Posted on 11/30/2023 9:54:45 AM PST by Miami Rebel
Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson agreed wholeheartedly with the assertion that National Review founding editor William F. Buckley Jr. was “one of the great villains of the 20th century” during a Wednesday interview with Dave Smith, a comedian and libertarian YouTube host.
Smith launched the initial attack on Buckley, declaring “I’ll tell you this: Whatever this atrophy in like the intelligence of the American people, it’s, I think it’s accelerating. I mean it’s-. Look, and again, just like you said I’ll disclaimer as well: I’m talking about people who I don’t necessarily like. Like I view Bill Buckley as like one of the great villains of the 20th century. I think he ruined-”
At that point, Carlson interrupted to shout “I couldn’t agree more!” and pound his fist on a table with a laugh.
“But, but, but he was a clearly very — also CIA by the way — but he was also a very intelligent guy and witty, and not speaking down to his audience, and like a popular show, his Firing Line show would be Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley arguing with each other,” said Smith.
In addition to founding and overseeing National Review, Buckley was a prolific, widely-read columnist who also hosted the long-running interview show Firing Line. He is regarded as one of the founding fathers of the modern conservative movement, and helped shape its ideological parameters as well as propel it to political success within the Republican Party.
He also worked for the CIA for two years after graduating from Yale.
Both Carlson’s brother and firstborn son bear the first name Buckley. It is not clear whether his brother was named after the famed conservative commentator and activist, although the Carlson’s father, Dick Carlson was a right-of-center journalist who was appointed the director of the United States Information Agency under President Ronald Reagan and U.S. ambassador to Seychelles under President George H.W. Bush.
You’re not only disingenuous, you’re violating the recommendation you left on your “About” page here at FR.
Perhaps you remember writing this:
“Name-calling, stereotyping, and childish insults do not substitute for rational thought and intelligent discussion”
In any event, here’s a few extra morsels to munch on.
It’s hard when it’s your ox being gored. I get it.
“Buckley supported the legalization of marijuana and some other drug legalization as early as his 1965 candidacy for mayor of New York City.[158][159] But in 1972, he said that while he supported removing criminal penalties for using marijuana, he also supported cracking down on trafficking marijuana.
Buckley later said he wished National Review had been more supportive of civil rights legislation in the 1960s.[142] He grew to admire Martin Luther King Jr. and supported the creation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
Buckley became a close friend of liberal Democratic activist Allard K. Lowenstein. He featured Lowenstein on numerous Firing Line programs, publicly endorsed his candidacies for Congress, and delivered a eulogy at his funeral.[104][105]
Buckley was also a friend of economist John Kenneth Galbraith[106][107] and former senator and presidential candidate George McGovern,[108] both of whom he frequently featured or debated on Firing Line and college campuses. He and Galbraith occasionally appeared on The Today Show, where host Frank McGee would introduce them and then step aside and defer to their verbal thrusts and parries.”
Don’t fall for their left/right games.
I had met Miss Rand three years before that review was published. Her very first words to me (I do not exaggerate) were: “You ahrr too intelligent to believe in Gott.” The critic Wilfrid Sheed once remarked, when I told him the story, “Well, that certainly is an icebreaker.” It was; and we conversed, and did so for two or three years. I used to send her postcards in liturgical Latin: but levity with Miss Rand was not an effective weapon. And when I published Whittaker Chambers’ review, her resentment was so comprehensive that she regularly inquired of all hosts or toastmasters whether she was being invited to a function at which I was also scheduled to appear, because if that was the case, either she would not come; or, if so, only after I had left; or before I arrived. I fear that I put the lady through a great deal of choreographical pain.
Here’s what RUSH thought of Buckley:
https://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2021/03/02/what-rush-said-about-buckley-is-what-were-saying-about-the-maha-now/
-PJ
Who doesn’t know sarcasm when they see it.
Buckley and Vidal had a few one on one debates if I recall. They were somewhat infamous.
Yes....NR started dying in the late 90’s early 2000’s to me anyway.
“Whittaker Chambers wrote a scathing review of Atlas Shrugged in National Review.”
Curious. Neither Chambers, nor Rand, were perfect. However, each made a positive contribution, IMO. Why must so many conservatives judge other conservatives harshly? We see it in this very thread.
Lol. A person can be a conservative 99% of the time. But if he has a non-conservative position of any kind then the FR knives come out. Just like with liberals. 100% adherence is required or it’s off with your head.
Spare me the smarm ... it’s unbecoming.
Your cut-n-paste does a poor job of characterizing Bill Buckley’s long career. Again, you were there. You read NR in real time. You know better. Or you should. Of course he wasn’t perfect, and of course he did things I disagreed with at the time. Remember his campaign against Lowell Weicker? It made sense at the time, but it didn’t work out as well as he intended.
I see you’re latching on to drug legalization. It seems that perhaps he foresaw the horrific threat to our civil liberties and constitutional rights the “War on Drugs” became.
I see that you are upset at him debating the likes of George McGovern. WTF? How do you debate the left without debating a leftist? Don’t be stupid.
The bottom line here is you’re worth taking seriously.
I don't know what happened to its corpse. What I see online today, the few times I see it, is of little value.
Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens need to get an Adolf and Eva thing going together.
did you not know that Rino neocon are what you call those who disagree with your views.... There are Rino and Neocons but there is also a tendency to label republicans you disagree with the neocon and Rino.
I have to add a comment to the end but just because it is about William F. Buckley. In the second half of the 70’s, I started reading the editorial pages of my local newspaper which was decidedly conservative at the time. They had lots of interesting columns, Thomas Sowell, names I don’t remember, and Buckley. I swear to God that I never was able to read an entire column by that guy. He used words that you would have to look up in the dictionary to know what he was talking about and he combined them in ways that you would have to really think about before going on to the next sentence. It wasn’t that his words were so meaningful that they made me feel wonder or awe, they were boring as hell. Sowell was so easy to read because he related to his audience and Buckley seemed like he was showing off his superior diction and vocabulary.
“Rino” and “neocon” are meaningless insult words. They’re no different from calling someone a “motherfxxker”. There’s no objective meaning, it’s just a rude way of saying “I don’t agree with you and I hold you in contempt”.
Think he better stick to talking about Aliens UFO's lol
The thing to do is identify which “conservatives” were actually communists or otherwise anti-American merely parroting conservative views.
Just because Buckley could yap his jaw doesn’t mean he believed what he said.
Remember the “Young Guns”? Paul Ryan was one of those scoundrels gracing the front of that rag.
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