RIP William F Buckley Jr

Message Bookmarked
Bookmark Removed

For those of us old enough to actively not miss you, I say adieu, asshole.

MaggieGo, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:32 (eighteen years ago)

he was fun to watch in debates

Hurting 2, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:33 (eighteen years ago)

Surprised the NRO site isn't all black.

Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:33 (eighteen years ago)

RIP weezy f baby

and what, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:36 (eighteen years ago)

PARTY! A polished turd.

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:37 (eighteen years ago)

The first thing I thought of was a Robin Williams/Eddie Murphy sketch on early eighties SNL where Williams played Buckley.

Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:37 (eighteen years ago)

The sacrificial fires will burn in Boho Grove tonight.

sexyDancer, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:38 (eighteen years ago)

The first thing I thought was: "oh no, Cigarette Smoking Man from the X-Files!" but that's someone else :-/

StanM, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:40 (eighteen years ago)

I went to school with a dude whose family used to go boating with the Buckleys; he had a picture of himself and WFBJr standing at the bow looking surprisingly fly. Said dude died several years ago in a hot-air balloon accident.

RIP awesome quirky conservative dude who knew WFBJr.

HI DERE, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:41 (eighteen years ago)

as with Mailer, Gore Vidal wins again.

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:42 (eighteen years ago)

do I even have to say it

Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:44 (eighteen years ago)

rip dude.

with buckley gone and the bush presidency in tatters, is it safe to say neoconservatism is dead?

is it also safe to say we will see 29823058798 "insightful" opinion columns/editorials/blog entries suggesting same within the next month?

BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:44 (eighteen years ago)

didn't someone quote the old fuck saying McCain was soft on torture about 3 days ago? Running, if on fumes, to the last patrician breath...

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:45 (eighteen years ago)

Dude I knew used to buy crates of oranges and peanut butter and pass them out to everyone in the entryway. He also became infamous for wandering around in Harvard Square in a bathrobe attempting to test the range of his new cordless phone and for trying to throw away all of his clothes the first time he washed them because they were "ruined" (ie, "wrinkled, and he didn't know how to iron them").

HI DERE, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:46 (eighteen years ago)

when i was little i was impressed by his accent and demeanor on firing line and also thought he was british :x

sleep, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:48 (eighteen years ago)

anyway rip duder

sleep, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:49 (eighteen years ago)

in the wake of Robin Williams and SCTV's Joe Flaherty, you know who should do a sketch-comedy Buckley? Owen Wilson.

My dad voted for Reagan 2x, and found WFB an amusing pretentious ass.

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:50 (eighteen years ago)

thats a pretty fair assessment i think!

sleep, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:51 (eighteen years ago)

I read the transcripts of old "Firing Line" episodes a few months ago. For all his batshit hysteria about the wrong things, he was a writer of uncommon intelligence and impish wit (he never took himself too seriously). It's quite safe to say that no one in modern conservatism – least of all at The Corner – can replace him.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:53 (eighteen years ago)

well as someone (in a NYT op-ed?) said, current cons (eg Billy Kristol) don't write books.

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:55 (eighteen years ago)

R.I.P., really smart and sometimes very funny maniac with some awful ideas who would sail his mini-yacht 3 miles off the coast of the U.S. to smoke pot with assorted intellectual giants.

They could make a really amazing DVD boxset of some of the better "Firing Line" episodes.

Savannah Smiles, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:55 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRjZR8j4-z4

and what, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:56 (eighteen years ago)

The Corner will be unbearable for the next few days – worse than when Reagan died.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:58 (eighteen years ago)

I don't think I ever saw my grandfather enjoy TV more than when watching Buckley/Vidal.

Michael White, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 16:59 (eighteen years ago)

srch "You'll stay plastered, fag" clip

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:00 (eighteen years ago)

just posted it

and what, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:00 (eighteen years ago)

it's "you goddamn queer"

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:00 (eighteen years ago)

the o.g. morbius vs and what

and what, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:01 (eighteen years ago)

Chomsky vs Buck

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:01 (eighteen years ago)

RIP

deej, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:01 (eighteen years ago)

number-tattoo the cryptofascist's corpse.

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:02 (eighteen years ago)

ALVY
(Looking down at the magazine)
What is this? What are you, since when do you read the "National Review"? What are you turning in to?

ANNIE
(Turning to a nearby chair for some gum in her pocketbook)
Well, I like to try to get all points of view.

ALVY
It's wonderful. Then why don'tcha get William F. Buckley to kill the spider?

Elvis Telecom, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:12 (eighteen years ago)

I'm more affected by Wally George's death for some reason.

Mackro Mackro, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:16 (eighteen years ago)

RIP, weird crazy old intelligent guy

remy bean, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:18 (eighteen years ago)

A hilarious John Boehner eulogy:

"America has lost a giant. William F. Buckley was, in large measure, the architect of the modern conservative movement. His intellect, wit, and dedication have inspired generations. In the 1950s, as many in America were moving toward a socialist future of ever-expanding government and ever-decreasing freedom, it took an act of courage and vision to stand athwart history and yell, ‘stop’ as Buckley wrote in the first issue of National Review. As long as America honors the ideals of our Founding Fathers – free speech, freedom of religion, and limited, Constitutional government - his legacy will be cherished."

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:40 (eighteen years ago)

RIP

A charming speaker and writer, he seemed anachronistic long before he passed away. I rarely agreed with him, but he was at least a civilized voice for the right, something in short supply now.

Brad C., Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:49 (eighteen years ago)

'god and man at yale' was one of the most eye-opening books i read in college, which set a context for the rise of conservatism at a time when i was really confused about how people could think that way.

deej, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:51 (eighteen years ago)

On September 15, 1963 a bomb went off at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, killing 4 black girls and injuring many more children. (Those killed were Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair; McNair had been a classmate of the young Condoleezza Rice). The bomb was set by members of the Klu Klux Klan, as part of a wave of terror designed to intimidate the civil rights movement. Here is how National Review commented on the bombing in the October 1, 1963 issue of their biweekly Bulletin: “The fiend who set off the bomb does not have the sympathy of the white population in the South; in fact, he set back the cause of the white people there so dramatically as to raise the question whether in fact the explosion was the act of a provocateur - of a Communist, or of a crazed Negro. Some circumstantial evidence lends a hint of plausibility to that notion, especially the ten-minute fuse (surely a white man walking away from the church basement ten minutes earlier would have been noticed?). And let it be said that the convulsions that go on, and are bound to continue, have resulted from revolutionary assaults on the status quo, and a contempt for the law, which are traceable to the Supreme Court’s manifest contempt for the settled traditions of Constitutional practice.”

brownie, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:54 (eighteen years ago)

"at least a civilized voice for the right"

AIDS tattoos? Civilization is overrated, apparently (Nazis loved Wagner).

Dr Morbius, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 17:58 (eighteen years ago)

I'll have to find that AIDS column; I don't think it was THAT militant, if I'm remembering it correctly.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:00 (eighteen years ago)

http://i47.photobucket.com/albums/f163/courtneykaehler/maracas.jpg

gr8080, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:02 (eighteen years ago)

RIP

wanko ergo sum, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:03 (eighteen years ago)

"stand athwart history"?

wtf that is some shitty writing

Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:05 (eighteen years ago)

I can't say I admired him, because I didn't. He was staunch for the privileges of the priveleged, catty, self-important and was not above intellectual dishonesty when it suited his purposes.

OTOH, he had an arch sense of humor, which was a nice feature when it came into play, and he was capable of surprising one by actually stepping away from the dogma from time to time. Witness his eventual conversion to opposition to the War on Marijuana.

The story went that he sailed his luxury sailboat into international waters and smoked some marijuana. It convinced him that the stuff was essentially pretty harmless and not worth outlawing. Too bad that he exhibited such willingness to embrace facts over ideology all too rarely.

As for his vaunted vocabulary... nerts to him. It never could expunge the stain of his many apologia for the outrageous.

Aimless, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:06 (eighteen years ago)

is no one going to decry ILX's satisfaction over the death of a certifiable asshole as ghoulish/inhuman/morbid/cruel etc? O THE HUMANITY

Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:07 (eighteen years ago)

Wonkette's headline:

"Elegant, Witty Conservative Writer William F. Buckley Jr. Dies, Leaving No Intellectual Heirs"

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:09 (eighteen years ago)

OK this is vile.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:10 (eighteen years ago)

Public heath officials are considering measures which, 20 years ago, would have been though fascistic interventions in human rights. There is thought of infiltrating gay sites, particularly those on the Internet. What, having identified such sites, will they then do? Interpose a message about the danger of unprotected sex? Collect names and email addresses, and send individual warnings to prospective victims? Such measures are not easily composed: “Dear Sir: You have recently kept company with Tony Venenum. Tony has a new and dangerous strain of AIDS and you may have contracted it. You should report to a doctor and you must not engage in unprotected sex because in doing so you may be committing murder.” The boundaries of the new campaign, let alone the niceties, haven’t been resolved upon, but not much thought is being given to concerns of privacy. Murderers need to be stopped, and if this means opening their mail, well — such things happen and you can take comfort that you may be saving a life.

The objective is to identify the carrier, and to warn his victim. Someone, 20 years ago, suggested a discreet tattoo the site of which would alert the prospective partner to the danger of proceeding as had been planned. But the author of the idea was treated as though he had been schooled in Buchenwald, and the idea was not widely considered, but maybe it is up now for reconsideration.

The smirking tone is just awful.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:11 (eighteen years ago)

Buckley went against The Corner on Iraq and/or torture dinnt he?

Eazy, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:11 (eighteen years ago)

I never understood how his celebration of the legislative branch jibed with the Republican, or at least the Nixon and post-Nixon love of the executive.

Michael White, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:11 (eighteen years ago)

The New Republic sneaked a reporter on board The Corner's annual cruise (someone post the link?). All the young neocons were shaking their heads sadly and making crazy-guy hand gestures when Buckley decried the war.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:13 (eighteen years ago)

Okay, this bit from the NYT obit is repulsive:

The merits of the argument aside, Mr. Buckley irrevocably proved that his brand of candor did not lend itself to public life when an Op-Ed article he wrote for The New York Times offered a partial cure for the AIDS epidemic: "Everyone detected with AIDS should be tattooed in the upper forearm to prevent common needle users, and on the buttocks, to prevent the victimization of homosexuals," he wrote.

"Merits of the argument aside" -- WTF

Brad C., Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:43 (eighteen years ago)

He also became infamous for wandering around in Harvard Square in a bathrobe

huh, when i lived in boston that would be a good way to become anonymous. blend in with the crowd.

chicago kevin, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:48 (eighteen years ago)

Most of the people wandering Harvard Sq in a bathrobe weren't on a phone excitedly saying, "Can you still hear me? I'm in Store 24 now!"

HI DERE, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 18:51 (eighteen years ago)

i won't miss him. for all the nonsense about what a great old-time conservative he was (""he opposed the war in iraq," etc.), WFB effectively ruined conservatism in america. his constant bleating for all-out war with the soviet union, his pitiful apologies for mccarthy, his snooty, moralistic tone - apart from being a slightly better writer, there was precious little to distinguish him from today's liberal-baiting hacks. a genuine conservative might have opposed the truman administration for actual conservative reasons - the national security act, the loyalty oaths, the trumped-up war in korea - but WFB contained his criticisms to pretending that truman was a "socialist."

that said, it's hard not to at least kind of respect a man who developed the most ridiculous public persona imaginable and took it so dead seriously.

J.D., Wednesday, 27 February 2008 19:13 (eighteen years ago)

you're right, most of the bathrobed people saying that in store 24 were not on the phone.

xpost.

chicago kevin, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 19:13 (eighteen years ago)

guys you should be paying more attention to Myron Cope, not this fuck.

El Tomboto, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 20:16 (eighteen years ago)

My eccentric acquaintance wasn't a fuck!

HI DERE, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 20:19 (eighteen years ago)

J.D. – do you know Buckley's relationship with Robert Taft, Vandenburg, and the isolationist wing of the GOP?

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 20:28 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, and he didn't come up with anything as enduring as the "Terrible Towel", which is just about the only thing I like about the Steelers.

Bill Magill, Wednesday, 27 February 2008 21:19 (eighteen years ago)

James Wolcott's fine obit -- fantastic actor, average writer, wrong side of history.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 February 2008 00:24 (eighteen years ago)

I like him. Right now we need a liberal/left version of this guy.

burt_stanton, Thursday, 28 February 2008 00:35 (eighteen years ago)

gore vidal wins again?

BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 28 February 2008 00:37 (eighteen years ago)

I just checked NRO--the Joe Lieberman piece on Buckley seems seriously to have been written by someone with Downs' Syndrome. Of course, I applaud Joe if he hires such people for his staff.

mulla atari, Thursday, 28 February 2008 01:32 (eighteen years ago)

as with Mailer, Gore Vidal wins again.

-- Dr Morbius, Wednesday, February 27, 2008 8:42 AM

gore vidal wins again?

-- BIG HOOS aka the linesbiter Wednesday, February 27, 2008 4:37 PM

remy bean, Thursday, 28 February 2008 01:35 (eighteen years ago)

vidal ftw

brownie, Thursday, 28 February 2008 01:46 (eighteen years ago)

alfred: i admit i haven't heard much about WFB being associated with that crowd. i think there's a great deal to admire in the "old right" GOP - and there were plenty of isolationist progressive liberals, like charles beard - and i find it hard to see WFB's full-on support of the cold war as anything but a betrayal of that. admittedly, he wasn't alone, but i find it ridiculous to see people like wolcott try to distinguish him from "the right-wing lunatics who destroyed conservatism."

J.D., Thursday, 28 February 2008 02:06 (eighteen years ago)

btw have you read garry wills's "confessions of a conservative"? it's a memoir of wills's days working at national review, and has some hilarious WFB stories. wills was a little freaked out when he got to the office and discovered that everyone there talked just like buckley!

J.D., Thursday, 28 February 2008 02:08 (eighteen years ago)

Who will write awesome mystery novels?

Fluffy Bear Hearts Rainbows, Thursday, 28 February 2008 02:09 (eighteen years ago)

didn't WFB write a novel about elvis? i could forgive a lot for that.

J.D., Thursday, 28 February 2008 02:13 (eighteen years ago)

alfred: i admit i haven't heard much about WFB being associated with that crowd. i think there's a great deal to admire in the "old right" GOP - and there were plenty of isolationist progressive liberals, like charles beard - and i find it hard to see WFB's full-on support of the cold war as anything but a betrayal of that. admittedly, he wasn't alone, but i find it ridiculous to see people like wolcott try to distinguish him from "the right-wing lunatics who destroyed conservatism."

Like a lot of intellectuals on the left and right, he was infatuated with power and those who used it -- the same fallacy that Orwell, analyzing the writings of James Burnham, deplored. But Wolcott's responding to Buckley's manner; the man, by all accounts, didn't call you a traitor for disagreeing with him, and probably respected you all the more for it.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 February 2008 02:17 (eighteen years ago)

is no one going to decry ILX's satisfaction over the death of a certifiable asshole as ghoulish/inhuman/morbid/cruel etc? O THE HUMANITY

Eh, it takes a turn for the amusing when you contrast it with the death of, er...let's say Norman Mailer.

It's like when you compare the Castro v. Pinochet threads. One man's "brutal tyrant who ruled with an iron fist" becomes "[name of country] leader who dared to defy [name of powerful countries who wanted him ousted] and survive numerous attempts at overthrow finally calls it quits..."

Cunga, Thursday, 28 February 2008 05:20 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.alternet.org/story/57001

J.D., Thursday, 28 February 2008 08:32 (eighteen years ago)

NYT obit headline: "Sesquipedalian Spark of Right"

So nice the haw-haw humor made the move to their new Blade Runner HQ.

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 14:01 (eighteen years ago)

"The Beatles are not merely awful. They are so unbelievably horrible, so appallingly unmusical, so dogmatically insensitive to the magic of the art, that they qualify as crowned heads of antimusic."

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 16:17 (eighteen years ago)

rec.music.beatles
Beatle Hater William F. Buckley Dead At 82
Messages 1 - 25 of 30

sleep, Thursday, 28 February 2008 16:21 (eighteen years ago)

OK, I laughed at "crowned heads of anti-music," which is a spot-on Geirism.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 February 2008 16:26 (eighteen years ago)

WFB was a reactionary that elite liberals loved. The New York Times' multimedia tribute to him is not surprising, glossing over Buckley's less attractive stances in his long public career. But that was Buckley's true talent: making reprehensible opinions palatable to liberal tastes. He was much smoother than Ann Coulter, but not that different in ideological outlook. Coulter crashes into rooms, yelling, spitting bile in all directions. WFB slid in almost silently, his bouncing eyebrows the sole evidence of his presence -- until he spoke, that is -- and even then, bullshit oozed from his mouth in polysyllabic strips, with liberals like John Kenneth Galbraith and Murray Kempton eagerly lapping up his crap.

For all of Buckley's social charms, augmented by his harpsichord playing, let's recall that he and his money-losing magazine National Review opposed civil rights for African-Americans while backing white Southern statist repression in the 1950s and early '60s. Buckley himself openly questioned the logic of giving blacks the vote at all, hinting that "chaos" might ensue if the darker hordes voted in a bloc.

http://dennisperrin.blogspot.com/2008/02/socked-in-god-damned-face.html

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:11 (eighteen years ago)

This bears repeating.

William F. Buckley was, in large measure, the architect of the modern conservative movement.

Have some quiet time and think on what that means.

kenan, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:22 (eighteen years ago)

I mean, Morbs is dead on this time, you guys. The man was a fucking horror show.

kenan, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:22 (eighteen years ago)

but he dressed so well

max, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:26 (eighteen years ago)

THIS time?

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:38 (eighteen years ago)

WFB was a reactionary that elite liberals loved.

i can't read any more

remy bean, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:40 (eighteen years ago)

elite-lib wannabe!

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:41 (eighteen years ago)

purely from a historical perspective writing him off as the thinking man's ann coulter is nonsense

of course he was an asshole, obv

deej, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:42 (eighteen years ago)

THIS time?

Right, as opposed to having a perfectly avoidable conniption.

Speaking of which, where can I find video of Buckley arguing with Carl Sagan about nuclear proliferation? Apparently that one's a corker.

kenan, Thursday, 28 February 2008 17:57 (eighteen years ago)

no, but there are three thousand youtube copies of vidal telling him to shut up

remy bean, Thursday, 28 February 2008 18:00 (eighteen years ago)

deej, Perrin didn't remotely suggest Coulter was as large a "historical" figure as WFB, what he's saying is that beneath the WASP Yalie sheen his ideas are just as clownish and barren.

Dr Morbius, Thursday, 28 February 2008 18:04 (eighteen years ago)

Lotsa Chomsky on youtube, too. It's good television, you gotta give it that.

kenan, Thursday, 28 February 2008 18:05 (eighteen years ago)

i dont really agree xp

deej, Thursday, 28 February 2008 18:06 (eighteen years ago)

Andrew Sullivan posted WFB's letter to Marvin Liebman, who came out to him:

"I honor your decision to raise publicly the points you raise ... but you too must realize what are the implications of what you ask. Namely, that the Judaeo-Christian tradition, which is aligned with, no less, one way of life, become indifferent to another way of life ...

National Review will not be scarred by thoughtless gay bashing, let alone be animated by such practices ... You are absolutely correct in saying that gays should be welcome as partners in efforts to mint sound public policies; not correct, in my judgment, in concluding that such a partnership presupposes the repeal of convictions that are more, much more, than mere accretions of bigotry. You remain, always, my dear friend, and my brother in combat."

"mere accretions of bigotry" – ugh.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:13 (eighteen years ago)

Hitchens and Buckley, 1998, speaking on the events of 1968.

Telling exchange:

ROBINSON Well, Bill, you were . . . as you read the kids who were in the street protesting, how much of it was relatively sophisticated ideology? They weren't just rejecting the strait-laced lives of their parents, but their whole notion, their whole Cold War notion, that Communism was bad, we were good. And how much of it was just naivete, romanticization of the commies, and so on?

BUCKLEY Well, you've asked the hard questions. The fact is that there was kind of a listlessness in the sixties, and that listlessness called for a kind of masturbatory relief. People wanted to find if they could go ahead and get their kicks in some way that they hadn't been getting them, and the more so if they could wed them to some ideal. In fact, what it was was primarily self-concern and an attempt to cast a noble perspective on what it is that you were up to.

ROBINSON You were engaged in narcissism, Christopher?

HITCHINS I think I'll have to quarrel, literally as well as metaphorically, with Mr. Buckley's characterization of it as masturbatory. Actually, it was quite celebrated for going the distance. Perhaps one of the great things about it was that it was the first generation--or perhaps one of the last great things about it, but at any rate one of the true things about it--one of the first generations to take the separation of sex and procreation for granted, which I think led to a great deal of jealousy, incidentally, not to say envy among preceding generations.

Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:18 (eighteen years ago)

he sailed his luxury sailboat into international waters and smoked some marijuana

^^pussy

omar little, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:20 (eighteen years ago)

yeah the chomsky v. buckley shit on youtube is FIRE, you can see the panic in his eyes when he realizes he's in a corner. THE corner.

BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:34 (eighteen years ago)

FIRE is probably the last thing i would call that debate

deej, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:46 (eighteen years ago)

chomsky vs. buckley shit on youtube is AMBIEN

deej, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:47 (eighteen years ago)

it's just stimulating to the neurons is what i mean

http://www.emeraldrose.com/FireHeadCover.jpg

BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:49 (eighteen years ago)

I listened to that clip more than watched it, and tell me if I'm crazy, but can't you just see Buckley as the voice of Shere Khan from The Jungle Book?

kenan, Thursday, 28 February 2008 19:51 (eighteen years ago)

Alfred asked -- The New Republic story about the cruise.

Ned Raggett, Thursday, 28 February 2008 20:53 (eighteen years ago)

chomsky v. buckley

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYlMEVTa-PI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R9Samvw6Z08

Tracer Hand, Friday, 29 February 2008 02:25 (eighteen years ago)

should i assume tracer's last post just put everyone to sleep

deej, Friday, 29 February 2008 03:01 (eighteen years ago)

i actually think it's riveting watching buckley try every trick in his book and still come up so woefully short! these videos could be called "portrait of a drowning man"

Tracer Hand, Friday, 29 February 2008 11:32 (eighteen years ago)

that interview is on the DVD of Manufacturing Consent

Dr Morbius, Friday, 29 February 2008 14:21 (eighteen years ago)

I guess Tracer has killfiled me. Interesting.

kenan, Friday, 29 February 2008 14:31 (eighteen years ago)

whoops sorry dude

Tracer Hand, Friday, 29 February 2008 15:48 (eighteen years ago)

NY Times brings the lolz with Carter-on-left; then a cool gravedance from Veedle:

Over 33 years, the list of guests on “Firing Line” was impressive and very much bipartisan: Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, Clare Boothe Luce and Henry A. Kissinger on the right. Muhammad Ali, the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Jimmy Carter and William M. Kunstler on the left. There were also, of course, people who, by dint of political or personal conviction, would not appear on “Firing Line.”

“I was never on his show,” Gore Vidal, with whom Mr. Buckley had a famous feud, said on Thursday. “I don’t like fascism much.”

He added: “I was one of the first people he asked. And, of course, I refused to be on it. And, of course, he lied about it afterward.”

Dr Morbius, Friday, 29 February 2008 20:20 (eighteen years ago)

haha Gore's always good for teh lolz

Shakey Mo Collier, Friday, 29 February 2008 20:22 (eighteen years ago)

editor: "Let's pick a white leftist besides Kunstler... Any Democratic president will do..."

Dr Morbius, Friday, 29 February 2008 20:26 (eighteen years ago)

i am reminded of how sad i'll be when gore vidal dies

J.D., Friday, 29 February 2008 20:41 (eighteen years ago)

R.I.P Bill, a man of integrity and style, and one of the last great American thinkers. Maybe it's a blesisng he won't be around to see the next eight years.

If Assholes Could Fly This Place Would Be An Airport, Friday, 29 February 2008 20:53 (eighteen years ago)

It already is.

Dr Morbius, Friday, 29 February 2008 20:55 (eighteen years ago)

Slate re-linked his email dialogue with Kinsley from a while back. When he types years, he employs the old-school typewriter quirk of using a lowercase L for the one, as in l964. (The surprise was that Slate's default font is such that I didn't even notice the first few times.)

nabisco, Saturday, 1 March 2008 00:17 (eighteen years ago)

if i started doing that would it be like when dudes wear fedoras

deej, Saturday, 1 March 2008 04:12 (eighteen years ago)

n_n

BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Saturday, 1 March 2008 04:54 (eighteen years ago)

Alex Cockburn:

When I first came to America in 1972 I was astonished to find that the conservative cold warrior William Buckley had a television channel paid for out of public funds and reserved for his exclusive use. This was PBS, which alternated Buckley's show with "Wall St Week". In an effort at balance PBS offered the left's point of view in Sesame Street. Buckley's syndicated column was also featured in Dolly Schiff's New York Post. I found him mostly unwatchable and unreadable, being 97 per cent predictable and disgusting in all his views, with a style intolerably loaded with affectation -- fake English urbanity and pompous usage. He was the sort of writer who could never use the word "punishment" without sticking "condign" in front of it, the better to flaunt his stylistic credentials.

His staple was straight cold-war paeans to the unfettered glories of capital. It was all aimed at college-age conservatives. I doubt the rubes could endure him. Who would, when the alterative was Jimmy Swaggart in full spate?

Dr Morbius, Tuesday, 4 March 2008 19:55 (eighteen years ago)

one year passes...

One of many such stories but this one's a reasonably in-depth interview with Christopher B. about the memoir.

Ned Raggett, Friday, 24 April 2009 19:33 (sixteen years ago)

allen ginsberg's appearance on the firing line is some kind of something

schneebles schnabel but they don't fall down (donna rouge), Friday, 24 April 2009 20:01 (sixteen years ago)

kerouac's is really sad

Mr. Que, Friday, 24 April 2009 20:17 (sixteen years ago)

^

I second or third or whatever wanting to see that Sagan debate.

invitation to rabies (╓abies), Saturday, 25 April 2009 09:36 (sixteen years ago)

Although it is a cliche to point it out, Wm. F. Buckley was precisely the kind of man who would have crucified Christ 100 times out of 100.

Not only crucified him, he would have gone out of his way to ensure it and chortled at the thought of him nailed to a cross under a scorching sun, as he drank some nicely chilled wine on a veranda with a pleasant view. If some urbane company were present, he no doubt would have passed off some witty conversation on the subject, leaving them all congratulating themselves on their shared sophistication. iow, a shitheel with polished manners.

Aimless, Saturday, 25 April 2009 18:28 (sixteen years ago)

Nah that was Yoo.

Ned Raggett, Saturday, 25 April 2009 18:37 (sixteen years ago)

His compassion for the Vietnamese people was legendary, Ned. The poor were his especial concern. The similarities to Mother Theresa are too numerous to mention.

He spent his life comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable. Nothing could make a wealthy burgher more apoplectic than to quote some of Buckley's political opinions to him.

Or am I mixing him up with Lord Buckley?

Aimless, Saturday, 25 April 2009 18:56 (sixteen years ago)

Lengthy excerpt in the NY Magazine.

I'm crossing over into enterprise (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 25 April 2009 20:53 (sixteen years ago)

six years pass...

his FBI file -- pissed off Hoover eventually

https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2015/oct/01/william-f-buckleys-fbi-file/

skateboards are the new combover (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 13 October 2015 15:41 (ten years ago)

http://media.giphy.com/media/yoJC2uNKCH6n6qcTwA/giphy.gif

hunangarage, Tuesday, 13 October 2015 15:55 (ten years ago)

that's some uncanny valley shit

Οὖτις, Tuesday, 13 October 2015 15:58 (ten years ago)

how does he make his eyelids do that??

please don't shampoo your eyes (stevie), Tuesday, 13 October 2015 19:18 (ten years ago)

Catholicism.

The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 13 October 2015 19:31 (ten years ago)

Best part is young Christopher Buckley knowing how to hyphenate syllables.

The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 13 October 2015 19:46 (ten years ago)

one year passes...

Is Clint Eastwood giving his character some Buckley mannerisms in dirty harry? Specifically the famed this is a 44 meegnum speech?

D'mnuchin returns (darraghmac), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 22:43 (eight years ago)

"I wondah, Mister Eastwood, if you can explain the, ah, concatenation of events that have made you America's top box office stah...."

the Rain Man of nationalism. (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 22:52 (eight years ago)

Although it is a cliche to point it out, Wm. F. Buckley was precisely the kind of man who would have crucified Christ 100 times out of 100.

Not only crucified him, he would have gone out of his way to ensure it and chortled at the thought of him nailed to a cross under a scorching sun, as he drank some nicely chilled wine on a veranda with a pleasant view. If some urbane company were present, he no doubt would have passed off some witty conversation on the subject, leaving them all congratulating themselves on their shared sophistication. iow, a shitheel with polished manners.

― Aimless, Saturday, 25 April 2009 18:28 (eight years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Pilate isn't the bad guy in the Bible tbf

D'mnuchin returns (darraghmac), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 22:54 (eight years ago)

i musta missed that episode of Firing Line, dmac

Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 23:49 (eight years ago)

The line just came up on some quotes thing and I'm telling ya he's doing Buckley I'm sure of it

D'mnuchin returns (darraghmac), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 23:53 (eight years ago)

you're reminding me of that old SCTV bit where they had assorted celebs doing the Taxi Driver mirror monologue, i think Joe Flaherty's Buckley was in there.

Supercreditor (Dr Morbius), Tuesday, 6 June 2017 23:56 (eight years ago)

six years pass...

I got to see the American Masters ep on Buckley last night. It's a bit delicious how every retrospective on Conservative thought produced in the last 8 or so years has to wrap up with Trump, and if it's from the last few years, you get Trump *and* J6.

an icon of a worried-looking, long-haired, bespectacled man (C. Grisso/McCain), Saturday, 6 April 2024 21:38 (one year ago)

It doesn't even have to be about Conservative thought; I've seen at least four or five documentaries the last few years that started in one place and ended with Trump. It doesn't even have to be a documentary--BlacKkKlansman ended with Trump. He's the endpoint of history for films made during a certain window.

clemenza, Sunday, 7 April 2024 01:11 (one year ago)

xp haven't seen the doc but scott s linked this piece in another thread:

https://prospect.org/politics/2024-04-17-an-implausible-mr-buckley/

budo jeru, Wednesday, 17 April 2024 15:43 (one year ago)

That piece is excellent, as so much of Perlstein's work is

Big Bong Theory (stevie), Wednesday, 17 April 2024 15:51 (one year ago)

one year passes...

Really good piece by Jensen on the biography.

https://defector.com/william-f-buckleys-bill-never-came-due

xyzzzz__, Saturday, 19 July 2025 12:13 (eight months ago)

I have it on hold at the library.

hungover beet poo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 19 July 2025 12:20 (eight months ago)

There is one fantasy about Buckley that goes like this: America was better off when men like him were famous, and that we are lacking proper right-wing intellectuals. Of course, the right wing itself doesn’t believe this; they think they have plenty. It is liberals, and sometimes even leftists, who dream of a modern Firing Line. I sympathize with this fantasy but do not particularly share it. My wish, which is maybe equally childish, is that men like Buckley would be burdened by the fact of themselves. I would love to believe that people like him are conflicted, tortured, haunted in some way when, as they survey their lives, they confront what they have wrought.

Tanenhaus offers no comfort in this regard. A priest, looking to reassure the devout Buckley, once suggested to him that “everyone at some point has doubts.” Buckley responds, “I never did.” The book gives me the sense that this is true of matters both spiritual and profane. Buckley never doubted, never wavered, merely laid down his head after a long, untroubled life. He lied as well as he did, and so prolifically and for so long, because it really came that easily to him.

hungover beet poo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, 19 July 2025 12:24 (eight months ago)

i read tanenhaus’ whittaker chambers bio earlier this year. incredibly good book

flopson, Sunday, 20 July 2025 20:38 (eight months ago)

Yup. It's prime Sotobait.

hungover beet poo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Sunday, 20 July 2025 21:04 (eight months ago)

someone really ought to make a movie about the hiss case. nixon is like the crooked detective in a film noir with all the shoe leather investigating. and his cussing is amazing

flopson, Monday, 21 July 2025 21:38 (eight months ago)

this does sound like a great book but holy shit 1,040 pages! I've already read Lonesome Dove this year, ain't no way I'm reading something even longer.

Evans on Hammond (evol j), Monday, 21 July 2025 22:06 (eight months ago)

lol I will probably just listen to the inevitable Know Your Enemy episodes on it. They had him on to talk about Hiss, too.

paper plans (tipsy mothra), Monday, 21 July 2025 22:13 (eight months ago)

They’ve already done an episode on it

Iza Duffus Hardy (President Keyes), Monday, 21 July 2025 22:25 (eight months ago)

Well I guess I need to catch up!

paper plans (tipsy mothra), Tuesday, 22 July 2025 13:02 (eight months ago)

one month passes...

https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_fullsize/plain/did:plc:2kfemzpsbyfpzkp4op6dopoj/bafkreia6s6o6i2svzdppuonlhikjp6kgsfw34oylqozynsj3epxdlizwvq@jpeg

Lithium Just Madison (C. Grisso/McCain), Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:29 (six months ago)

no way

budo jeru, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:30 (six months ago)

They couldn't get a better photo? then again

H.P, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:32 (six months ago)

first AI stamp?

budo jeru, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:33 (six months ago)

They should issue a special Buckley-Vidal stamp.

clemenza, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:36 (six months ago)

"Stop calling me a crypto Nazi or I'll sock you in your goddam face" still an all-time sentence

H.P, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:42 (six months ago)

and you'll stay plastered (to an envelope)

budo jeru, Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:44 (six months ago)

From crypto Nazis to crypto-bro Nazis, the long journey of the American right.

paper plans (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 10 September 2025 02:47 (six months ago)


You must be logged in to post. Please either login here, or if you are not registered, you may register here.