When Tim Russert started out in public life, first as chief of staff to Senator Pat Moynihan, then as counselor to New York governor Mario Cuomo, he was every political reporter's favorite. He combined that gigantic Irish joie de vivre with a perfect understanding of what every reporter needed—the right lead, the right quote, the right insight. Like just about every other reporter I knew in New York, I considered him my friend—and an indispensable resource.

Then he married Maureen Orth, who was also a friend of mine, and together they would light up my annual media party whenever they made a joint appearance. I remember him walking in once and seeing only light beer at the bar. "I don't want to be difficult," he said, "but don't you have any real beer?" I did, and I was happy to oblige.

Considering how good he was at giving reporters what they needed, it wasn't a big surprise when he decided to try to beat us at our own game. After a few years as an NBC News executive in New York, he moved to Washington, where he took over the bureau—and then made his name as host of Meet the Press.

Russert's transition from source to interrogator was a seamless progression. And from his new perch at NBC, he also looked after his old friends. When my first book came out, it was Tim who pulled the string to make sure I got on the Today Show—on Thanksgiving Day.

His success at Meet the Press soon made it the dominant Sunday chat show—and made him the 800-pound gorilla of the Washington press corps. Success brought him fame and wealth, a big house, and then a bigger house, in Washington, and another big house in Nantucket. He had a wife and a son and job that he adored, and he never took any of them for granted. He was the proud son of a Buffalo garbage collector, who loved his father and his family and his profession, a fierce believer in the American dream, who never forgot how much he had benefited from it.

His always-tough questions brought attacks on him from the left and the right. And his Catholic impulse to sometimes insert religion into politics could offend his more secular colleagues. When he asked the Democrats in an early presidential debate to name their favorite piece of scripture, many of us thought that question should have been out of bounds.

Jealousy was surely part of the reason that some of us were sometimes so tough on him. After all, this was someone who hadn't started out as a reporter, but once he dipped his foot in the water, he became more successful than almost everyone else. Today his sudden death leaves all feeling utterly bereft—and leaves me wishing that I had remembered to praise him as often as I criticized him.