Comments on: The World’s Smartest Conservative Was a Dope

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 17:57:58 +0000

John: You are correct. I therefore resign my position as King of Massachusetts.

By: John Knight

John Knight — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 17:36:26 +0000

Wow.This rant is the dumbest post I’ve read in a while, and that’s saying something.The “racist” accusation is bizarre.The hyper-literal take on “the first 2,000 names” is a hopelessly wooden interpretation.And the claim that Wm. Buckley was “a dope” is misplaced confidence at best.I suppose that Mr. Laden is smarter-than-average and reasonably competent at his job, but in the end, that’s not saying all that much. His intelligence and education obviously has not given him the common sense one wants in a high-ranking government official, and his glowing lack of humility marks him as completed unsuited to wielding power in a responsible fashion.

By: the real cmf

the real cmf — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 19:08:47 +0000

R.Totale : exactly what is there to understand about an elitist–the lace curtain underwear, or the better than thou arrogance?Greg: You have a great sense of Boston-Irish history here in this post. Where did you get that Boston Phone book phrase? I haven’t heard that,and couldn’t find it anywhere–but you are the third entry down on Google with that phrase;-)I did find a cool racial slur data base thoughhttp://www.rsdb.org/I like your use of the word racism here as well. Pierre Bordieux has been using this idea of racism and class racism for years, and its nice to see it get out there–yup, racism exist even amongst the classes, and the same theoretical ‘races’…

By: R. Totale

R. Totale — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 18:46:23 +0000

William F. Buckley (oddly enough one of my parents’ best friends is a Bill Buckley, and he’s absolutely nothing like this twit) was not someone I paid a great deal of attention to outside of the matter of his massive gambling problem combined with his authorship of “The Book of Virtues”.You’re thinking of Bill Bennett.Greg -Loath him? Really? Either your perspective is all out of whack or you have defined “loathsome” much more loosely than me. Also, it certainly is convenient for you that someone you disagree with ideologically just happens to be a dope and a racist. It’s almost as if it saves you the trouble of trying to understand him.

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 15:20:15 +0000

Josh,I’m afraid that your incredulity is not sufficiently powerful mojo to ward off W.F.Buckley’s well known and widespread elitism and general obnoxiousness. Do you not see my point? My point is that Buckley, who would just as soon telly you that he is the smartest person in the world as look at you with those creepy snake-like eyes, accidentally correlated a variable to itself and called it significant. He made a rookery error. Over and over again, it would appear.Feel free to deny anti-Irish racism if you like, but you cannot deny the fundamental truth of what Buckley did.

By: Joshua Zelinsky

Joshua Zelinsky — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 15:13:54 +0000

Not everything is about racism; I see no evidence that this comment was racist at all. And Buckley would have been smart enough to realize that the first 2000 names would not be frequently Irish. I see no compelling reason to see this as at all racist. There are a lot of valid critiques of Buckley that you could bring up. This is not one of them.

By: jeffk

jeffk — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 14:33:47 +0000

Jesse claimed that the streets of Saint Paul were laid out by a gang of drunk Irishmen.Wait, they weren't?

By: Brian X

Brian X — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:23:56 +0000

William F. Buckley (oddly enough one of my parents’ best friends is a Bill Buckley, and he’s absolutely nothing like this twit) was not someone I paid a great deal of attention to outside of the matter of his massive gambling problem combined with his authorship of “The Book of Virtues”. What I want to know is how someone could naturally grow up with that accent without having been raised by one of the more retarded members of the British royal family.

By: greg laden

greg laden — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 20:50:17 +0000

James: Have you lived in Boston?Buckley was as Irish as the Tower of London, despite his ancestry.

By: James

James — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 20:37:11 +0000

Now, what you have to understand is that it is well known that this was not simply a dig on Harvard, but also, a racist remark disparaging of the Irish.

Really?

I've heard the Buckley comment dozens of times and never thought it had anything to do with the Irish.

Buckley was himself an Irish-American, and, like most of the Boston Irish he was supposedly sliming, of the Catholic persuasion. That adds to my skepticism.