The following logical fallacies beset your response:
"Defending the dead from ... waiting until they're gone to criticize them"
Many of the people who are criticizing the man and his legacy were critics of his actions through the sixty years during which he was building that legacy. It is true that he can no longer speak in witty dismissal of what they say, and it's also true that during his lifetime, a great deal of what he said to dismiss his critics did not actually address what they were saying, but simply mocked, distracted, and confused them. Do not confuse his success at argumentation with his being factually, ethically or morally right; sometimes his best rejoinders in terms of wit were also the ones which had no bearing whatsoever on the argument he was dismissing.
This is not to say that he wasn't capable of answering a point with a counter point, or answering a theory with a telling analysis of the flaws in the theory, because he was. However, when it came to the harder questions, the ones where neither "liberal" nor "conservative" approaches are adequate to the situation, where it takes the hard work of cooperation, compromise, creativity and sacrifice? Not his forte, in my experience, based on observing his debates on his personal public pedestal.
Other people who are now speaking ill of him, may have never had the opportunity nor the reason to examine him and his life, and some may have been "cowardly" in that they did not feel safe in speaking ill of the man in life. And given the nature of the press and public speech, without the opportunity afforded by his death and the publicity attending to it, there are surely many whose ill words were simply ignored as not-too-newsworthy.
"historic distance"
This is a popular quash. It's also silly for two reasons:
That "legacy" you speak of has been built over the last 50-60 years, and while we cannot know every outcome, we can and do know many of them already. To reduce it to the absurd: the legacy of a mass-murderer (say, Jim Jones) is pretty much laid out then and there before us when the action happens. Historical distance actually serves to cloud and confuse the events themselves, unless someone is able to go in and analyze, document, and yes, draw conclusions.
And secondly, it is every bit as much the right and responsibility of people here and now to examine "legacy" that we are living with, as it will be of people in the more distant future. In fact, it's more inherent on us to deal with it NOW, thanks to the hijacking of "conservatism" by a cultic religious minority that has resulted in a corruption of the principles of conservatism, the partial dismantling of the system of checks and balances in our government, and the instigation of an ego-building war at the cost of our next decade or so of economic stability.
In other words, while Buckley should not be blamed for the actions of a cadre of the variously stupid, venal, and insane, he is the gardener who tended the weeds rather than the flowers. Whenever he championed the cause of those in power and encouraged their support and adherence to their examples, he shares their culpability. Whenever he rejected their actions and argued for a return to more true principles, to real conservatism rather than the current blend of fanaticism and carpet-baggery, he points out their culpability.
Which is also a way for me to say, "I have not bothered to follow anything he's said or done in this century, but I know that the current regime greatly admires him and claims to be following his example."
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2008-03-01 09:59 pm (UTC)"Defending the dead from ... waiting until they're gone to criticize them"
Many of the people who are criticizing the man and his legacy were critics of his actions through the sixty years during which he was building that legacy. It is true that he can no longer speak in witty dismissal of what they say, and it's also true that during his lifetime, a great deal of what he said to dismiss his critics did not actually address what they were saying, but simply mocked, distracted, and confused them. Do not confuse his success at argumentation with his being factually, ethically or morally right; sometimes his best rejoinders in terms of wit were also the ones which had no bearing whatsoever on the argument he was dismissing.
This is not to say that he wasn't capable of answering a point with a counter point, or answering a theory with a telling analysis of the flaws in the theory, because he was. However, when it came to the harder questions, the ones where neither "liberal" nor "conservative" approaches are adequate to the situation, where it takes the hard work of cooperation, compromise, creativity and sacrifice? Not his forte, in my experience, based on observing his debates on his personal public pedestal.
Other people who are now speaking ill of him, may have never had the opportunity nor the reason to examine him and his life, and some may have been "cowardly" in that they did not feel safe in speaking ill of the man in life. And given the nature of the press and public speech, without the opportunity afforded by his death and the publicity attending to it, there are surely many whose ill words were simply ignored as not-too-newsworthy.
"historic distance"
This is a popular quash. It's also silly for two reasons:
That "legacy" you speak of has been built over the last 50-60 years, and while we cannot know every outcome, we can and do know many of them already. To reduce it to the absurd: the legacy of a mass-murderer (say, Jim Jones) is pretty much laid out then and there before us when the action happens. Historical distance actually serves to cloud and confuse the events themselves, unless someone is able to go in and analyze, document, and yes, draw conclusions.
And secondly, it is every bit as much the right and responsibility of people here and now to examine "legacy" that we are living with, as it will be of people in the more distant future. In fact, it's more inherent on us to deal with it NOW, thanks to the hijacking of "conservatism" by a cultic religious minority that has resulted in a corruption of the principles of conservatism, the partial dismantling of the system of checks and balances in our government, and the instigation of an ego-building war at the cost of our next decade or so of economic stability.
In other words, while Buckley should not be blamed for the actions of a cadre of the variously stupid, venal, and insane, he is the gardener who tended the weeds rather than the flowers. Whenever he championed the cause of those in power and encouraged their support and adherence to their examples, he shares their culpability. Whenever he rejected their actions and argued for a return to more true principles, to real conservatism rather than the current blend of fanaticism and carpet-baggery, he points out their culpability.
Which is also a way for me to say, "I have not bothered to follow anything he's said or done in this century, but I know that the current regime greatly admires him and claims to be following his example."