My colleague Jeff Hart has written an article on Bill for The American Conservative. The Iraq war furnishes its bookends. I think that Hart, who has become a fierce critic of the war over the last few years, overstates how much Bill thought that the war had discredited conservatism. He neglects altogether Bill’s very strong support for other aspects of the war on terrorism. (Bill wrote in praise of Norman Podhoretz’s World War IV, for example.) He also implies that Bill shared Hart’s view of Rush Limbaugh as a “radio blowhard.” I am quite confident that he didn’t.

Most of Hart’s article, though, is a charming and affectionate ramble through NR’s history. These are mostly twice-told tales, often having been told by Hart himself, but getting refined on each retelling. He has one nice one that I hadn’t heard before:

Buckley had many talents in addition to being perhaps the most important journalist of his time, but to put it bluntly in the interest of truth, his paintings were awful.
I heard that once, before I had begun to ski at Gstaad, David Niven had told Buckley that Marc Chagall was coming, admired Buckley’s spy novels, and would like to see him. “Fine, love to meet him,” said Bill. “Wait a minute, Bill,” said Niven. “Chagall is a real artist. World famous. You wouldn’t take him to your studio, would you?” “Of course not,” replied Buckley. Niven and Chagall arrived at the chalet and Buckley took him right to the studio. Chagall looked around at Buckley’s paintings and said in French, “The poor paint.”