Vidalotry #4: The Buckley Debates

[@jlastre]

First, thank you for this series. I am a child of the 60s and 70s. I was born in 1964 and am a lapsed Catholic. People’s brains 🧠 just imploded with _Myra Breckinridge._ I saw the movie first but god it was funny watching fellow Catholics lose their collective junk over the book even 10 years after it was published. Also I’m from Chicago and when I was a child and first heard Vidal make those statements about Vietnam when I was about 12 made me a fan of Vidal forever. Never heard the Newman comment. Makes me admire him more.

[@leenguy]

Really excellent podcasts about Gore's life and career, am really enjoying it, thanks!

[@bobbest1611]

vidal referred to buckley as marie antoinette and in an essay in esquire about the debates he called him a queen. i wonder if vidal knew something about buckley that was not popularly known.

[@marianotorrespico2975]

Bob Best --- Yes . . . because Christopher Hitchens indirectly commented upon "that" when he noted that W.F. Buckley worked very hard to always be busy, as if to avoid time alone with himself and his demons and discontents.

[@bobbest1611]

@@marianotorrespico2975 i read another essay about buckley. he had invited 2 young men to a dinner party at his home. he invited them to stay for the weekend. the next day they went swimming in his pool and buckley joined them naked. they then went out on his yacht the next day. nothing sexual was ever mentioned but the incident did strike me as curious.

[@marianotorrespico2975]

@@bobbest1611 --- Where there is smoke. . . .

[@MariusRiley]

: He was spot-on about televised political debates.

[@michaelcarrig627]

Cool series. Excited on the Mailer piece.

[@danie-v2o]

Great video! What is the soundtrack?

[@jlastre]

You can find this debate by just doing a search on “Vidal Buckley”. It’s quite famous. Thomas G has it in three parts. Also _The Best of Enemies_ documentary contains the debates.

[@danie-v2o]

Thanks but that wasn't my question

[@weownthistown]

@@danie-v2o the spacey instrumental soundtrack is original compositions by the host, Ryan Breegle

[@danie-v2o]

@@weownthistown thanks! Is that the intro soundtrack? I can’t find it?

[@harryantino]

It’s fascinating to take the subject of Vietnam in this video. By the time of the end of their lives both Vidal and Buckley had basically come to the view that America should largely stay out of foreign affairs. This means Buckley’s support for the Vietnam War, though probably wrongheaded, was essentially anti communist in nature. The Cold War was something he was proved right about, and Gore probably wrong. To Gore Vidal’s credit he remains much the calmer man throughout the debates and was ahead of his time on many socials issues, and in terms of the racial question anyway, this was something he has over Buckley. Buckley it seems, at the time at least, never thought the black man measured up to the privilege of the vote.

[@roughhabit6496]

Buckley introduced the world to Thomas Sowell. What did Vidal do for African Americans?

[@harryantino]

@@roughhabit6496 Vidal was generally more in favour of Voting Rights at a key time they were trying to make those gains. WFB went on to admit his own wrongheaded ideas on the subject, which were shall we say “old south’ in there nature. I think you’ll find the below a good watch if you’ve not seen it already. kzbin.info/www/bejne/fHrFlZWog56WrdE

[@hatuxka]

Vidal understood that genocide was part and parcel of how the US prosecuted the war in Vietnam. Cf the book “Kill Anything That Moves”.

[@roughhabit6496]

Yes the left having started the war , soon turned on a dime and proceeded to politically profiteer from the discontent of that war . They are still doing it fifty years later . That’s how ungallant and despicable they are .

[@hatuxka]

@@roughhabit6496 as usual, both “left” as you call them and the right, the duopoly, voted for war there and the right barely voted in Nixon who had a plan supposedly, but bombed and fought on until 1972, Humphrey might to would probably have done the same

[@roughhabit9085]

How do you thoughtfully call someone a Nazi?

[@marianotorrespico2975]

Rough Habit --- Easy, by just quoting the facts.

[@Jelperman]

If the jackboot fits...

[@marianotorrespico2975]

@@Jelperman --- THE RIGHT-WING CINDERFELLA WHO NEVER WAS | Yes, especially because Buckley was just another tough-talking coward, ever ready to guard the skirts at the home front . . . against the Communists and the Jews, yet, like John Wayne and St. Jesus Reagan, he dodged combat duty because [SECRET REASONS]; whereas, Gore Vidal enlisted to the U.S. Army, and served in the north Pacific theatre of war. It is fascinating to see Nazi worms wriggle when asked a straight question; ’til the day he dies, the right-winger continually excuses his cowardice, whilst demanding to be taken seriously as a Warmonger, as if he were an alpha male who was going to lead by example, i.e. a rifleman.

[@odinallfarther6038]

Vidal can thoughtful curse you from your hole too your pole as they say but you would not want him to it would be a completely degrading and humiliating while being holy amusing . He would have been a star on a roast if he just let his raw humour rip .

[@davidmcginness6718]

@@marianotorrespico2975 Could you provide a citation for Vidal in the North Pacific? I can't find any evidence he was involved in combat. If by North Pacific you mean Alaska that's a little misleading lol. Equally, Buckley fans might point to his role in the honor guard or CIA service as showcasing real patriotism My point is you should take Buckley and Vidal by their ideas rather than biography. And really, I think they're both very mixed bags that way. Maybe I've got a preference for Vidal, but I appreciate Buckley for making an intellectually stimulating show which ran for decades, where he gave an honest platform for minorities, LGBTQ, and women to argue with him, something very rare for the time.