Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Download MP3
The World’s Katy Clark remembers political journalist Robert Novak, who died today at 78.
Read the Transcript
This text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.
LISA MULLINS: A newspaper man who covered elections in the United States for a half century has died. Right-wing columnist and TV host Robert Novak was 78 years old. He died of brain cancer. The World’s Katy Clark reports.
KATY CLARK: Novak was a legendary Washington columnist who relished his nickname – the Prince of Darkness. He said it was become of his unsmiling pessimism about the future of America. To TV audiences Novak was well-known as the long-time combative co-host of CNN’s Crossfire.
CROSSFIRE ANNOUCNER: Crossfire. One the left Tom [PH] Braydon. On the right Robert Novak.
CLARK: Novak made headlines himself in 2003. That’s when he revealed the identity of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame. Plame was the wife of a former US ambassador who had voiced doubts about President Bush’s case for the war in Iraq. The leak eventually lead to a long-running criminal investigation into senior Bush administration officials. Novak always maintained he had done nothing wrong despite the fact that a CIA spokesman had asked him not to print Plame’s name.
ROBERT NOVAK: If anybody had said that I was endangering intelligence operations and if I was endangering anybody’s life I wouldn’t have written it. If Mr. Tenet, director of Central Intelligence – who I knew very well, had a good relationship with – if he had gone on the line with me and said I really don’t want you to write this I wouldn’t have put it in.
CLARK: Novak had many fans including Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell. In paying tribute today McConnell praised Novak for his tireless shoe-leather reporting and keen insight into Washington’s politics and personalities. But some believe that in that in the Valerie Plame case Novak let his audience down. Bob Steele teaches journalism values at the Pointer Institute.
BOB STEELE: He was a very savvy guy and he and many other journalists, particularly columnists, use those in the political arena all the time. And those politicians and government officials also manipulate and use the journalists all the time. And in that particular case one can’t help but think that Novak and some other journalists were less than wise in the way in which they played their cards in the Valerie Plame situation.
CLARK: Steele says unfortunately some will think less of Robert Novak because of the Plame story. He adds that Novak was truly a significant voice in American journalism. For The World this is Katy Clark.
Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.
Discussion
No comments for “Political columnist Robert Novak dies”