Not Even A Hedgehog: The Stupidity of Ronald Reagan

Slate ^ | 6-7-2004 | Christopher "Loved By So Many on FR" Hitchens

[LincolnLover]

*Excerpt*

"...only saw him once up close, which happened to be when he got a question he didn't like. Was it true that his staff in the 1980 debates had stolen President Carter's briefing book? (They had.) The famously genial grin turned into a rictus of senile fury: I was looking at a cruel and stupid lizard..."

[beckett]

You cannot be serious, unmatched?

I said "almost unmatched."

It is the standard prose of a British public school journalists cum essayist.

What can I say? You think he can't write. I think he can. So sue me. His work is anything but "standard."

[cinFLA]

Excuse me? My understanding is that a ballistic missile's path is determined strictly by ballistics - weight, firing time, firing angle, engine power, etc. A guided missile's path can be adjusted by sensors, on the missile or on the ground. It is thus not a ballistic missile. Am I wrong?

Not wrong but not entirely right. ICBM's are 'guided' during the initial booster launch but are ballistic from then on.

[pete anderson]

Was it true that his staff in the 1980 debates had stolen President Carter's briefing book? (They had.)

What an outright lie! Where on earth Did Hitchens get the idea that Reagan used Carter's Debate Book to prep for the 1980 Debates.

Pure Hogwash!

[meandog]

Hitchens had a wife? ...I was almost certain that I heard him admit (on a PBS program about religion) that he was gay.

[Restorer]

Nahh. Reagan was married to Nancy Wyman till she dumped him after winning her Oscar. Hitch tried in his article to imply that RR had dumped his first wife, which is the opposite of the truth.

[olde north church]

P.J. O'Rourke is quoted two pages back (this is not a response to the posting), has anyone read Mr. O'Rourke's writings from his work at National Lampoon? He is no different than Mr. Hitchens in the "even a blind Frenchman finds a bottle of wine once in a while" category. Is there absolution only when we agree with an individual? I was under the impression this was the tolerant side of the political fence.
I have been quite upset since Saturday afternoon with a tear or two, I'm not ashamed to admit, his article stunned me as well. I do know this, though, President Reagan was great enough of a man that his memory puts work such as this far deep into the shadows.
I will continue to read his work, as is my right, as yours to not read it is yours. What will Mr. Hitchens impact on American society 50 years from now? What will President Reagan's?

[ThanhPhero]

I hate that when I see it because that is the "reasoning" of the left and the farther left the more entrenched is that way to think, i.e. The value of one's discourse depends , besides on the ideological content, on the social origins of the writer or speaker. If one is ideologically correct one is still wrong because his views can only be a trick if he had the wrong parentage or comes of the wrong class or race.

When a liberal argument is countered by flurries of namecalling and pointing at a neophyte instead of countering his argument I worry that people are emotionally on the other side even though they prefer, for now, a conservative point of view. When we argue points instead of dismissing a troll who happens to make an argument rather than just spreading drek, then we sharpen our own arguments and thought processes. And to do it to those who actually live at our end of the spectrum but have some funny ideas is atrocious. Argue with them-argue with Buchanan when he is wrong. Hitchens is right often enough that we can afford to fairly calmly point out his errors and his substitution of emotion for reason when he is wrong.

[YaYa123]

I'd love to drink a bottle of bourbon with Hitchens and debate until one of us passed out. I have no sympathy for his causes, but I believe he has the sort of integrity completely absent in most Leftists. Of course he thinks Reagan was stupid; the alternative is a complete refutation of everything Hitchens believes in. It's intellectual self-preservation....."

50 posted on 06/07/2004 11:25:38 AM PDT by Mr. Bird

Thank you, Mr. Bird. You remind us why people here admire Christopher Hitchens. "integrity completely absent in most Leftists" resides with Hitchens.

And so it stings when he goes after one of our heros, our beloved President Reagan, especially with that wickedly nasty tone. "Over the top", I'd say, and "mean" too. But I remind myself how I loved it when Bill Clinton was Hitchens' targeted prey. Besides...whatever Hitchens says about Reagan will not hurt Reagan, nor will it shake our admiration for him.

I won't stop admiring Hitchens either. This latest spew of venom only proves how much more admirable he is than the rest of the left leaning media. Those cowardly cads are all over television, hypocritically purring about Reagan's many accomplishments, occasionally throwing in a subtle little dig that one supposes helps them swallow their own words without choking. Unlike them, Hitchens goes on the record with a vengence. I wouldn'be be surprised if Cowardly Cad # 1, Chris Mathews, has Hitchens on this week. Hypocrit Mathews won't have to utter one criticism of Reagan, he'll let Hitchens do it for him.

Reading Hitchens is an intellectual adventure, and you always know he's telling it like he thinks it is. The following lets you know precisely where Hitchens is coming from, and why he has special loathing for men and women who believe in God. "In the Fall 1996 issue of Free Inquiry Hitchens is interviewed by Matt Cherry and says: "I'm an atheist. I'm not neutral about religion, I'm hostile to it. I think it is a positively bad idea, not just a false one. And I mean not just organized religion, but religious belief itself."

[Nonstatist]

Hitchens had a wife? ...

Yes, he does.. Remember that incident with Sidney Blumenthal? He was there with his wife, Carol Blue..In any event, I think he's on his second marriage. A guy with a temperament like his would have to be lucky to stay married, IMO.

[YaYa123]

But let's get back to the subject at hand...refuting Hitchens, not bashing him.

Almost point by point, Hitchens is nitpicking:

1. Reagan had been misinformed about a word in the Russian language.

2. Quibbles about a lame jokeline, "may the force be with you".

3. Didn't like it that Reagan believed, spoke, and spooked non-believers, about the Biblical Armageddon.

4. In the Oval Office, Ronald Reagan told Yitzhak Shamir and Simon Wiesenthal, on two separate occasions, that he himself had assisted personally at the liberation of the Nazi death camps.(I've got an expert working on the truth of this one.)

5. Hitchens nitpicks again, between his term "South African leadership", and Reagan's "apartheid South Africa".

6. Lebanon was a debacle. Ok, let's give Hitchens that the middle east under Reagan was a cauldron of trouble, for us, and for the world. Let's own up to the fact that Reagan made mistakes, missteps, and had errors in judgement and faulty advice. Name a president who hasn't!

None of that justifies Hitchens' vitriolic, personal attack on President Reagan, before he is laid to rest.
cruel and stupid lizard
rictus of senile fury
dumb as a stump
a obvious phony and loon

But really, these insults are little bee stings, just Hitch playing bitch... for what? Attention? Controversy? He loves both, you know. And oh how we ate it up when Clinton was the recipient!

But Hitchens' real dagger to the heart, he reserves for his friends, his left of center American intellectual friends who thought Carter or Mondale or Dukakis or Bentson bested Reagan in any way.

[Mustangcountry]

The Pentagon Papers were illegaly leaked by the Browne, halberstam, Sheehan axis of disinformation. The PP's were heavily edited, distorted, and butchered with the most left-wing tactics of lying.

Go find "Our Vietnam Nightmare" on the internet. it's a great read by a Chicage tribune Journalist that debunks a lot of crap by BSH way back when during the heady days of Vietnam.

[Mustangcountry]

No he did not.

Hitchens is a damn liar. You should read some of his whoppers about Pinochet and the Khmer Rouge.

[Mustangcountry]

Notice he provide no source or quotation.

Typical left-wing way of falsely accusing soemone of something.

Aren't Simon and Shamir dead?

[D Rider]

Hitchens:"not that there are any non-ballistic missiles—a corruption of language that isn't his fault"

Proof that Hitchens is an idiot. There are plenty of non-ballistic missiles, (like the sparrow , hellfire or any cruise missile.) A ballistic missile has the defining characteristic, that it falls in a ballistic path after the power shuts off. Similar to when an artillery shell leaves the barrel.

What a complete boob. Shows himself to be an idiot, while he tries to call someone an idiot.

[Militiaman7]

Christopher Hitchens was an a$$hole when I met him and he still is today.

Hitchens isn't qualified to lick the horse crap off President Reagan's boots.

[beckett]

Aren't Simon [Weisenthal] and [Yitzhak ] Shamir dead?

As far as I can tell from an internet search, both are alive but very old. Weisenthal is 95 and Shamir 89.

[section9]

Hitchens' one redeeming emotion is that he understands the War on Terror. It is unfortunate that he fails to understand Reagan's historical importance.

Be Seeing You,

Chris

[Yardstick]

Do you know the name of that article? Can it be found on the net?

[swheats]

He could have had anyone in the world to dinner, any night of the week, but took most of his meals on a White House TV tray.

Yet look at all he accomplished and the people who saw freedom during his term.

What have you accomplished Hitchens?

[Joe_October]

...Hitchens wrote the whole piece looking for nasty things to say about Reagan. That he had to reach for something as silly as this shows he had slim pickings to draw from.....

I found Hitchens eminently useful. If anyone could actually says something about Renaldus that would stick it would be Hitchens.

The two worst things he said was that Reagan LOOKED like something bad once and he and his boys wish they had done what Reagan actually did (regarding the collapse of Communism).

Other than that, he takes every cheap shot he can and finds nothing.

I'm not sad that Reagan is gone. I'm grateful that he lived.