Comments on: Burlesquoni

By: Mark

Mark — Mon, 29 Sep 2003 21:43:00 +0000

“superannuated tory fart” – Brilliant

By: dsquared

dsquared — Mon, 29 Sep 2003 17:12:22 +0000

Paul Johnson, eminent British historian and author [arsehole - dd], Lee Kuan Yew, senior minister of Singapore [beneficent and wise father of his country, if perhaps a little inclined to litigation - dd], and Ernesto Zedillo, former president of Mexico [arsehole - dd], in addition to Forbes Chairman Caspar W. Weinberger [arsehole - dd], are now periodically writing this column.

Wow.

By: dsquared

dsquared — Mon, 29 Sep 2003 14:59:07 +0000

I shit you not

By: Henry

Henry — Mon, 29 Sep 2003 01:22:02 +0000

Didn’t actually know about that other little nugget. You got a link to it? See Naples and die how are ya.

By: dsquared

dsquared — Sun, 28 Sep 2003 23:50:16 +0000

You missed the best bit of SB’s speech, the bit where he started boasting about low inheritance taxes with the slogan “come and die in Italy”

By: Seb

Seb — Sun, 28 Sep 2003 20:14:41 +0000

Even when Johnson allegedly offers “facts,” he turns out to be all wrong.

By: David Duff

David Duff — Sun, 28 Sep 2003 19:29:47 +0000

Weeeeellll, as Jeremy Paxman might wheeze, I read both pieces and if you think Kleiman did for Johnson then I can only suppose you also think the French won the battle of Waterloo. If there was any ranting in evidence it came entirely from Kleiman. Johnson’s prose by contrast was a model of clarity and brevity of sentences except for those requiring a list of examples to support his arguement. Johnson is an old man. My guess is that Kleiman is a young man. But I know which one is the windbag! David Duff

By: Doug

Doug — Sat, 27 Sep 2003 19:43:07 +0000

Pity the American conservative, though, often a teetotaler on top of everything else, averse even to overdoing the port…

By: Henry

Henry — Sat, 27 Sep 2003 17:30:28 +0000

I’d actually thought about linking to the Hitchens smackdown (pun intended?), but thought that I was already being mean enough. Ophelia – thanks for the nice words.

By: Ophelia Benson

Ophelia Benson — Sat, 27 Sep 2003 16:58:59 +0000

“And his prose style is wretched; the sort of sub-Burkean lugubrious sententiousness that conservatives are liable to mistake for profundity when they’ve overdone the port a bit.” Brilliant! Even almost Burko-Johnsonian-Hitchensian, perhaps. With just a dash of Hazlitt.

By: Tom

Tom — Sat, 27 Sep 2003 11:52:06 +0000

Ugh. Johnson really doesn’t improve with age, does he? For a little light relief, here is a brilliantly rude smackdown by Christopher Hitchens. It’s from the period before he too began to lurch towards Johnsonhood.