WHY

I stand in the cold. I'm looking down the street, keeping an eye out for Kate. She's taking the Metro into the city and should be here any moment. I'm standing right outside the Newseum. It's about 10:45. The service is going to start in 15 minutes. An SUV pulls up and out jumps an elderly couple. The man smiles and says hello. It's Donald Rumsfeld. It speaks volumes that he is here to pay tribute to the man who made his living aggressively going after him.

Kate arrives just a few minutes later.We're here to pay tribute to John McWethy who died suddenly and unexpectedly in a skiing accident in Colorado. His wife and two sons are here. So is Charles Gibson, and ABC News President David Westin, Sam Donaldson, and a host of other ABC veterans. There are people here from CNN and CBS. The eulogies are smart, witty, warm, which is fitting, because that is what distinguished McWethy.

There are very few people who enter your life briefly but leave an indelible mark. McWethy is one of those remarkable people. Charles Gibson says, "Sometimes I think it's okay to be mad at God, and this is one of those occasions." To take it one step further, sometimes I think it's okay to be envious of Charles Gibson, and this is one of those occasions. It would be easy to envy him for his position, or salary, but that's not why.

I'm envious because he talks about a dinner where McWethy had come up with a list of questions to engage the mind. They started with the innocuous, like name your favorite movie and the best dinner you've ever had. Eventually the questions progressed on. I'm envious because I know what it's like to have him prod and poke your mind and get you to think about the more important issues in life.

Just a few years back Jack and I were at a workshop in Baltimore. It was a day long affair and we were sitting next to one another, talking throughout the day. I mentioned to him that I wanted to see a Niteline report he had done on returning vets suffering from PTSD. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is of keen interest to me for a number of reasons. He mentioned that he had a copy in his car and would give it to me at the end of the day.

When the workshop was over we went out to the parking lot and in the cold and snow talked and talked. Finally Jack said, "Hey your freezing to death, lets jump in the car." He turned on the heat and we talked, and we talked some more. We talked about life, and our families, and our upbringing. We talked about all the important things, including our philosophy on life. We talked about how demanding, and yet rewarding our business can be. We swapped funny stories. I think we covered it all. At some point, I had to get out of the car or the folks inside would send a search party.

So I knew when Charles was talking about that dinner, just how special that night must have been. I slugged this 'Why', and you are probably wondering why. So many people talked about that word yesterday. John felt it was the most important question, and he said so in a commencement address at his alma mater, Depauw University. It certainly was the most important question yesterday. Why was this man with so much life, wit and wisdom taken so early? We all know sometimes the most important question can be impossible to answer.