For an editor, the night before a magazine goes to press involves periods of manic activity interspersed with long lulls of waiting for stuff to happen. When I first came to TNR, I used to spend the downtime reading through the magazine’s archives. There are all kinds of treasures to be found in there, but invariably the articles that caused me to emit peals of indecorous laughter while alone at my desk (possibly prompting my new coworkers to wonder whether I was mentally sound), were written by Jonathan Chait. Today, he's leaving TNR to take a job at New York magazine (he will be replaced by the excellent Timothy Noah). As longtime readers know, Chait's oeuvre combines an intellect as sharp as a diamond drill with one of the best senses of humor in the business. Below, Jonathan Cohn has the last word on Chait's qualities as a friend and colleague, but I wanted to share links to a few of my favorite pieces that he has written during his years at the magazine. We wish him all the best.