[lbo-talk] cruising the right

[Carl Remick]

>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>
>On Jul 13, 2007, at 10:57 PM, Carl Remick wrote:
>
> > Well, it would be hard to beat the National Review's cruise for
> > hilarity,
> > what with Norman Podhoretz serving as shipboard tummler.
>
>For sure, but what's going on with WFB?
>
>[...]
>
>Buckley is an urbane old reactionary, drunk on doubts. He founded the
>National Review in 1955 – when conservatism was viewed in polite
>society as a mental affliction – and he has always been sceptical of
>appeals to " the people," preferring the eternal top-down certainties
>of Catholicism.

I'll admit that Buckley looks pretty good in Hari's Independent article, but 
that's only because he's standing next to Norman Podhoretz.  As far as 
Buckley's being "urbane" in an absolute sense is concerned, I always think 
how suave WFB was in his heyday during the 1968 Democratic National 
Convention, when he delivered this subtle, witty riposte to Gore Vidal on 
ABC-TV:  "Now listen, you queer stop calling me a crypto-Nazi or I’ll sock 
you in you goddamn face and you’ll stay plastered."  Ah, there's nothing 
like those "eternal top-down certainties of Catholicism."

<http://www.pitt.edu/~kloman/debates.html>

Carl

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