On Tuesday, as Norah O’Donnell was walking me through her surprise decision to step down from CBS Evening News in pursuit of more cross-platform and hopefully zeitgeist-inducing Pope Francis-style interview specials, it occurred to me that the delicate choreography surrounding her career shift—the emphasis on her new Barbara Walters–ish incarnation, the de-emphasis on the future of the Evening News, even the offer to give me an exclusive interview—belied the real upheaval actually taking place at one of America’s most storied journalistic institutions. As I reported on Tuesday, CBS Evening News is now likely to transition to an ensemble cast of rotating anchors behind the desk, ironically making the House of Cronkite the first network to relinquish the half-century-plus format of a singular, expensive anchor in the chair. (For the record, CBS News has not said or confirmed this, but… well, this is why you pay for Puck).