“Where ya been?”
“Just hanging out.”
The opening exchange between veteran CBS correspondent Mark Knoller and Press Secretary Tony Snow opened what was clearly one of the most ballyhooed of briefings for White House reporters - and what turned out to be one of the most memorable of my career as a White House correspondent.
As we all have known since his dramatic appearance at the annual White House Correspondents Association dinner April 21, Tony Snow would be returning on Monday morning, April 30th, to his familiar podium beneath the official emblem of the White House. For more than a month, the President’s top spokesman had been missing from his familiar haunts as he underwent surgery for the cancer he has been battling since he was a Fox TV commentator and had not yet become the third press secretary to George W. Bush on April 21 of last year.
Although he said he will commence chemotherapy to attack “some cancers in the peritoneum” on Friday of this week, Snow insisted that it would not interfere with his twice-a-day briefings for reporters. In his words, “The design is to throw it into remission and transform it into a chronic disease. If cancer is merely a nuisance for a long period of time, that’s fine with me.”
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| HUMAN EVENTS' John Gizzi and fellow White House correspondents welcome Press Secretary Tony Snow back Monday morning. |
