you nice liberals are so literal-minded. she's just a provocateur! isn't it fun?
― horseshoe, Monday, 19 December 2011 16:55 (twelve years ago) link
She claims Hitchens drank last July, but he said several times that he gave up drinking; he'd lost the taste for it.
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 16:55 (twelve years ago) link
http://imnotatoy.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/w5bcn.gif?w=500
― nuhnuhnuh, Monday, 19 December 2011 16:56 (twelve years ago) link
good katha pollitt remembrance bit.ly/tjCN5l
― max max max max, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:23 (twelve years ago) link
TNC grapples with Hitchens' support for Iraq.
Nevertheless, I think Glenn's frame is wrong. Virtues don't excuse sins; they cohabit with them. Thomas Jefferson was a slaveholder. Perhaps worse he was a slaveholder who comprehended, more than any other, the moral failing of slavery, and it's potential to bring the country to war, and yet at the end of his life he argued for slavery's expansion, and on his death many of his slaves were sent to the auction block.
At his end, Jefferson sided with those who would eventually bring about the deaths of 600,000 Americans. He argued that the antebellum South would have either "justice" versus "self-preservation." To paraphrase Churchill, it chose the latter and consequently got neither. But Jefferson was a beautiful writer, and a great intellect, whose thinking and prose I consistently find stunning. This admiration does not negate his moral cowardice. Both are true at the same time. (The same point could be made in regards to our conversation over Elizabeth Cady Stanton.)
Given Hitchens own ties to this magazine, of which I'm very fond, I'd like to say that--at least in this space--there's no demand for exclusion, or any sense that Hitchens worthy of unalloyed admiration. No one should ever receive, or wisely desire, such a thing. I can't really speak for other people, but I don't believe in an essential, irreducible moral nature. I don't see Hitchens, or anyone else, as a case of either/or.
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:32 (twelve years ago) link
pollitt's piece is good. it's kind of a trip for me to imagine them interacting irl.
― horseshoe, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:34 (twelve years ago) link
What I saw was that drinking made him angry and combative and bullying, often toward people who were way out of his league—elderly guests on the Nation cruise, interns (especially female interns).
post graduate level zing
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:40 (twelve years ago) link
really who dreamed up this idea of a cruise as fundraiser for a political magazine
― slandblox goole, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:42 (twelve years ago) link
just imagining it is so strange and horrible
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:43 (twelve years ago) link
there should be a short story where it's really some kind of bait and switch and they've all joined the navy reserve or an oil shipping line or something
― slandblox goole, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:47 (twelve years ago) link
shanghaied to write spam for the russian mob
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:48 (twelve years ago) link
I voted for him twice, and I wouldn't want to be at sea w/ Ralph Nader (esp if Jim Hightower was also around)
― Dr Morbius, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:52 (twelve years ago) link
what u voted twice for ralph nader how has this fact never come out on ilx before???
jk :)
― Mordy, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:53 (twelve years ago) link
morbs and nader bunked together in the navy how has this fact never come out on ilx before???
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:55 (twelve years ago) link
haha
― horseshoe, Monday, 19 December 2011 17:56 (twelve years ago) link
i just cannot stop imagining a soused hitchen screaming at a tableful of old lefties just tryna enjoy their chicken a la king and then flipping the table and storming off in disgust
― max max max max, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:00 (twelve years ago) link
its really amazing
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:01 (twelve years ago) link
katha pollit clucking in the background
― horseshoe, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:01 (twelve years ago) link
chainsmoking in his cabin angrily writing out a 1200-word screed about the variety show
― max max max max, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:02 (twelve years ago) link
threatening to quit if pollitt doesnt publish it immediately, on board the ship
puking over the side of the deck while his intern holds his hair
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:03 (twelve years ago) link
trying to charm an indifferent waitress with a story about dodging a militia in lebanon and then barfing over the side
xp lool
― slandblox goole, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:04 (twelve years ago) link
http://media.salon.com/2010/07/pollster_scott_rasmussen_to_speak_on_national_review_cruise_for_free-460x307.jpg
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:05 (twelve years ago) link
haha goole
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:06 (twelve years ago) link
I'm pretty sure couscous is favored over chicken a la king on The Nation cruise.
also Richard Dreyfuss was on it a couple years ago
― Dr Morbius, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:07 (twelve years ago) link
why was Richard Dreyfuss on some couscous?
― OH NOES, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:08 (twelve years ago) link
Dan crunches on indefinite pronounds like cornflakes.
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:10 (twelve years ago) link
RICHARD DREYFUSS OVER A BED OF COUSCOUS JOIN US NATION MAGAZINE CRUISE 2012
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:10 (twelve years ago) link
*pronouns
btw I hate to tell u this year's returned to port yesterday
http://www.nationcruise.com/
― Dr Morbius, Monday, 19 December 2011 18:10 (twelve years ago) link
lol at puking while an intern holds his hair
― caek, Monday, 19 December 2011 21:06 (twelve years ago) link
http://nearemmaus.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/hitch.jpg?w=690
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 21:10 (twelve years ago) link
omg he rode a folding bike, it all makes sense now
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Monday, 19 December 2011 21:14 (twelve years ago) link
he was recreating Lenin's arrival at Finland Station.
― Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 19 December 2011 21:17 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.salon.com/2011/12/20/i_knew_christopher_hitchens_better_than_you/singleton/#comments
― HOOS aka driver of steen, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 18:55 (twelve years ago) link
Not as funny as I wanted it to be.
― Lord Sotosyn, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 18:55 (twelve years ago) link
still pretty funny
― iatee, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 18:58 (twelve years ago) link
The first time I saw him, he had a bird on each arm and a woman by his side.
Sometimes the cheap laughs are the best.
― ledge, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 19:02 (twelve years ago) link
http://overratedwhitedudes.tumblr.com/post/14311784932/more-lucid-than-the-average-mean-spirited-drunk
― v-whiney (Cuauhtemoc Blanco), Tuesday, 20 December 2011 22:22 (twelve years ago) link
overrated tumblr whites
― nuhnuhnuh, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 22:32 (twelve years ago) link
Ron Jeremy? come on, bro.
― Matt Armstrong, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 22:34 (twelve years ago) link
okay "the MGD 64 of human beings" for McConaughey is pretty funny
― OH NOES, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 22:37 (twelve years ago) link
yeah honestly I only disagreed with like 3 of them but Ron Jeremy is deserving of his status.
― Matt Armstrong, Tuesday, 20 December 2011 23:02 (twelve years ago) link
Oh man, I haven't thought about Neil Pollack in years!
― sterl, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:22 (twelve years ago) link
neither have i!
― river wolf, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:37 (twelve years ago) link
I don't have a clue who he is!
― Aimless, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:40 (twelve years ago) link
he was a thing for a while!
― Cooper Chucklebutt, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:49 (twelve years ago) link
The anthology of american literature is basically pieces like this about/in the style of most major macho literary figures of the 20th century. Since then, I guess he's written a bunch of other funny stuff too.
― sterl, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:49 (twelve years ago) link
Yeah, Anthology is hilarious
― Number None, Wednesday, 21 December 2011 18:52 (twelve years ago) link