Precisely, LS. It is the disingenuosness of Noonan that caused my criticism of her column.
Buckley, OTOH, just lacks vision, even in his brilliance, and that's where his critique comes from.
But great men of vision......both Reagan and Bush 43......are unaffected by the criticism of those who can't see what they see.
Brilliance does not always equal "vision." Buckley is no exception. I recall in the 1980s that George Will was MYOPIC when it came to the dynamic of supply-side tax cuts. He just didn't get it. He drove me nuts! I despised him . . . until I heard him in a Yale debate over foreign policy where he made one of the most astounding defenses of American preeminence in the world that I have ever heard.
Brilliance in foreign policy doesn't mean that you understand economics sometimes, or vice versa. Buckely is just wrong and his timing was wrong, wrong, wrong.