Russert wasn't a professional journalist. He was a lawyer who became a Washington political operative and befriended the CEO of GE, one of America's largest corporations. He sent Russert to run NBC, a GE company and source of less than 3% of GE's total profit. Russert's job was to make sure NBC was generally positive about and never really questioning of the government, government contracting representing 40% of GE's income. He was also GE's eyes and ears in Washington, GE investing billions in lobbying administrations obviously wanting to know what's going on.


Everything you watch is run by five guys, all of whom with exactly the same outlook. Russert was emblematic of the moment when US news media stopped asking questions the government didn't want to answer. It's a personal tragedy for the family and everything but Russert was no journalist. He just played one on TV. He was a corporate lawyer with a powerful friend and a fraud and an imposter on the telly.