Robert Novak Passes Away at 78

I do try to keep an eye on politics, and my obsession with it didn't start until college. One show I watched religiously was Crossfire, starring Novak alongside James Carville, and I remember the "walking out" incident quite vividly (which you can find here). While still in the fire of my politically-charged learning phase, I hated him, gladly called him "The Prince of Darkness," and couldn't have been happier to see him embarrassed and ridiculed on network news. I thought that he'd slink off after that incident on "Crossfire" and then return to his post as the conservative counterpoint to J.C. (James Carville, not Jesus Christ), because he was the only person who could handle the Ragin' Cajun with any adroitness.

The fire in my belly cooled, I became (somewhat) more moderate, and still no Novak. That single incident couldn't have stopped such a pro, could it? It did. It was, sadly, basically his exit from the public eye, as he was found to have a brain tumor some time later and never returned to television or his newspaper column at the Chicago Sun-Times, for which he was probably most well-known. He was 78.

There is, to note, a much longer article over at The Huffington Post.