THE TYGRRRR EXPRESS

Tim Russert is on my mind, which is normal at this moment. Yet he will be on my mind for a long time after the last eulogy is read. Before adding any other thoughts, my heartfelt prayers go out to his wife, his young son Luke, and his father “Big Russ.” The ultimate parental nightmare is being pre-deceased by your children, and the pain does not go away.

For the sake of full disclosure, I have never watched Meet the Press or any of the other Sunday talk shows. As much as I like politics, I like sleeping in more. The only thing I watch on Sundays is football.

Nevertheless, I have watched Tim Russert many times on various evening news programs, as well as on some Presidential debates. He was the consummate professional.

His untimely death has me thinking adult, grownup thoughts. I hate that, since it interferes with my ability to think about the sophomoric stuff that drives my family insane. Today was supposed to be a day dedicated to R Kelly. The jokes will be there at a more appropriate time.

One train of thought is the random, and perhaps arbitrary, nature of it all. My father was given a second chance, and even a third chance. My Uncle Joey has been given his new lease on life. Yesterday he had successful quintuple bypass surgery, with my dad having had his bypass surgery a few months ago.

As relieved as I am that my father and my uncle survived, my dad’s close friend never got that opportunity. He was four years younger than my dad, and at age 53, two weeks after seeing my dad, he just died. Like Tim Russert, only five years younger, he was gone. Why did Bill Cooper and Tim Russert not get their chance? Why did Eddie Small, the father of neighborhood kids, not get his second chance? I have not thought about Eddie Small in a couple decades, but now I wonder why his kids were not as lucky as I was.

Is God really up there spinning a wheel like Pat Sajak?

It cannot be based on merit. From all published reports, Tim Russert seemed to be a fine human being.

In some cases, people ignore their doctors. My dad’s father would always want to know what college the doctor attended, and what his grades were. After all, why should a 90 year old man listen to a 45 year old about preservation of life?

Tim Russert seems to have just been an unfortunate innocent victim.

When I got the news, I was about to eat a monstrously large burger, as is my habit. I am only 36, but it was still scary to eat.

I hate exercise. When I told my friends and family that I joined a football league, I had to explain to them that I meant playing, not watching. I even did some walking recently, and have vowed to do some sit ups.

I like playing sports. I just had nobody to play with. Now I do, so I play. Going to a gym is not my thing.

I drink diet soda instead of regular, and the taste is terrible. I even try to eat kettle cooked potato chips, instead of the regular ones. Of course, a bag of Doritos on occasion is a must.

I should do more, but I refuse to say something I know I will not actually do. All I know is I do not want to die. Sometimes I wonder if these little things even matter. If they don’t, I would go back to regular soda in a heartbeat.

While I have only questions about what “it” all means, I have clear answers on why Tim Russert is considered the consummate professional.

Tim Russert, above all things, was fair. The media that was praising him will hopefully actually learn from him. I doubt they will, in the same way I doubt I will eat that much healthier.

Tim Russert in his life was partisan. He was a democratic operative. He worked for former Governor Mario Cuomo, a staunch liberal. Yet Tim Russert as a journalist put his partisanship aside. He was tough, but there was no question that he wanted to get to the truth, which is the whole point of journalism.

The reason the media is a disaster today is because the professional journalists are practically all gone. Chet Huntley and David Brinkley are gone. Bernard Shaw of CNN has long since retired. Outside of Jim Lehrer, there are not many unbiased journalists left.

I should not say they are unbiased. We are all biased. Some of us know how to put our biases aside. I manage 75 people. They know my political views. They also know that my politics will not cloud how I handle situations. When a left wing coworker faced tough times, it meant a lot when she looked at me and said, “I know you’ve got my back.”

I am thinking about this heavily because I know two rabbis that are both left wing. They were both in positions where they had to be neutral. One of them simply got tired of being neutral, so he left his position and joined a partisan organization to do advocacy work. I will miss him, but am totally supportive of his decision. He needed to feed his passions, and he wanted to do so without violating his professional oath as a rabbi. I always knew that this rabbi had my back, and that although he disagreed with my politics, he was there for me.

The other rabbi simply lets his politics interfere with his job. He cannot stop. He is not a bad person, but I told him the other day that he might want to consider leaving his temple and joining a partisan organization.

I am a blogger, and I am biased. I freely admit that. I also know that when I am at my day job, I am “Joe Neutral.”

Tim Russert became Joe Neutral. He did this because he valued his integrity and his professional reputation more than his politics.

His death is a potential death knell for journalism itself. I hate to imply that an entire industry can be crippled by the loss of one man, but if journalists today do not learn from why Tim Russert mattered so much, they will not reach his level.

Life is about making things better, and that can start with improving ourselves. Tim Russert worked hard. He did his research. He waded through stacks of paper because getting the story right is what mattered.

Tim Russert valued the truth. That is his legacy.

He will be missed.

eric