WASHINGTON —
Tim Russert, who pointedly but politely questioned hundreds of the powerful and influential as moderator of NBC’s “Meet the Press,” died Friday of an apparent heart attack. The network’s Washington bureau chief was 58.In addition to his weekly program, Russert made periodic appearances on the network’s other news shows, was moderator for numerous political debates and wrote two best-selling books.
NBC interrupted its regular programming to announce Russert’s death, and in the ensuing moments, familiar faces such as Tom Brokaw, Andrea Mitchell and Brian Williams took turns mourning his loss.
RIP Tim.
I will miss him.
Very sad to hear his untimely death at a young 58 years of age. Condolences to his family.
That’s just terrible. He was a great guy.
He will be missed by many, regardless of political conviction.
Tim was the best interviewer. He will be sorely missed.
He was one of the ‘good guys.’ He brought dignity and quality to NBC. ‘Meet The Press’ won’t be the same without him.
Tom Brokaw almost broke up on the live feed prior to network interruption.
I’ll sure miss him.
We lost one of the good guys today.
I’ll miss him. I’ll miss his voice. I have been watching his show for as long as I can remember. I really trusted him more than any other current journalist. My heart goes out to his family.
An extremely intelligent newsman with a great sense of humor, he will be sorely missed.
Bush had him killed because he didn’t drink the kool-aid and totally support the war like an idiot.
Unfortunate. Shouldn’t be too hard for NBC to find another who doesn’t even try to disguise his biases though.
Sorry for the family.
But he was a mediawhore. He was a conservative republican and his bias showed.
The only reson he got famous was he kept bringing up the fat chich in the blue dress “lewinski”.
mediawhore
I herd it was a bacon bit.
Well, it only took 10 posts before the DU idiots showed up! I have to laugh at Evolouie. He was a conservative republican and his bias showed.
Russert worked for Senator Moynaham (D NY) and Gov. Mario Cuomo (D NY)
I have lost respect for almost all in the so called main stream media but felt Russert was right down the middle. Whoever he was interviewing, he took the opposite side. No softballs. He will truly be missed.
Well said BillM. I was watching MSNBC and nearly everyone broke up a bit. Andrea Mitchell came near to tears when she started to recall that he always called her “Mitch.” Russert didn’t know that her father also called her that.
We lost a really great man today, and the world will be a poorer for it.
I wonder if it was an aortic aneurysm. To be completely unresponsive to CPR, it seems like it would have to be something like that. That’s what took out Harvey Korman, and before him, John Ritter. It’s like walking around with your own personal time bomb that you can’t hear ticking.
Regardless, it’s a shame.
hands down the best interviewer of all time
Indeed, he might well have been “the best interviewer” but he still fell short. He was good by challenging current positions with contradictory statements made in the past “but” he all too often let the interviewee off the hook with a single followup to the evasion.
He explained this once saying that it wasn’t his role to get into an argument with the person and after asked and challenged, the viewer could make up their own mind.
The very best interviewer would find a way to make that 2-3-4th followup question to nail the bastards without becoming argumentative?
“Fair and Balanced” is one of the more corrupt ideas to enter our cultural mainstream. The truth is not balanced by a lie.
Seriously, I never saw Tim Russert on TV, although I have seen short clips of him on the web. Could have something to do with me rarely getting up before noon on Sunday, and also having no TV in the house since 2003.
Bobbo, I saw that in his interviews but didn’t know why he did it. I had guessed it was because of the relatively short time format for his show, and some of those pols had a lot to be asked about in that limited time.
He played to intelligent people…the responses to his follow-ups went uncontested, but he was right about viewers. If anyone thinks he was biased on MTP then you need to consider your own biases. He was always fair.
But, being fair is not always about being balanced. Nutball or extreme viewpoints do not deserve the same amount of discussion as mainstream viewpoints. That’s what Fox did so well…they made nutballs seem normal by balancing unbalanced viewpoints more than anyone else.
#20–Olo==We see things pretty much the same, except every politician I have seen is such a smooth liar that one followup challenge pretty much allows the politician to still say anything they wish and get away with it UNLESS the viewer already has the information? So, in a real sense, Russert very rarely “informed” his viewers as the dummies could sit there unswayed while the informed already knew?
Maybe thats harsh. If you didn’t know McSame was against the Bush tax cuts 2 years ago, being informed by Russert that was McCains position would be a piece of information one could confirm after the interview.
I did love the recent exchange where Matthews had to ask 17 times what act of appeasement would take place if Obama talked to a dictator and the zombie took that long to admit he didn’t know. That would make for boring tv if it happened on every question?
My condolences to Mr Russert’s family and friends. I’m sure they will miss him. What is annoying to me is how much the news networks have been playing up his death. He was a newsreader and an interviewer. Let’s face it, very few peoples worlds will be changed by his passing.
My belief is that Russert and the rest of the corporate media have sold the rest of us out by shaping the news to suit their corporate masters. While the dollar has lost over half of its value since 2001 the corporate media pushes stories like Obama calling lower middle class people “bitter” or Clinton lying about being shot at in Bosnia.
Gas has gone from $1.50 to $4 a gallon and the media acts like Bush’s disastrous war in Iraq has nothing to do with it.
NBC now has a chance to replace him with a blond chick with big tits and dumb questions.
#24–Angel==dumb questions? I’ll bet you didn’t know the Obama fist dap was a terrorist sign.
I actually very much enjoy the beauty of the female news readers. What do you want, Andy Rooney?
I think the media has gone a tad overboard with their coverage. Russert just isn’t that important, but you can’t expect reporters to accept that.
I guess the hardcore Hillary fans are saying good riddance. It was Russert’s question on drivers licenses for illegal aliens that started the downfall of the House of Clinton.
Another boomer who abused his body dies young. Not exactly news… R.I.P. Tim
ANOTHER adversary of the Clintons dies unexpectedly. The unfortunate, yet boringly predictable string of deaths keeps getting longer and longer. What a coincidence!