Bill Buckley Passes...

[James Brody]

"William F. Buckley founded the political magazine National Review in 1955, hosted the television show Firing Line from 1966 until 1999, and was a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist. His writing style was famed for its erudition, wit, and use of uncommon words." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_F_Buckley)

Bill Buckley, after living a perfect life, died yesterday the perfect death, nodding off while working in his study. Given that skeptics and loners give both protection and flexibility to emergent organiztions, even the lefties benefited from having Bill with us. Ann Coulter is a gadfly and she remembers best Buckley's gadfly nature. (We all pick our environments!) Enjoy her tribute to him...

JimB

"WILLIAM F. BUCKLEY: R.I.P., ENFANT TERRIBLE

"February 27, 2008

"William F. Buckley was the original enfant terrible.

"As with Ronald Reagan, everyone prefers to remember great men when they weren't being great, but later, when they were being admired. Having changed the world, there came a point when Buckley no longer needed to shock it.

"But to call Buckley an "enfant terrible" and then to recall only his days as a grandee is like calling a liberal actress "courageous." Back in the day, Buckley truly was courageous. I prefer to remember the Buckley who scandalized to the bien-pensant.

"Relevant to Republicans' predicament today, National Review did not endorse a candidate for president in 1956, correctly concluding that Dwight Eisenhower was not a conservative, however great a military leader he had been...Nor would National Review endorse liberal Republican Richard Nixon, waiting until 1964 to enthusiastically support a candidate for president who had no hope of winning. Barry Goldwater, though given the right things to say -- often by Buckley or Bozell, who wrote Goldwater's Conscience of a Conservative -- was not particularly bright.

"But the Goldwater candidacy, Buckley believed, would provide "the well-planted seeds of hope," eventually fulfilled by Ronald Reagan.... When later challenged on Reagan's intellectual stature, Buckley said: "Of course, he will always tend to reach first for an anecdote. But then, so does the New Testament."...With liberal Republicans still bothering everyone even after Reagan, Buckley went all out against liberal Republican Sen. Lowell P. Weicker Jr. When Democrat Joe Lieberman challenged Weicker for the Senate in 1988 ... Buckley started a political action committee to support Lieberman, explaining...that he "doesn't have the tendency of appalling you every time he opens his mouth."

More at: http://www.anncoulter.com/
See also the magnificient testimonials to him at http://www.nationalreview.com/