[blitzgig]

Amazing that Buckley and Galbraith were good friends, considering the ferocity of their arguments.

[bubman]

bump

[Frank T]

Hopefully another nail in the coffin of the Great Society.

RIP? Good riddance.

[ClearCase_guy]

Buckley is gracious, of course.

There was a time when the influential people in society knew how to behave. Civility is now largely gone, though I think people on the Right have held on to a bit more civility than those on the Left.

[Semper Paratus]

I cut my conservative teeth in high school watching WFB on Firing Line debate people like JKG.

How appalled WFB must be with the how the genre has degenerated into Crossfire and Hardball.

[Hawthorn]

The most influential economists of the 20th century were John Maynard Keynes and Milton Friedman. Period. End of story.

John Kenneth Galbraith? He shouldn't even be mentioned in the same paragraph as Keynes and Friedman. Not even close.

I'm tempted to say even more. But as the wisdom of the ages dictates, "De mortibus nihil nisi bonum."

[Taliesan]

Buckley, usually brilliant, at times pedantic, but always graceful. More style in his little finger, and so on.

[untenured]

Amazing that Buckley and Galbraith were good friends, considering the ferocity of their arguments.

There are some among those who traffic in ideas who can amiably break bread with their opposite numbers. But I suspect there are a lot fewer than there used to be. I also suspect that the turmoil of the 1960s, combined with the revolt against it, is mostly responsible for this.

[Mr. Jazzy]

Buckley is an honorable man.

I sincerely doubt that JKG would have been so gracious and magnanimous if the fates of the two had been reversed.

JKG was a maker and seller of the poison that is socialism. He was an ardent elitist who professed to care only for the good of all, but lived only for himself and personal aggrandizement, ... not that that is bad thing!

I wonder what how surprised he was to see that Karl Marx was not in charge in the "collective in the clouds".

Speak no ill of the dead.

(I prefer english.)

[FerdieMurphy]

I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.

[Santiago de la Vega]

As for Galbraith's economics, there is little doubt that neither he, nor the donkeys that voted him influential, will survive the test of time.

The three most influential economists of the 20th century are:

1. Milton Friedman - Monetary Analysis
2. Ronald Coase - Property Rights Analysis
3. Irving Fisher - Theory of Interest

Most important of these is Milton Friedman whose analysis of money lead directly to the annihilation of inflation and the subsequent dominance of the Republican Party.

Without a failing economy to get them elected, the Democrats have nothing to sell the average American voter.

Galbraith will be forgotten as fast as his lifeless body cools.

Good riddance.

[BamaAndy]

Galbraith was always wrong in terms of the total economic picture of a capitalist system with some freedom still protected. He never seemed to see or acknowledge his error even after the failure of his ideas. (He was the tax and big government contrast to Milton Friedman--who remains one of my heros to this day). Still RIP--but I'd rather see his theories die quickly, but they won't because we have so many brainwashed, incapable, silly libs entrenched in our institutions now.