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Russert appeared briefly in a scene on the television drama ''[[Homicide: Life on the Street|Homicide]]'' as himself. On that show, one of the fictional characters, [[Megan Russert]], was his cousin. Russert also appeared on the [[Nickelodeon (TV channel)|Nickelodeon]] game show ''[[What Would You Do?]]''
Russert appeared briefly in a scene on the television drama ''[[Homicide: Life on the Street|Homicide]]'' as himself. On that show, one of the fictional characters, [[Megan Russert]], was his cousin. Russert also appeared on the [[Nickelodeon (TV channel)|Nickelodeon]] game show ''[[What Would You Do?]]''


Tim Russert married [[Maureen Orth]] in 1983. They met each other at the 1976 Democratic National Convention. Orth has been a special correspondent for ''[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'' since 1993. They have a son, Luke, who graduated from [[Boston College]] in 2008 and hosts the XM radio show ''60/20 Sports'' with [[James Carville]]. Russert was a [[Washington Nationals]] and [[Washington Wizards]] season ticket holder.<ref>{{cite web|accessdate=2008-06-13|url=http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/02/05/this_russert_will_be_interrogating_athletes_on_radio/|title=This Russert will be interrogating athletes on radio |work=[[The Boston Globe]]|date=2006-02-05|author=Reiss, Mike}}</ref>
Tim Russert married [[Maureen Orth]] in 1983. They met each other at the 1976 Democratic National Convention. Orth has been a special correspondent for ''[[Vanity Fair (magazine)|Vanity Fair]]'' since 1993. They have a son, Luke, who graduated from [[Boston College]] in 2008 and hosts the XM radio show ''60/20 Sports'' with [[James Carville]]. Russert was a [[Washington Nationals]] and [[Washington Wizards]] season ticket holder.<ref>{{cite web|accessdate=2008-06-13|url=http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2006/02/05/this_russert_will_be_interrogating_athletes_on_radio/|title=This Russert will be interrogating athletes on radio |work=[[The Boston Globe]]|date=2006-02-05|author=Reiss, Mike}}</ref> Russert was elected to the board of directors of the [[Baseball Hall of Fame]] in Cooperstown, New York in 2003.<ref>http://washington.nationals.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20080613&content_id=2907226&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb</ref>


===CIA leak scandal===
===CIA leak scandal===

Revision as of 01:30, 14 June 2008

Tim Russert
Tim Russert, October 22 2007
Born(1950-05-07)May 7, 1950
Buffalo, New York, U.S.
DiedJune 13, 2008(2008-06-13) (aged 58)
Washington, D.C.
OccupationJournalist
Notable credit(s)Meet the Press moderator
(1991–2008)
SpouseMaureen Orth (married 1983)
ChildrenLuke
Websitehttp://msnbc.msn.com/id/4459759/

Timothy John Russert, Jr. (May 7 1950 – June 13 2008[1]) was an American journalist who hosted NBC's Meet the Press. Serving more than 16 years as moderator, he was the longest-serving host of the program. He was NBC News' Washington Bureau Chief and also hosted the self-titled CNBC/MSNBC weekend interview program Tim Russert. He was a frequent correspondent and guest on NBC's The Today Show and Hardball. He co-hosted the network's presidential Election Night coverage and presented the polling results of the NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey on the NBC Nightly News. Russert collapsed and died in NBC's Washington studios on Friday June 13 2008.[2]

Biography

Early life

Born in Buffalo, New York to Irish American Catholic parents, he received a Jesuit education.[3] Russert was an alumnus of Canisius High School in Buffalo and a graduate of John Carroll University and Cleveland-Marshall College of Law at Cleveland State University. Russert commented on Meet the Press that he went to Woodstock "in a Buffalo Bills jersey with a case of beer". Russert was admitted to the bar in New York and the District of Columbia. He served as counselor in New York Governor Mario Cuomo's office in Albany from 1983 to 1984 and was chief of staff to Democratic Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan from 1977 to 1982. While in law school, an official from his alma mater, John Carroll University, called Russert to ask if he could book some concerts for the school as he had done while a student. He agreed, but said he would need money because he was running out of money to pay for law school. One concert that Russert booked was headlined by a then-unknown singer, Bruce Springsteen, who charged $2,500 for the concert appearance. Russert told this story to Jay Leno when he was a guest on the The Tonight Show on NBC on June 6 2006.[4] On September 28 2007, Springsteen and the E Street Band played live on the Today show in Rockefeller Plaza, and Russert could be seen listening to the music in casual dress toward the front of the stage.

File:Russertmarkerboard.jpeg
Russert with his trademark white marker board

Career

Russert graduated from law school and worked on New York Democrat Daniel Patrick Moynihan's Senatorial campaign in 1976. He worked on New York Democrat Mario Cuomo's gubernatorial campaign in 1982. Russert was hired by NBC at their Washington Bureau in 1984. He arranged for Pope John Paul II's first interview on American television in 1985.[2] He became Washington Bureau Chief in 1988.[5]

Russert calculated possible United States Electoral College outcomes on a marker board on the air during NBC's coverage of the 2000 presidential election and memorably summed up the outcome as dependent upon "Florida, Florida, Florida."[6] Russert again accurately predicted the final battleground of the presidential elections of 2004: "Ohio, Ohio, Ohio." On the MSNBC show Tucker, Russert predicted the battleground states of the 2008 presidential election would be New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona and Nevada, saying, "If Democrats can win three of those four, they can lose Ohio and Florida, and win the presidency."[7]

Russert took over the Sunday morning program Meet the Press in 1991, and would become the longest serving host of the program. Its name was changed to Meet the Press with Tim Russert, and went to an hour-long format in 1992. Russert was known especially for his extensive research in preparation for interviews. One common approach he used was to find old quotes or video clips that he would present to guests that were inconsistent with their more recent statements, and then ask them to clarify their positions. Russert, who was a Senior Vice President of NBC News, often moderated political debates.

An avid fan of the Buffalo Bills football team, Russert usually closed Sunday broadcasts during the football season with some type of pro-Bills comment. He had also ended his show by mentioning the successes of Boston College football, baseball, and hockey.

During his career, Russert received 48 honorary doctorates and won several awards for excellence in journalism including the Edward R. Murrow Award from the Radio-Television News Directors Association, the John Peter Zenger Freedom of the Press Award, the American Legion Journalism Award, the Veterans of Foreign Wars News Media Award, the Congressional Medal of Honor Society Journalism Award, the Allen H. Neuharth Award for Excellence in Journalism, the David Brinkley Award for Excellence in Communication and the Catholic Academy for Communication's Gabriel Award.[2] Russert also received an Emmy Award in 2005 for his coverage of the funeral of Ronald Reagan.[8]

Personal life

Russert's recent book, Wisdom of Our Fathers

Russert penned a bestselling autobiography, Big Russ and Me, in 2004 (ISBN 978-1401352080), which chronicled his life growing up in a predominantly Irish working-class neighborhood in South Buffalo and his education at Canisius High School. Russert's father, a World War II veteran who held down two jobs after the war, emphasized the importance of maintaining strong family values through the methods of the "carrot and the stick," the reverence of faith, and of never taking a short cut to reach a goal. Russert claimed to have received over 60,000 letters from people in response to the book, detailing their own experiences with their fathers.[citation needed] He released Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons in 2005, a collection of some of these letters, which also became a bestseller.

Russert appeared briefly in a scene on the television drama Homicide as himself. On that show, one of the fictional characters, Megan Russert, was his cousin. Russert also appeared on the Nickelodeon game show What Would You Do?

Tim Russert married Maureen Orth in 1983. They met each other at the 1976 Democratic National Convention. Orth has been a special correspondent for Vanity Fair since 1993. They have a son, Luke, who graduated from Boston College in 2008 and hosts the XM radio show 60/20 Sports with James Carville. Russert was a Washington Nationals and Washington Wizards season ticket holder.[9] Russert was elected to the board of directors of the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York in 2003.[10]

CIA leak scandal

Scooter Libby, chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that Russert was the first to tell him of the identity of Central Intelligence Agency officer Valerie Plame (Mrs. Joseph C. Wilson). Russert testified previously and again in United States v. I. Lewis Libby that he would neither testify whether he spoke with Libby nor would he describe the conversation.[11][12] Russert did say, however, that Plame's identity as a CIA operative was not leaked to him.[11]

Russert testified again in the trial on February 7 2007.[13] At the trial, the prosecution asserted that Federal Bureau of Investigation agent had called Russert regarding Russert's phone call with Libby, and that Russert had told the agent that the subject of Plame had not come up during his conversation with Libby.[13]

During the trial, another witness, former Cheney communications director Cathie Martin, testified that she "suggested we put the vice president on Meet the Press," hosted by Russert on NBC, and that it was "a tactic we often used....It's our best format."[14]

Death

On the afternoon of June 13 2008, Russert collapsed at the offices of WRC-TV, which houses the Washington, D.C. bureau of NBC News where he was the bureau chief, while recording voiceovers for the Sunday edition of Meet the Press. Despite immediate attempts at resuscitation by EMS and transportation to Sibley Memorial Hospital, Russert never regained consciousness and was pronounced dead a short time later. News of his death was reported live on NBC, CNBC, and MSNBC by Tom Brokaw.[15] He had just returned from a family vacation in Italy, where he went to celebrate his son's graduation from Boston College.[16] While his wife and son remained in Italy, Russert returned to prepare for his Sunday television show.[17]

An autopsy, performed on the day of his death, determined that his history of diabetes mellitus and coronary artery disease lead to sudden cardiac death. The precise cause of death was a cardiac arrhythmia caused by coronary thrombosis of the left anterior descending artery.[18][2] On the special reports program, Russert's friend Dr. Newman stated that the autopsy showed coronary artery disease in the left anterior descending artery, and a fresh blood clot was visible on one of these plaques, and this was most certainly the cause of sudden death.

On the evening of his death, the entire, nearly commercial-free half hour of NBC Nightly News was dedicated to Russert's memory, featuring previous news segments with Russert and interviews with some of Russert's colleagues.

References

  1. ^ Hurt, Charles (2008-06-13). "Tim Russert Dies from Apparent Heart Attack". New York Post. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  2. ^ a b c d "NBC's Tim Russert dead at 58". msnbc. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  3. ^ "Tim Russert, John Carroll University Class of '72, to Moderate Democratic Debate". Retrieved 2008-06-13. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |publiisher= ignored (|publisher= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ "John Carroll University, Cleveland, OH". Brucebase. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  5. ^ "Interview With Tim Russert". CNN Reliable Sources. CNN. May 23 2004. Retrieved 2008-06-13. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  6. ^ Howard Kurtz, Washington Post: In the Hot Seat, Washington Post, May 23, 2004.
  7. ^ Tucker, June 15, 2007
  8. ^ "About Meet the Press". MSNBC. 2008-06-13. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  9. ^ Reiss, Mike (2006-02-05). "This Russert will be interrogating athletes on radio". The Boston Globe. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  10. ^ http://washington.nationals.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20080613&content_id=2907226&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb
  11. ^ a b Template:PDFlink. United States of America v. I. Lewis Libby. United States District Court for the District of Columbia. 2004-06-04. Retrieved 2008-06-13. Page 3.
  12. ^ In the indictment of Libby, the grand jury found that Russert did not ask Libby if Libby knew that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA. Template:PDFlink. United States of America v. I. Lewis Libby. United States District Court for the District of Columbia. 2005-10-28. Retrieved 2008-06-13. Page 19.
  13. ^ a b Lewis, Neil A. NBC's Russert Wraps Up Prosecution Case in Libby Trial. The New York Times. 2007-02-09. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  14. ^ Milbank, Dana (2007-01-26). "In Ex-Aide's Testimony, A Spin Through VP's PR". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  15. ^ "Tim Russert dead at 58". CNN. 2008-06-13. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  16. ^ Washington Post, NBC's Tim Russert Dies at 58
  17. ^ New York Times, The Caucus
  18. ^ Morgan, David (2008-06-13). "TV newsman Tim Russert dies of heart attack". Reuters. Retrieved 2008-06-13.

Further reading

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