Dr. Donald Devine

Donald Devine, the former director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is director of the Federalist Leadership Center and holds the Grewcock professorship in American values at Bellevue University. He is a Washington Times columnist, a writer, an adjunct scholar at The Heritage Foundation, and a Washington policy consultant. He was President Ronald Reagan's head of Federal personnel from 1981-85, advising him beginning in 1976. He was a senior advisor to Bob Dole from 1988 to 1996 and to Steve Forbes between1998-2000. For 14 years, Dr. Devine was associate professor of government and politics at the University of Maryland, specializing in democratic theory, public opinion and policy. Devine is the author of seven books, the Attentive Public, The Political Culture of the United States, Does Freedom Work?, Reagan Electionomics, Reagan's Terrible Swift Sword, Restoring the Tenth Amendment and, most recently, In Defense of the West. He was also senior editor of Western Vision and American Values, a book of readings on Western civilization. He lives in Shadyside, Maryland, is married to Ann S. Devine and they have four children and eleven grandchildren.

Robert Novak

Robert D. Novak was born Feb. 26, 1931, in Joliet, Ill. His first newspaper jobs were as a reporter for the Joliet Herald-News and the Champaign-Urbana (Ill.) Courier while attending the University of Illinois (1948-1952). Novak has a B.A. degree from Illinois and, in 1997, received the University's distinguished alumnus award. Novak has also received honorary doctorates from Kenyon College and the University of Illinois.

Following service in the U.S. Army as a Lieutenant during the Korean War (1952-1954), Novak joined the staff of the Associated Press in Omaha, Neb. Later, he was transferred to Lincoln, Neb., and then Indianapolis, Ind., covering politics and the state legislature in both places. In 1957, the AP transferred him to Washington, D.C., where he began covering Congress.

Novak joined the Washington bureau of the Wall Street Journal in 1958 as its Senate correspondent and political reporter, becoming chief congressional correspondent for the Journal in 1961.

On May 15, 1963, Novak teamed up with the late Rowland Evans, Jr., then congressional correspondent for the New York Herald Tribune, to write "Inside Report," a political column published four times a week. Since 1966, the Chicago Sun-Times has been the home newspaper to the column. On May 15, 1993, Evans retired from the column. Novak continues to write the column three times a week. The column is carried by over 300 newspapers, Internet sites and other publications through Creators Syndicate.

One of the longest running syndicated columns in the nation, "Inside Report" has always been based on hard reporting. For over a quarter of a century, both columnists not only criss-crossed the nation regularly covering politics, but also traveled abroad to report wars, revolutions and international conferences around the globe.

Novak has covered great events and interviewed world leaders in every part of the world. His 1978 trip to China included an exclusive interview with Deng Tsiao-Peng that opened the way for normalization of U.S.-Chinese relations.

Novak produces a twice-monthly newsletter, the Evans-Novak Political Report. Novak has written for most of the nation's periodicals and is currently a contributing editor for Reader's Digest.

Novak's first book was "Agony of the GOP: 1964." In collaboration with Rowland Evans, he has written "Lyndon B. Johnson: The Exercise of Power," "Nixon in the White House" and "The Reagan Revolution." In November 1999, Novak's newest book, "Completing the Revolution: A Vision for Victory in 2000," was published.

He is a commentator for Cable News Network, where he hosts the "Novak Zone" interview program, appears on and serves as co-executive producer of CNN's political roundtable, "Capital Gang," regularly co-hosts "Crossfire" and appears occasionally on NBC's "Meet the Press."

Novak was a Radford Visiting Professor of Journalism at Baylor University in 1987. He is the 2001 winner of the National Press Club's "Fourth Estate" award for lifetime achievement in journalism