A Few (Short) Words from William F. Buckley Jr.:
“I won't insult your intelligence by suggesting that you really believe what you just said.”
“Liberals claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.”
“I get satisfaction of three kinds. One is creating something, one is being paid for it and one is the feeling that I haven't just been sitting on my ass all afternoon.”
“The best defense against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry.”
—William F. Buckley Jr. (1925-2008), conservative icon, author, talk-show host, magazine editor and wordman, died at his desk in Stamford, Conn., yesterday. (See New York Times obit)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
The man was a sorcerer/siren. I hated most of his perspectives, but I sure loved to listen to him. Like all good obits, the NYTimes retrospective is a celebration of his infuriating wit:
ReplyDelete"He taped 1,504 [Firing Line"] programs, including debates on scores of topics like 'Resolved: The women’s movement has been disastrous.'”
"There were exchanges on foreign policy with Norman Thomas, feminism with Germaine Greer, and race relations with James Baldwin. Not a few viewers thought Mr. Buckley’s toothy grin before he scored a point resembled nothing so much as a switchblade."
"[L]ining up squarely behind Southern segregationists, [Buckley said] that Southern whites had the right to impose their ideas on blacks who were as yet culturally and politically inferior to them. After some conservatives objected, Mr. Buckley suggested instead that both uneducated whites and blacks should be denied the vote."
"Mr. Buckley did not accord automatic support to Republicans. For President Dwight D. Eisenhower, whom National Review was founded in part to oppose, the magazine ultimately managed only a memorably tepid endorsement: 'We prefer Ike.'”
"In 1985, David Remnick, writing in The Washington Post, said, 'He has the eyes of a child who has just displayed a horrid use for the microwave oven and the family cat.'”
"To the New York City politician Mark Green, he purred: 'You’ve been on the show close to 100 times over the years. Tell me, Mark, have you learned anything yet?'”
“'No other act can project simultaneous hints that he is in the act of playing Commodore of the Yacht Club, Joseph Goebbels, Robert Mitchum, Maverick, Savonarola, the nice prep school kid next door and the snows of yesteryear,' [Norman] Mailer said in an interview with Harper’s Magazine in 1967."
"When asked what he would do if he won [the NYC mayor's race in 1965], he answered, 'Demand a recount.' He got 13.4 percent of the vote."
Great stuff....
I especially agree with the liberals shocked reaction to other opinions. I have no quarrel with liberals or conservatives, but I do remember my ideas constantly being squashed by a liberal professor who couldn't accept any opinion other than his own (not at USU, don't worry).
ReplyDeleteI know of a number of students that change their course of study because the so called "free expression of ideas" is nothing more than a place to indoctrinate unsuspecting freshmen of liberal agendas.
Here's to the teacher, instructor, professor, or whomever, who allows the minds of the future to grow and educates students rather than drilling them with nonsense like government figures in the novel "1984".
I'm truly surprised that I made my way into a Journalism track. After the arrogant filth that was shoved down my throat, I still see hope for those who will endure the extremes, conservative, liberal, or otherwise.