Robert Novak: 1931-2009

by Fred Barnes
The Weekly Standard
http://www.weeklystandard.com/
08/18/2009 2:10:00 PM


Robert Novak terrified Washington. Elected and appointed officials, Democrats and Republicans, lobbyists and self-styled defenders of the "public interest" -- few were comfortable when Novak had them in his sights. Nor should they have been. The reason was simple: Bob Novak didn't play political games. He wasn't partisan. If he came across useful information about anyone, it would appear in his syndicated column. Novak died today at 78.

FILE - In this Feb. 12, 2007 file photo, syndicated columnist Robert Novak, left, and his attorney James Hamilton, leave federal court in Washington. Novak, who was a central figure in the Valerie Plame CIA leak case, has died. (AP)

It's not too much to call Novak journalism's last honest man in Washington. Ideologically, he was conservative, the more so the older he grew. He was quite up front about this. But he didn't cover for his allies or mistreat his adversaries. If a conservative Republican disappointed him, Novak would let you know.

He was unique in another way: his reporting. His column, which he wrote for four decades with Rowland Evans, had a slant and plenty of analysis. Its strength, however, consisted of big scoops or nuggets of fresh reporting. No other columnist could match this. Appearing three days a week in the Washington Post, it was a column that couldn't be ignored.

The relentless, remorseless reporter -- the Prince of Darkness, as he fashioned himself publicly -- was only one side of Bob Novak. The other was a kind man, a patriot, a doting grandfather, a pal of liberal and conservative journalists alike, and a mentor to many younger men in the media, including me.

I was a reporter for the now-defunct Washington Evening Star newspaper when I met Bob Novak in 1973. He was already a world-famous columnist. We were both covering then-Vice President Gerald Ford. We struck up a conversation -- about basketball.

He was an astute fan of the game and we got season's tickets together the next year -- and for 35 years after that -- for the Washington Bullets (now Wizards) NBA team. Novak rarely missed a game.

He also was a fan of the University of Maryland for reasons too obscure for me to go into. When Maryland won the NCAA basketball championship in 2002, Novak and his son Alex attended every game, home and away. Meanwhile, he kept up a heavy schedule of TV appearances, speeches, reporting trips, and heavily reported columns. Novak was the hardest working man in journalism.

Novak mixed basketball and reporting. He went to China in 1978 and made a huge splash when he visited Democracy Wall in Beijing and interviewed Chinese leader Teng Hsaio-ping. On the way home, he stopped in LA to see a Maryland basketball game, flying home to Washington on the team plane. He told me later that only one person on the plane opened a book during the flight and it wasn't one of the "student athletes." It was Novak.

He wasn't always a conservative. In the 1960s and into the 1970s, he was a moderate Republican legendary for punching out a Goldwater delegate who was harassing him at the 1964 Republican convention in San Francisco. And even when he became a conservative, he wasn't a conventional one.

Novak became a champion of supply-side economics before Ronald Reagan had even heard of the newest version of free market economics. And in column after column, he wrote about the new apostle of the supply-side message, Jack Kemp. Along with Bob Bartley of the Wall Street Journal, Novak was responsible for popularizing supply-side and making it the economic policy of the Reagan administration.

President Reagan was one of Novak's few favorites in the White House, though he knew President Johnson well and indeed married a woman, Geraldine Williams, who worked for him. And Novak split with both President Bushes on their wars in Iraq. He favored a non-interventionist foreign policy.

His last major scoop was the revelation that Valerie Plame, a CIA employee, was behind her husband's trip to Africa and later attack on President George W. Bush. Democrats blamed the Bush White House for the leak, but it turned out Novak had heard about it from State Department deputy secretary Richard Armitage.

Born Jewish, Novak converted to Christianity at age 66 after an encounter with a young Catholic woman at Syracuse University. Her comment that he needed to make up his mind about his faith prompted him to join the Catholic church a year later.

That episode is the subject of one chapter, entitled Conversion, in his memoir, The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years of Reporting in Washington. There aren't many great books about Washington, but Novak's is one, all 639 pages of it. The book is dedicated to his wife, "my intrepid and loving partner."


Fred Barnes is executive editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.


Robert Novak, R.I.P.

Faith, freedom, and free enterprise.

By Larry Kudlow
National Review
http://www.nationalreview.com/
August 18, 2009, 5:19 p.m.

Now we say good-bye to Robert Novak, who passed away early Tuesday morning at the age of 78. Yet another conservative icon has left us. He was a good friend, and an amazing reporter. In fact, I believe he was the best reporter of his generation, which spans all the way back to the Eisenhower years.

Bob had a lot of opinions — conservative opinions; Reaganesque opinions. But his pursuit of journalistic detail, facts, scoops, and stories that no one else got was remarkable. He was “old school” in this respect, which is why he was so esteemed by political allies and critics alike.

Shoe leather is a term that comes to mind, and doggedness, and very hard work. Bob had a deep distrust of government. But even during the Reagan years, when I confess to being a source, Bob would write tough stories about the administration he supported. That was the thing about Bob: He was both a conservative icon in terms of his unswerving political beliefs, and a journalistic icon in terms of his unyielding tradecraft.

His last book, The Prince of Darkness, is a phenomenal account of Washington over the last 50-some-odd years. And it is a brilliant account of politics by a guy who refused to trust politicians, even the ones he favored. I can’t think of anybody today who writes the way Bob Novak wrote.

I knew him well, from tons of television work. We actually had a show together for a year back in 1990. It was called Money Politics. It was produced by Neal Freeman and it ran every Sunday until the deep recession turned it off.

Down through the years I had many an encounter with Bob on CNN’s Crossfire. Even though we agreed on most issues, he’d still come after me for one thing or another. You had to be on guard. Bob was a hoot.

He also was an anti-Communist hawk on foreign policy and a supply-sider on the economy. In The Prince of Darkness he wrote that Jude Wanniski’s The Way the World Works was the most influential book he ever read.

Down through the years Bob proselytized for the work of Wanniski, Art Laffer, Bob Mundell, Jack Kemp, and many of us lesser lights in the movement. He believed in low tax rates to grow the economy and a gold-backed dollar to keep prices stable. Sounds almost quaint today, in Obama’s very-big-government Washington. But it really was the heart of the successful Reagan economic revolution.Back in July 2007, after the publication of The Prince of Darkness, I interviewed Bob once again on CNBC. He was as sharp as a tack and remarkably conversant on everything. We had him on for almost the whole show. It was a real treat.

One of the great things about Bob was how he stood by his friends through thick and thin. I know this from personal experience. Though I first met him in the late 1970s, our friendship became much closer after I crashed and burned over alcohol and drug abuse in the mid-1990s. He congratulated me for moving on, and he exhorted and encouraged me in my new full-time career in broadcast journalism and column-writing. I loved him for that. Bob was a tough guy, but not with his friends. He was loyal. So am I.

Over the past twelve years Bob became a strong and devout traditional Catholic. He converted at the age of 66 as he came to grips with faith and embraced Jesus Christ. He did so on very personal terms, without any drama, but his belief was strong and deep. He came to believe that Christ died for us and our sins and for our salvation. As he looked back on his own life, and his several brushes with death, he came to understand that Jesus saved him and had a purpose for him.

As a Catholic convert myself, I often spoke with Bob as he neared his final decision. I had been received into the Church a few years earlier, and Bob would call me not so much for advice, but to talk about my decision. I always told him to follow his heart and his instincts. He did, with enormous grace.

In the past year and a half, conservative giants Bill Buckley, Jack Kemp, and now Robert Novak have departed. These were very different people, but they were all phenomenal leaders. They dedicated their lives to faith, freedom, and free enterprise. I was blessed to know all three men very well. They had an immeasurable influence on my life.But for today I am saddened by the passing of my friend Bob Novak. May he rest in peace.

— Larry Kudlow, NRO’s Economics Editor, is host of CNBC’s The Kudlow Report and author of the daily web blog, Kudlow’s Money Politic$.


Robert Novak, Long-Time Conservative Columnist, Dies at 78

Washington's 'Prince of Darkness' Broke High-Stakes Scoops

By Adam Bernstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Tuesday, August 18, 2009 1:03 PM

Robert D. Novak, 78, an influential columnist and panelist on TV news-discussion shows who called himself a "stirrer up of strife" on behalf of conservative causes, died today at his home in Washington of a brain tumor first diagnosed in July 2008.

FILE- In this Aug. 15, 1958 black-and-white file photo, Associated Press staff reporter Robert Novak is shown at work as he talks on the telephone in the Senate Press Gallery on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP)

Mr. Novak's "Inside Report" syndicated column, shared for 30 years with the late Rowland Evans, was important reading for anyone who wanted to know what was happening in Washington. Mr. Novak and Evans broke stories about presidential politics, fiscal policy and intra-party feuds. Their journalism, which reported leaks from the highest sources of government, often had embarrassing consequences for politicians.

In recent years, Mr. Novak was best known for publicly identifying CIA operative Valerie Plame. His July 14, 2003, column was printed days after Plame's husband, former U.S. ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, publicly claimed that the Bush White House had knowingly distorted intelligence that Iraq tried to obtain uranium from Africa.

The column triggered a lengthy federal investigation into the Plame leak and resulted in the 2007 conviction of a top vice presidential aide, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, for perjury and obstruction of justice. President George W. Bush later commuted Libby's prison term.

Mr. Novak was accused by prominent journalists of being a pawn in a government retribution campaign against Wilson. Mr. Novak, who had called the U.S. invasion of Iraq "unjustified," denied the allegation.
He wrote that his initial column was meant to ask why Wilson had been sent on a CIA fact-finding mission involving the uranium. Then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage mentioned Plame's CIA position to Mr. Novak, and Bush aide Karl Rove confirmed it.

In a 2006 column, Mr. Novak wrote that Armitage "did not slip me this information as idle chitchat. . . . He made clear he considered it especially suited for my column." Armitage told The Washington Post that his disclosure to Mr. Novak was made in an offhand manner and that he did not know why Plame's husband was sent to Africa.

Mr. Novak lamented that the Plame story would "forever be part of my public identity" despite having written columns he said were more important.

Until the Plame controversy, Mr. Novak had largely been known as a strong anti-Communist in his foreign policy views. He also was an leading advocate of supply-side economics, a belief that tax cuts would lead to widespread financial prosperity.

David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union lobbying organization, said that Mr. Novak helped transform supply-side economics from a fringe idea into a tenet of President Ronald Reagan's economic policy. Keene called Mr. Novak "a giant of the profession" who "gave respectability and visibility to conservative ideas and positions in the 1970s, when they were mostly dismissed."

Mr. Novak was a congressional reporter for the Associated Press and the Wall Street Journal before he teamed with Evans in 1963 to write a Washington-based political column for the old New York Herald-Tribune. "Inside Report" ran in almost 300 papers nationally, including The Post. Mr. Novak continued the column after Evans's retirement in 1993. Evans died in 2001.

Focusing on political intrigue rather than starchy analysis, they had an immediate effect with news about Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater's likely nomination as the Republican presidential candidate in 1964.

The Goldwater story led a Newsweek profile about the duo that helped shape their formidable reputation. But as Mr. Novak wryly noted, the Newsweek account was written by his close friend Michael Janeway.
"Little in Washington is on the level," Mr. Novak wrote in his 2007 memoir, "The Prince of Darkness," which had long been his nickname.

He earned that sobriquet in the early 1960s for what he called his swarthy looks, poor skills as a raconteur and "grim-visaged demeanor." He said that his unsmiling pessimism was a stark contrast with the upbeat spirit of the Kennedy administration and its many admirers in elite journalism circles and that he was a strikingly different type of Washington insider than his business partner Evans, a debonair Georgetowner at ease on the city's dinner circuit.

Mr. Novak was considered by many Washington colleagues to be far more generous than the scowling character he assumed on television debate programs such as CNN's "Crossfire," but he said the more combative aspect of his personality was heightened on television.

He wrote in his memoir, "I found myself engaged on issues I seldom wrote about: capital punishment, gay rights, abortion and gun control. I was never asked to take any position I opposed, but the process had the effect of hardening my positions."

The format of such shows as "The McLaughlin Group" and "Crossfire" pitted liberals such as Bill Press and James Carville against conservatives such as Mr. Novak and Pat Buchanan and left them to spar on divisive social issues.

The TV programs helped define Mr. Novak's reputation as a self-professed "right-wing ideologue." He wrote in his autobiography that he rarely disliked those with whom he appeared combative -- one significant exception was then-presidential candidate Jimmy Carter, whom the columnist called a populist demagogue and "habitual liar."

On one episode of "Face the Nation," Mr. Novak insisted that the candidate reveal which members of the diplomatic corps Carter objected to as "fat, bloated, ignorant" and unqualified except for being Nixon financiers. Carter declined to answer, and Mr. Novak persisted: "Can you name one, though? You make the accusation all over. There are only four ambassadors, governor, who have contributions to Mr. Nixon. Are any of them that fit that category?"

New York Times television critic Walter Goodman wrote in 1993 that Mr. Novak along with McLaughlin and Rush Limbaugh showed "a cruder face of conservatism. The insurgents do not trade in intellectual display. . . . Their fire is directed mainly at liberal Democrats, but their styles offer an implicit rebuff to the Republican establishment."

Nicholas Lemann, dean of Columbia University's journalism school, said Mr. Novak "took great pleasure in playing the bad guy, the heavy, like guys in pro wrestling who come out all dressed in black. He'd sort of sneer and say the mean thing, so he developed that as part of a character he played on TV. It works with the medium to have a bad guy, and most journalists don't want to do that."

Robert David Sanders Novak was born Feb. 26, 1931, in Joliet, Ill., into a family that voted Republican. He said he became attracted to politics after his father, superintendent of a gas production plant, let him stay up late to listen over the radio to the 1940 Republican Party convention.

His family's heritage was Lithuanian Jewish, but Mr. Novak said he grew disenchanted with liberal sermons at synagogue and fell away from religion until undergoing a conversion to Catholicism in the late 1990s because of "spiritual hunger."

After attending the University of Illinois, where he began his journalism career, he reported for the Associated Press in the Midwest before the wire service sent him to Washington in 1957. He said his devotion to work helped end his first marriage, to an Indianapolis socialite named Rosanna Hall. In 1962, he married Geraldine Williams, then-secretary to a top aide of then-Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson.

She survives, along with their two children, Zelda Caldwell of Washington and Alexander Novak of Bethesda, and eight grandchildren.

In Washington, Mr. Novak's early mentor was Willard Edwards, a Chicago Tribune reporter of such anti-Communist sympathies that he often sat on the dais with members of a Senate internal security subcommittee.
Edwards introduced the young reporter to politicians whom many in the press corps considered radioactive for their far-right ideology. Important tips from those congressmen helped Mr. Novak land scoops and win a reputation for aggressive coverage of Capitol Hill.

Bruised feelings, Mr. Novak wrote in his memoir, were often soothed over many cocktails. He added that his healthy ego was useful in handling inevitable complaints from powerful people.

When he printed an accurate tip that Alexander M. Haig Jr., President Gerald R. Ford's chief of staff, was out of favor with the president and would soon lose his job, Mr. Novak said he received an irate call from Haig, who threatened to sue for $5 million.

"Al," he replied, "you're out of luck. I don't have $5 million."

Mr. Novak wrote several books about Republican politics, but he said it was his skill at wooing members of both major parties that led to newsmaking exclusives.

A few months before he became presidential candidate George McGovern's running mate in 1972, Sen. Thomas Eagleton (D-Mo.) had confided to Mr. Novak, "McGovern is for amnesty, abortion and legalization of pot. Once middle America -- Catholic middle America, in particular -- finds this out, he's dead."

Eagleton insisted his name not be linked to the quote, and Mr. Novak reported at the time that the quotation came from "one liberal senator." The column caused a political furor.

Mr. Novak said he faced enormous pressure by Democrats to reveal his source, and some accused him of making up the quotation. Mr. Novak kept his promise to Eagleton and did not name him as the source until after Eagleton died in 2007.

A similar high-profile debate arose over Mr. Novak's refusal to name his source for the Plame column. After the column appeared, Mr. Novak endured threats to his family and attributed the loss of his work at CNN to the ordeal. He also amassed legal fees of $160,000.

In his memoir, Mr. Novak said he would not have used Plame's name if the CIA director or the agency's spokesman told him it would have endangered national security or Plame's life. A CIA spokesman had twice warned Mr. Novak not to print Plame's name but could not reveal why to Mr. Novak because her status was classified.

Mr. Novak told Washingtonian magazine in November that he would not hesitate to run the column again. "I'd go full speed ahead because of the hateful and beastly way in which my left-wing critics in the press and Congress tried to make a political affair out of it and tried to ruin me," he said.

"My response now is this: The hell with you. They didn't ruin me. I have my faith, my family and a good life. A lot of people love me -- or like me. So they failed. I would do the same thing over again because I don't think I hurt Valerie Plame whatsoever."

RePosted

Link Is Forged by Rockefeller and Goldwater
In their first political column, Rowland Evans and Robert Novak explored a campaign-season collaboration between left-leaning Republican Gov. Nelson Rockefeller and right-leaning Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater. As Novak wrote 45 years later: "Like many of my 'scoops,' it proved ephemeral."

Behind Humphrey's Surge
This column, highlighting Sen. George McGovern's support for "amnesty, abortion and the legalization of pot," contributed to the defeat of his presidential candidacy.

Mr. Ford's Advisers: Gen. Haig Must Go
Evans and Novak predicted, accurately, that President Ford's chief of staff was on his way out -- a column that prompted threats from Haig.

Supply-Side Triumph
Devoted supply-siders, Evans and Novak cheered the "triumph of supply-side economics as the reigning doctrine of Republicanism."

Mission To Niger
Novak's best-known column, in which he publicly identified CIA operative Valerie Plame.

My Leak Case Testimony
After the conclusion of the Plame leak investigation, Novak wrote about his role.

Death of the Chief
The death of Chief Illiniwek epitomizes such unsavory aspects of contemporary American public life as political correctness, hypocrisy and bureaucratic tyranny.

Arm's-Length Leniency
In the Libby case, President Bush made a Solomonic decision -- if King Solomon had actually split the baby and given halves to rival mothers.

Why Lott Cashed It In
For Trent Lott, like many in today's Congress, big money trumps public service.

A Column's 45 Years
On May 15, 2008, Novak claimed the nation's current longest-running syndicated political column.

How a Tumor Is Changing My Life
"I thought 51 years of rough-and-tumble journalism in Washington had made me more enemies than friends," Novak wrote, "but my recent experience suggests the opposite may be the case."


Memories of working for Robert Novak

By: David Freddoso
Commentary Staff Writer
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/
August 18, 2009

There I was, 27 years-old and still working my first job in Washington. And I was staring down Robert David Sanders Novak.

"Writing an editorial," he told me, "is like wetting your pants in a dark suit. It gives you this a nice, warm feeling, and no one notices."


with Karl Rove

I wasn't a source -- I was a job applicant. This was Novak's way of counseling a young, conservative writer to stick to factual reporting as much as possible, to avoid becoming a career commentator. After asking me a series of questions -- all of which surely violated some federal employment law ("Do you plan on getting married soon? What are your politics?") -- Novak hired me as his assistant.

In late 2004, when I started working for him, Novak was writing three news-filled columns every week. By itself, the column was more work than most people could handle, but it was only a small part of what he did in a typical week. At age 74, and still recovering from a broken hip, he was also making two or three appearances on CNN's Crossfire each week. He was producing and appearing on Capitol Gang, which taped every Friday for Saturday night. He made brief Monday afternoon appearances with Judy Woodruff on the CNN segment called "Novak's Notebook." He was still doing a show then called "The Novak Zone," in addition to writing about one-third of the 4,000-word Evans-Novak Political Report every two weeks.

As if that wasn't enough, he was also writing his memoir at that time, The Prince of Darkness. He would produce a new chapter every two to three weeks for me and his other two staffers to copy-edit. The final, 667-page product is formidable, but consider that Novak's first draft was twice that length -- and just as gripping, in my opinion. (By unfortunate necessity, some great material had to be left on the cutting-room floor.)

If Novak's schedule seems unrealistic or ridiculous to you as I've recounted it above, just imagine how I felt as I watched him stick to it, week after week.

Novak was a master of using time well, which is part of why he was so effective. Despite his dark public image, he was not a mean or angry man -- in fact, he was a very dear friend to me and a kind, generous man. But he could become very angry when someone was impeding his work. That was how he got so much done.

On one particular day in 2007, I was the problem. I had been out of cell phone service range for 90 minutes, watching some of the Republican presidential candidates address conservatives at the Omni Shoreham hotel in Washington. I ducked outside after Mitt Romney's speech to find eight messages waiting: "David, I could just ***ing kill you right now. Where the hell are you?"

In that brief period, the boss had somehow lost his column for Monday -- he couldn't figure out where he had saved it on his computer an hour earlier.

There are a lot of famous stories in circulation about Bob Novak, and surely many of them will find their way into print this week -- the blowup with James Carville and the Plame Affair, for example. But the man I'll always remember is the one who used to call me late at night with his Microsoft Word problems: "The screen just turned all blue;" "It just doesn't look the way it's supposed to;" "Why is everything I type red and underlined?" I once had to talk him through "recovering" a file he had accidentally minimized on his screen. Sometimes I wondered whether he ever slept.

I will also remember that even if Novak needed a lot of help with some aspects of the modern world, he never needed help understanding its politics or finding a story in it. He worked tirelessly, and he spoke with everyone. That's how he kept his must-read news column running so hot for so long and with such consistency. He could always find something fresh and newsworthy with which to treat his readers in every column.

Novak's column, Inside Report, was the joy of his working life. He never cared much about his performance on television, but he'd always ask your opinion of his column. And the most important columns were not always the ones that got the most attention. The throwaway tip he got from Richard Armitage in July 2003 was the one that caused the biggest political mess. But, to offer just one example, his less-noticed column of July 30, 2007 might have prevented U.S. involvement in a bloody new war over Kurdistan.

I spoke to Novak only a few times in the last year of his life. I was told that his illness was hard on him in his final days, and he was unable to see a small group of us Novak alumni a few weeks ago.

When he was forced to retire -- and he never would have retired otherwise -- I wondered whether perhaps God, whom he found late in life, was giving him a chance to experience rest and peace while he was still alive. God willing, he rests now in peace.