When news broke last September about Olivia Nuzzi’s alleged relationship with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., my first instinct—within minutes, actually—was sympathy. I sent her a DM: “You’ll get through this.” She responded with a heart.

(The fact that I’m opening a column about media narcissism with my own DM slide should tell you everything about how far gone we all are. But I promise this is going somewhere.)

I meant it. I’d known Nuzzi professionally for years—never close friends, but friendly enough through the White House Correspondents’ Dinner circuit and occasional professional courtesies. She’d always been generous with contacts and advice. More importantly, she was, without question, one of the best political writers of her generation.

She was sort of a modern-day political version of Hunter S. Thompson (gonza?), and her work had that rare quality of being simultaneously gossipy and intellectually serious—the perfect dinner party companion who could pivot seamlessly from Page Six intrigue to deep New Yorker policy deep dive.