNBC, ABC, NBC or CBS (Roland Martin guest hosted a CNN show for a while, and Tony Harris does the news on CNN, but there is no black Nancy Grace or Glenn Beck). This has got to change.
Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition. To have Dr. Boyce's commentary delivered to your e-mail, please click here.