Issues and Answers

{{Short description|US weekly TV news program}}

{{pp-sock|small=yes}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}}

{{Infobox television

| image = Issues and Answers.jpg

| presenter = Howard K. Smith

Bob Clark

| country = United States

| language = English

| runtime = appx. 30 minutes

| channel = ABC

| first_aired = {{start date|1960|11|27}}

| last_aired = {{end date|1981|11|8}}

| open_theme = Second Suite in F for Military Band, Movement III: "Song of the Blacksmith" (Op. 28, No. 2)

| end_theme =

| composer = Gustav Holst

| producer = Peggy Whedon

| related = This Week (successor)

}}

Issues and Answers was a weekly Sunday morning talk show telecast by the American Broadcasting Company from November 27, 1960{{cite magazine | author = | date = 3 July 1961 | title = The politicians can't say 'no' to a lady | url = https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-BC/BC-1961/1961-07-03-BC.pdf | department = Programming | magazine = Broadcasting | location = Washington, DC | publisher = Broadcasting Publications Inc. | access-date = 28 December 2024 | page = 70 | quote = The show went on the air last November.}} to November 8, 1981. At the time, Sunday morning talk shows as they are now carried actually aired in mid-afternoons on Sundays before sports divisions had taken over the time slot in full, and the network distributed the show either live airing or for later broadcast to its affiliates (though interviews were often recorded in the later part of the previous week on Thursdays or Fridays).

Issues and Answers was ABC's counterpart to NBC's Meet the Press and CBS's Face the Nation. It featured TV reporters interviewing selected newsmakers of the contemporary time period – mainly domestic and foreign government officials and other insiders. Unlike the other networks' news-interview TV programs, which featured newspaper and radio reporters along with TV correspondents, Issues and Answers more commonly featured only personnel from ABC News.

For its entire run it was produced by Margaret "Peggy" Whedon, one of ABC's first female correspondents.{{cite magazine | author = | date = 17 January 1983 | title = Peggy Whedon | url = https://www.worldradiohistory.com/hd2/IDX-Business/Magazines/Archive-BC-IDX/83-OCR/BC-1983-01-17-OCR-Page-0141.pdf | department = Fates & Fortunes | magazine = Broadcasting | volume = 104 | number = 3 | location = Washington, DC | publisher = Broadcasting Publications Inc. | access-date = 28 December 2024 | page = 141}}

Issues and Answers aired its last edition on November 8, 1981, and replaced on November 15 by the re-formatted and hour-long This Week with David Brinkley, which remains on the air as of 2025, and now features George Stephanopoulos as moderator.{{cite news | last = O'Neal Parker | first = Lonnae | date = 25 September 1996 | title = Margaret Whedon Dies at 80 | url = https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1996/09/25/margaret-whedon-dies-at-80/29763d2f-5a6c-494a-a36d-6b860fbe65e5/ | url-access = subscription | work = The Washington Post | access-date = 28 December 2024}}