Best Of Enemies

Best Of Enemies, available on Netflix, is a fascinating look at the debates between Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley Jr. during the 1968 Republican Convention.

I'll leave you to it. Let me just say that for me the most interesting bit is the end. Buckley, the patrician libertarian, regrets something unnamed and says that he is tired of life. The film implies that what he regrets is losing his temper on national television and calling Vidal a "queer" after Vidal called him a "crypto-fascist." Mr. Buckley died in 2008.

Before Vidal, the patrician progressive, died in 2012 he told the ghost of William F. Buckley to "RIP... in Hell." An associate of Vidal's tells us that he loved the fact that he got the last word.

I really like Vidal's work, and in terms of both cognitive ability and talent for writing he eclipses me (as does Buckley, by a wide margin). His Julian is fantastic. Still, if I have my choice I'd rather go out like Buckley. I'd rather know that I should have done better than glory in the fact that I died last.

Either way both men were brilliant and both were principled. I admire Buckley's belief in personal responsibility and I admire Vidal's willingness question received wisdom.

The moral of the film, though, is that our toxic modern politics originates with these two.

Maybe...