Farewell to my friend Lou
Lou Dobbs was my friend. We had dinner not long ago.
He’d quietly been in hospice recently. Radiation. Then came a clean bill of health. Then it returned.
Wife Debi: “He was very private. But we couldn’t keep up. We ran out of time.”
The conservative anchor’s career began in Atlanta. When he finally left his popular nightly TV news show — I helped push him to join our WABC-AM radio family.
Debi: “He left us peacefully. Home with his family — daughter, daughter-in-law, three grandchildren. We were married in 1982. Both worked at CNN. We went out every night. Lou was the love of my life.
“I don’t know what to do, or what I’m going to do. It’s a great deal to take care of. Haven’t even thought about any memorial service.”
In 2009, after he left CNN, he told me: “There was growing constraint. Took a lot to walk away. The relationship is measured in three decades. Over the years they’ve changed. I’ve changed. The whole world’s changed. But I understood this wouldn’t work for me anymore. Issues existed that I felt intense about. Inability to express myself left me defenseless against detractors. Not a good feeling.”
After spending New Year’s at Mar-a-Lago, he told me: “We’re watching the convulsion of the Democratic party. They’ve become aliens.”
If you need a lift
NEW YORK, NEW YORK: I’m on Third Ave. between 79 & 80. Italian restaurant Due. A senior gent waddled over. Says: “I know you know Donald. I also know him. So how long you know him?” I said, “50 years.” He said, “I know him 70 years. I was an elevator operator. I worked for them all.” He had a nice table so they must’ve paid well. Me: “You voting for him?” Answer: “Absolutely!”
Pray for Connie
JOHN Cohan long lived one Brooklyn block from Connie Stevens. Even as a 1962 teen idol — probably back when she sang for Thomas Jefferson — she maintained that Gates Ave place. In 1962, on tour with her movie “Susan Slade,” she and co-star Troy Donahue bunked there. Connie, nearly 86, is in an LA nursing home. In need. Psychic Cohan, her friend, asks that prayers take center stage.
Focus on China
KENNEDY photographer Jacques Lowe taught p.r. man Jesse Ventura two things: recognize a moment and light. Result? Ventura is having a photo show on China, Aug. 7, at a gallery in the Hamptons. China must know something we don’t. He’s photographed its men aged 111, and women aged 113.
Talk of the town
MESSAGES out of the White House men’s room and flowing from his brain trust: junkie Hunter and wife Jill: Biden withdraws. August he’ll call for an “open” Democratic convention. He’ll stay in office until January. Endorses Kamala. Rumors rumor that Democrat historian Jon Meacham is crafting his address. And Kamala, favored even below Biden, is already vetting possible running mates.
REMEMBER: Money isn’t everything. Just works when you’ve mislaid your credit cards.
Only in New York, kids, Only in New York.
