William F. Buckley, Jr. [UPDATED YET AGAIN]

One of those permanent people the world feels lighter without, like a hot-air balloon with more ballast chucked overboard and fewer tethers.

Want to know how influential he was?

[T]he columnist, novelist, television talk show host and tireless intellectual [...] founded the modern conservative movement and was its articulate voice for nearly six decades[. ...]

Buckley was the intellectual heart of American political conservatism in the 1960s and '70s. His ardent friends and admirers came to include a California governor, Ronald Reagan, who
sought Buckley's counsel frequently during his campaign and presidency, calling him "perhaps the most influential journalist and intellectual in our era." Buckley also inspired generations of conservatives, who now fill think tanks and write for National Review, the Weekly Standard and the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal. [...]

"Without Bill, there'd be no conservatism as we know it today," said [Rich] Lowry[, editor of National Review]. "One of his earliest achievements was to forge this coalition of social conservatives, national security hawks and economic libertarians. That became the conservative coalition, and there would not be one today without it." [...]

But, unlike the conservative pundits who drive talk radio today, he had many personal friends and admirers among his public foes, including such luminaries as the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith and late writer Norman Mailer.

Alas, that aristocratic aspect of the tradition he founded -- a virtue of of elitism, probably -- did not survive.

Love him or hate him, you can envy him this:  his cook found him dead at his desk, mid-work.

UPDATE: Jack Whelan at After the Future, who could be described (inadequately) as a Christian progressive, points out the part of Buckley that was "deep down the trickster . . . a more sophisticated, lighter-hearted, wittier, and gentler Ann Coulter."  Worth reading for more insight into Buckley's romantic strain of conservatism.

UPDATE II: Karen sent me this beautiful and "ponder-ful" quote from The Anchoress (you must read this piece):

Buckley and Carson were two sides of an American coin forged when society was busily broadening its intellect and admitting all comers, when there was a sense of relishing the battle while respecting the foe, and of looking out for the little guy who might get caught between the thrusts and parries. We’re losing it. As the nation becomes more “privileged” in the superficials she is echoing empty at her depths.

The paradox of privilege is that it is meaningless when it only serves the self, when it thinks it has nothing to learn from anyone else. Buckley, I think, understood that; now he is gone. Who is left to teach it?

UPDATE III: Wonderful Buckley quotes at The Khaki Elephant.  Sample:

"I get satisfaction of three kinds. One is creating something, one is being paid for it and one is the feeling that I haven't just been sitting on my ass all afternoon."

Comments

[Simon]

A double tragedy when an artist dies with the brush still mid-stroke, as apparently happened here. He was a towering figure, the right man in the at the right time as a man of the right, and alas, totally irreplaceable. RIP.

[Ruth Anne]

The eulogy that will most interest me is if/when Father George Rutler writes one on him. WFB's conversion to Catholicism sparked a spate of conversions within the conservatives he trained. I know Laura Ingraham was one and I also think Dinesh D'Souza was one, too. I might be mistaken on that, but he was a spiritual influence as well.