Tonight ABC news anchor Charles Gibson eulogized a colleague and friend, retired journalist John McWethy, who died yesterday in a ski accident.

Gibson spoke movingly of McWethy’s commitment to objective reporting and to uncovering the facts: “Jack believed that the most important word, the most powerful word, in the English language is why.”

Those words queued up a film clip of McWethy speaking at a DePauw University graduation ceremony:

All institutions, all endeavors, all relationships, are improved by a good scrubbing, using the word “why”. In democracy it is the question we must all constantly be asking our government and our leaders. It is not unpatriotic to question the government. It is unpatriotic not to.

Here’s a video with negotiation advice for Yahoo in the face of Microsoft’s takeover offer.

(Hat tip to my pal Colin Rule.)