Posted on 09/27/2009 11:19:38 AM PDT by fours
Edited on 09/27/2009 12:39:50 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
William Safire, a speechwriter for President Richard M. Nixon and a Pulitzer Prize-winning political columnist for The New York Times who also wrote novels, books on politics and a Malaprop’s treasury of articles on language, died at a hospice in Rockville, Md. on Sunday. He was 79.
The cause was pancreatic cancer, said Martin Tolchin, a friend of the family.
There may be many sides in a genteel debate, but in the Safire world of politics and journalism it was simpler: there was his own unambiguous wit and wisdom on one hand and, on the other, the blubber of fools he called “nattering nabobs of negativism” and “hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history.”
He was a college dropout and proud of it, a public relations go-getter who set up the famous Nixon-Khrushchev “kitchen debate” in Moscow, and a White House wordsmith in the tumultuous era of war in Vietnam, Nixon’s visit to China and the gathering storm of the Watergate scandal that drove the president from office.
Then, from 1973 to 2005, Mr. Safire wrote his twice weekly “Essay” for the Op-Ed Page of The Times, a forceful conservative voice in the liberal chorus. Unlike most Washington columnists who offer judgments with Olympian detachment, Mr. Safire was a pugnacious contrarian who did much of his own reporting, called people liars in print and laced his opinions with outrageous wordplay.
Critics initially dismissed him as an apologist for the disgraced Nixon coterie. But he won the 1978 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, and for 32 years tenaciously attacked and defended foreign and domestic policies, and the foibles, of seven administrations. Along the way, he incurred enmity and admiration, and made a lot of powerful people squirm.
...The same here, a great loss for conservatives and third party advocates, RIP, Mr. Safire...
On Language, which has appeared in The New York Times Magazine since 1979. This column on grammar, usage, and etymology has led to the publication of 10 books and made him the most widely read writer on the English language.
It's always a pleasure to read the opinions of a person who is a clear thinker and has a command of the English language, whether you agree or not.
R.I.P.
In matters of language, Safire was the successor to John Ciardi. Who will be Safire's successor?
William Safire was a language expert. For example, he might have explored what the "H" in RHINO represents, or why you used all caps to describe an odd-toed ungulate.
RIP
He had a great desire to be liked by liberals; so he denounced his old friend Pat Buchanan and endorsed Bill Clinton. I never read him after that.
Bob Novak never denounced Pat Buchanan to win points with liberals.
Amen. You lose your conservative card, in my opinion, when you vote for Slick.
RIP.
Thanks. Its always good to get verbally spanked on a Sunday afternoon.
Safire didn't denounce Buchanan to win points with liberals, he denounced Buchanan because Buchanan is a Jew-hating wackjob.
A great loss. RIP, Mr. Safire.
i loved his books, "How Not to Write," and "William Safire On Language." he was much more than a wordsmith... more than a grammarian...
Don't you just hate when that happens?
You said it. And now America is one less, just when she needs them most. Instead we have charlatans, propagandists, and idiots.
Requiescat in pace. Go with God.
So what?
Are you one of these knee-jerks who only appreciate someone who agrees with them 100% of the time? 90% just won’t do.
You can say that again.
Ah, so. That explains why Safire joined in the secular liberal jihad against that movie, Passion of the Christ.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/01/opinion/01SAFI.html?hp
The villains at whom the audience's outrage is directed are the actors playing bloodthirsty rabbis and their rabid Jewish followers. This is the essence of the medieval "passion play," preserved in pre-Hitler Germany at Oberammergau, a source of the hatred of all Jews as "Christ killers."....
The richness of Scripture is in its openness to interpretation answering humanity's current spiritual needs. That's where Gibson's medieval version of the suffering of Jesus, reveling in savagery to provoke outrage and cast blame, fails Christian and Jew today.
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