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Wed 9 Jun, 2004 10:24 pm
Christopher Hitchens's biting assessment of the 40th President in Slate including this intriguing characterization:
"Ronald Reagan was neither a fox nor a hedgehog. He was as dumb as a stump. He could have had anyone in the world to dinner, any night of the week, but took most of his meals on a White House TV tray. He had no friends, only cronies..."
Can you judge a man by who he dines with? Is there a publicly-accessible record of who Reagan dined with, or any comparable records for the dinner companions of the more recent Presidents? The current I don't think this information is particularly hard to collect-- it is most certainly computerized by now. While it might ought to be of public interest who our top government officials meet with every minute of the day, that might be a radical demand of disclosure. On the other hand, a list of dinner guests should give a good sampling of whom the President keeps company with. Is this available?
I imagine GW dines most of the time with his dog Barney. I can't imagine 'W' being a great conversationalist during dinner, so finding another human to eat with is no doubt pretty difficult.
As for Christopher Hitchins, I think he's a POS. He looks like he's drunk most of the time and in need of a bath.
Welcome to A2K, jongarfunkel. Intriguing excerpt and it's customary on this forum to offer a link.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2101842/
side note about posting links
note: I would have posted the link, but the ultra-strict terms of service apparently forbid that. I've already had my first post removed (something which I'm still not happy about). But carry on the discussion.
Jon
If you post a link which is to a site that specifically has something for sale or is promoting your own site, it's against the TOS. It's Spam. If you post a link to an article in any journal where you have quoted an excerpt, no problem. Usually, I might suggest quoting the first paragraph of the article and then providing a link to the balance of the article. Our TOS is not that strict but it is something you have to agree to in order to participate.
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