Gwen’s Take: On loss and opportunity

This has been a wrenching week for those of us in the business of telling the truth on television.

A generation of information consumers mourned Jon Stewart’s announced exit from the satirical “The Daily Show” because they’d long ago decided fake news was better than real news.

A presumably older generation of news consumers absorbed the shock of Brian Williams’ suspension as NBC News’ chief anchor.

And then more shocking news: Bob Simon, CBS News’ venerable and elegiac story teller, who most recently entered our homes via “60 Minutes,” died in a New York City car crash.

I’ve interviewed and been interviewed by Stewart, worked with Williams, and never met Simon.

I was struggling with the idea that I had anything else to add about any or all of them in this space, when I came across this piece posted at the CBS News site that said it better than I could.

It is written by someone else I’ve never met, Christina Ruffini, a 30-something producer/reporter at CBS. Our paths may never have crossed, but her reflections on Simon felt familiar to me — more a rumination on the state of the news business than an obituary.

I thought that instead of spilling any more ink that could not say it better, I’d share it with you here.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published Thursday on Washington Week’s website. Thursday evening, the media world lost another newsroom veteran, New York Times’ David Carr. He was 58. Read his obituary here.