Robert Novak

Robert David Novak (born February 26, 1931) is a U.S. conservative columnist ("Inside Report", since 1963; until 1993 co-written with Rowland Evans) who is also well known as a television personality. He appears on programs such as CNN's Capital Gang or Crossfire or NBC's Meet the Press. He is referred to, by some Washington insiders, as "The Prince of Darkness".[1]

Born in Joliet, Illinois, he attended the University of Illinois from 1948 to 1952 and earned a bachelors of arts degree. He wrote for the Joliet Herald-News and The Champaign-Urbana Courier while in college. After serving in the Korean War as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, he joined the Associated Press and covered politics in Indianapolis. In 1957, he covered Congress for the AP in Washington, D.C. until he joined the D.C. bureau of The Wall Street Journal in 1958 to cover the Senate, eventually becoming the chief congressional correspondent in 1961. During his early years in Washington, Novak, although a Republican, held more centrist viewpoints than he does today; indeed, he supported the presidential candidacies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, with whom Novak was friends.

Novak has strong conservative views, yet does not strongly identify with the current direction of the Republican Party. Like Pat Buchanan, he is ideologically similar to what many call a paleoconservative. Born Jewish, Novak lost his faith in college but converted to Catholicism in 1998. He is a member of the Catholic organisation Opus Dei.

In 1966, he teamed up with Rowland Evans to create the Evans-Novak Political Report until Evans' retirement in 1993. Critics often derided their work together as "Errors and No Facts". His column is syndicated by the Chicago Sun-Times.

Controversies and scandals

In 2003, he disclosed the identity of CIA analyst Valerie Plame in his newspaper column after receiving a leak from a member of the Bush administration. The leak is currently being investigated, but some conservatives question the nature of the leak itself. The operative status of Plame, her function, and her involvement in her husband's trip to Africa are all questioned by some.

Critics complain that Novak has been inconsistent as he insists it would violate journalistic ethics to reveal the source of the Plame leak, but later called on CBS to reveal the source of the memos alleging President Bush had evaded National Guard service (see Rathergate).

Novak had also previously violated the principle of protecting sources by revealing Robert Hanssen as the confidential source for some of his articles. New York Observer, August 6, 2001: "Robert Novak. The conservative columnist admitted on July 12 that Mr. Hanssen had served as his main source for a 1997 column attacking Janet Reno, then the U.S. Attorney General, for supposedly covering up 1996 campaign-finance scandals." Novak wondered whether he had been "set up" by Hanssen. Ironically, Novak indicated at the time that he felt justified in doing so because Hanssen was a traitor – he had been found guilty of revealing the identities of undercover CIA operatives.

In March 2004, Novak insinuated on CNN's Crossfire that Richard Clarke had revealed government mistakes in his book dealing with the war against terrorism because he resented Condoleezza Rice's position as a black woman on the cabinet. In response to this insinuation, Jon Stewart of The Daily Show labelled Novak a "Douchebag of Liberty." Stewart has repeated the phrase a few times when Novak said or did something Stewart considered foolish or hypocritical.

In August 2004, after other journalists had reported on it, Novak admitted that his son, Alex Novak, is the Director of Marketing for the Swift Boat Veterans' publisher, Regnery Publishing. At the time he said that he didn't "think it relevant." Two months later Salon.com reported that Regnery's owner is also the publisher of Novak's own US$297 newsletter and that Novak is on the board of a foundation whose chief holdings are the stock of Regnery's parent company. [2]

Books

• Agony of the GOP, 1964
• Lyndon B. Johnson: The Exercise of Power
• Nixon in the White House: The Frustration of Power
• The Reagan Revolution

Reference

• Joe Conason, New York Observer, August 6, 2001, "Was Hanssen a Spy for the Right Wing, Too?"

External links

• Novak's column in the Chicago Sun Times
• CNN Crossfire Transcript, March 25, 2004
• "The Operative" by Mary Jacoby, Salon.com, Oct. 1, 2004
• "Bob in Paradise: How Novak created his own ethics-free zone" by Amy Sullivan, Washington Monthly, December 2004
• "All the President's Newsmen" by Frank Rich, New York Times, January 16, 2005