obit

CNN reports:

National Review founder and conservative commentator William F. Buckley Jr. was found dead Wednesday in the study of his Stamford, Connecticut, home, officials at the magazine said.

He was 82.

Buckley died while at work," said Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor of the National Review Online, in a written statement. "If he had been given a choice on how to depart this world, I suspect that would have been exactly it. At home, still devoted to the war of ideas."

It may be a bit unexpected to see praise for William F. Buckley here, but I can't not speak. Bill Buckley helped make me what I am today.

Buckley, and my father, who led me to Buckley's columns, they challenged me, the high school student, to push my political thinking up a notch. Knee-jerk reactions weren't good enough, think, Janet, think. Think first, lay your arguments carefully, think again. Do your arguments lead to what you think you believe, or are they leading somewhere else completely? Are your arguments true? What do you really think?