Conservative commentator Novak has a brain tumor

Conservative political commentator Robert Novak announced Monday he has been diagnosed with a brain tumor, less than a week after he struck a pedestrian with his Corvette and drove away.

Novak, 77, fell ill on Cape Cod, Mass., last weekend while visiting his daughter and was rushed to Brigham and Women's Hospital, where he said he was diagnosed Sunday with the tumor.

"I will be suspending my journalistic work for an indefinite but, God willing, not too lengthy period," Novak, editor of the Evans-Novak Political Report, said in the statement released by his publisher, Eagle Publishing.

Novak has been a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times for decades. His assistant, Kathleen Connolly, told the newspaper that doctors had not yet done a biopsy to determine if the tumor was malignant.