View From The Middle
What Ever Happened To Honoring Our Intellectuals?
By Charles Rogers

I wonder if we've seen the last of the intellectuals; I mean the real intellectuals - the ones we all look up to not just because we know they are gifted, but because, somehow, we feel they can relate to us, or vice versa.

Sadly, we mourn the passing of a major intellectual, William F. Buckley, Jr. at the age of 82 in his Connecticut home last week. When mentioning the death of this ultra-conservative genius to a group of young people last week, I was, unfortunately, more saddened because they did not recognize his name.

These young people aren't children. They are all over 18; some are in college; some in the last year of high school. I suppose it may be that I'm being too hard when I say they had no recognition of this man of accomplishment. There is no specific reason that I should even mentally chastise them for not knowing this man who at one time ran for mayor of this city; who hosted a television interview (now called "talk") show for 33 years, starting in 1966 until the show went off the air in 1999; who founded what we now call the Conservative Party and fostered the conservative movement right from the start; a man who wrote something like 50 books, some of them novels and one a dissertation on his own wry comments regarding the passing scene.

On "Firing Line," Buckley would interview heads of state, kings, queens and, yes, the common man, although that's not exactly the type of people the public wanted to see on his show. Because he was known as an intellectual, those who viewed his weekly show were enticed to do so because they wanted to see and hear him verbally "spar" with his argumentative adversaries. It was one of those times the viewer wanted to watch the show alone and in secret, so nobody could see him or her looking in the dictionary to find out the meaning of certain words. The pleasure was to witness the master orator letting those words trip from his lips so easily, as the smoke from his cigarette drifted into the camera's lens.

I know I've burdened readers with some exploits and name-dropping to a fault in the past. If it's too much of a burden, stop reading right about HERE, but, in 1965, when he ran for mayor, I was privileged to have been with one of the many media crews that covered him; racing around town as he gave speech after speech, shook hands with every dignitary and non-dignitary in sight and, finally, conceding defeat (which he knew he would have to do!) to fair-haired John Lindsay. I worked closely with his brother James, who later won a seat in Congress.

It was during this campaign that, when asked what he would do if he won, he uttered the famous phrase, "I'd demand a recount."

Obviously, his sense of humor matched his intellect, as you would surmise. Once we were visiting a cafe as Buckley was shaking hands here and there (he would really just touch fingers) and he winked at me as much as to say, "Look at me. They like me!"

The story that New York Times columnist David L. Brooks tells of Buckley is indicative of what kind of man he was: Brooks said that, while he was in his final year at Columbia University, he wrote a satire on one of Buckley's books or articles. He said he meant it as just that: a satire. "Then I forgot about it," he said. A short time later, Buckley was giving a speech at Columbia and called out to the audience, "If David Brooks is here, I want to give him a job."

Brooks said he went to work for Buckley the next week.

We don't really have people like William F. Buckley Jr. around any more. The closest we can come is, perhaps, Mr. Brooks. Statistics and recent polls report that our culture now is lacking more than it ever has before (as if we can't figure that out).

With the advent of the comprehensive, ever-present Internet - and the advances this infernal computer is making by the day - there is no reason for a young man or woman to think; to reason; to spread their wings; to let their intellect spread; perhaps to read.

The next time you're in a conversation with a youngster - even hanging out - just ask him or her a question involving geography or history. You might be surprised to find that (at least those I spoke with told me) Venezuela is a town in New Mexico, which, of course, happens to be a country near Cancun. And it will be wonderful when our fighting men and women return from that war-torn area.

I don't mean to demean these youths to any great degree. Heaven knows, I was not an A+ student way back when. I do blame our education community, however. Something is indeed wrong when the names of intellectuals are forgotten so easily.

Forgotten, did I say? The names were never known! Disheartening, isn't it?