What Doug said. His writing sparkled; he knew all sorts of wonderful things; he actually thought about them in interesting ways. Someone should go through those VV articles, including the ones he wrote with Jack Newfield, and the 1980s-90s Nation columns, especially the double-page ones he got to write before they cut his space, and edit a new anthology.
Hitchens was really great too, less interesting as a thinker, more wide-ranging, perhaps, in terms of his knowledge. His utter collapse has been a real tragedy. I would even care so much if he'd switched political sides of he hadn't traded in his brains and style at the door.
--- Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Apr 28, 2007, at 4:56 PM, Chris Doss wrote:
>
> > I really don't understand what people see in
> Cockburn.
>
> He used to be really really great. From around 1975
> or so when he
> first started writing for the Village Voice, and
> into his Nation
> columns in the early 1990s, he was a brilliant
> stylist and a really
> original thinker. The pieces collected in
> Corruptions of Empire are
> dazzling. As Lou Proyect said recently, though, he's
> devolved into a
> country gentleman with cranky opinions.
>
> Doug
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