While in college I was a fairly regular reader, at the library, of William F. Buckley, Jr.’s National Review magazine. Along with reading Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged, I was interested in conservative ideas, but came away unable to embrace them. I didn’t, however, register as a Democrat until twenty years later, during Bill Clinton’s second term. Newt Gingrich made it obvious that the Republican Party was no longer interested in governing, but in merely holding onto power.
I understand rich people wanting to protect their accumulated money, because it’s also true for those of us who are reasonably well off. What I can’t abide is Republicans being offended by the very existence of certain people. Their tolerance is tested when “those people” insist upon being seen and heard. In short, Republicans don’t believe in live and let live.
History has shown, to my satisfaction, that William F. Buckley managed to end up on the wrong side of every major domestic issue of his time, with the exception of Watergate. Defending the Democrats’ war in Vietnam must have been the height of irony for him. What would Buckley have thought of Trump’s advocacy of Putin’s Russia?
Buckley seemed to delight in ad hominem jibes at his political sparring partners. He was known for his verbal jousting with Gore Vidal. I don’t recall anyone ever comparing Buckley’s highly affected mannerisms to his contemporary, and fellow New Yorker, Truman Capote, who also enjoyed indulging in witty personal slights. This new American Masters documentary does a good job of damning William F. Buckley, Jr. with high praise.
As pointed out in the documentary, Buckley made many appearances on college campuses, and students enjoyed meeting him. As I have mentioned before, I was influenced in college when meeting Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith.
Here are Buckley and Galbraith at the start of Reagan’s first term, when the ideas of John Maynard Keynes had been overshadowed by Friedrich August Hayek, by way of Milton Friedman’s Chicago School laissez faire economics. Neither Buckley nor Galbraith lived long enough to see a Republican administration embracing Keynesian government intervention to save American Capitalism.
Note: I have linked to this video, rather the embed it, because of the warning about unauthorized distribution. The Hoover Institution Library & Archives doesn’t prevent embedding, which undermines the disclaimer.
