Tony Snow, R.I.P.

I saw Tony Snow in February at CPAC and you wouldn't have known he was sick at all. He'd been fighting cancer for years, but in meeting the man, there was no hint that he was suffering from a deadly illness. And now he's gone:

Tony Snow, the former White House press secretary and conservative pundit who bedeviled the press corps and charmed millions as a FOX News television and radio host, died Saturday after a long bout with cancer. He was 53. . . .
Snow died at 2 a.m. Saturday at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C.
Snow joined FOX in 1996 as the original anchor of "FOX News Sunday" and hosted "Weekend Live" and a radio program, "The Tony Snow Show," before departing in 2006. . . .
Snow took a job as an editorial writer for the Greensboro Record in North Carolina and went on to run the editorial pages at the Newport News (Virginia) Daily Press, Detroit News and Washington Times. He became a nationally syndicated columnist, and in 1991 he became director of speechwriting for President George H.W. Bush.

It was impossible not to like Tony, even if you disagreed with him politically. The late Sam Francis -- who worked with Tony at The Washington Times -- never thought much of Tony as an intellectual or a conservative, but that was not a personal animus. Tony was incapable of making enemies.

UPDATE: Michelle Malkin calls Tony a "mensch" and "one of the kindest people . . . in the news business," and links this video of Tony jamming with his band, Beats Workin':



Kathryn Jean Lopez links Tony's tribute to Reagan, quoting the Gipper's farewell note:

"When the Lord calls me home, whenever that day may be, I will leave with the greatest love for this country of ours and eternal optimism for its future."

Surely that would be Tony Snow's attitude, also.

UPDATE II: Brit Hume's video tribute: