american products go around the world, information products go around the world, so you're on serbed by people -- you're observed by people in every corner of the world. and we teach them not to like us. .. it is about an hour.

[applause] >> thank you, john. good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. there were two bills at national review and in the conservative movement. two bills. bill buckley, a brilliant shooting star who lit up the sky and william rusher, and never wavering north star by which conservatives learned to chart their political course. many have written about william f. buckley jr. that irresistible renaissance man, but no one until david frisk has given us an in-depth portrait of the other bill, william rusher. who among his other solutes for contributions played a pivotal

role in the life of the national draft goldwater committee. that was critical because if there had been no draft goldwater committee there would have been no presidential candidate barry goldwater in 1964 and if there had been no candidate goldwater in 1964, there would have been no president-elect ronald reagan in 1980. it was goldwater who approved reagan's famous a time for choosing television address which made reagan political star overnight and led to his running for governor of california and eventually president of the united states. david recounts how william rusher short up the goldwater committee when money ran short and spirits sagged. skillfully guided young americans for freedom and his

early chaotic days and forced some order and discipline on the blithe spirits who ran "national review," expanded the national movement, his newspaper column and lectures and championed ronald reagan when other conservatives were somewhat skeptical about the actor turned politician. william rusher love the american politics. rear wines traveling to distant lands and national review's effervescent editor bill buckley of whom he once said, quote, the most exasperatingly people in the world are so often the most beloved and he is no exception. david frisk has captured all of this and more in this splendid overdue biography of the other bill, william rusher. david frisk is a former award

winning reporter who received his ph.d. from claremont and will be teaching those lucky students at the alexander hamilton center in new york. ladies and gentlemen, please join me in giving a war heritage welcome to dr. david frisk. [applause] >> thank you for that wonderful introduction. of me and more importantly william rusher. can everyone here all right? there is a wide range in this room of the familiarity and relative unfamiliarity with william rusher who was the publisher of "national review" for 31 years, almost from the beginning.

it can also be said to have had a half century long career in american politics with something of a privileged ringside or front row seat. he never ran for public office, never held public office, never really found it anything on his own as a number of leaders did, never controlled his own institution. he was as i put it in my introduction, a new william rusher, the conservative movement, "if not us, who?: william rusher, 'national review' and the conservative movement," he was at the end of the limelight. a lot of people knew a lot less about him. but as people became aware of

william rusher, there was a general agreement among the hole fractious spectrum of american conservatism. we see how fractious it can be after this unfortunate election. there was wide agreement. libertarians, traditionalists, purists, pragmatists, william rusher knew what he was doing. one of his great achievements was to give movement conservatives from the early 1960s right up until the 1990s by which time he had semi retired. more confident than they otherwise would have had that there really was a conservative movement and that it really was moving. if in perfectly. we have seen in recent years of

lot of doubts about where -- whether the conservative movement exist anymore. some people doubt it deserve to exist, whether it has destroyed itself. there have been people all along who have said things like that. one of the things william rusher stood for most prominently and enduringly was the believe that we conservatives all have to pull together and all had to be together and keep being together. the most obvious shade comes to mind that he would put more articulately and memorably is not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good, not miss the forest for the trees. these are not the most innovating or exciting sort of messages, but it is very important to have a few people at or near the top of the

conservative movement's leadership who believe in and preach these things and you ask people, ask their fellow activists to remain focused on the need to win a majority of the american people and to govern. "national review" as a very intellectual magazines throughout its existence, and probably even more so in its early years in the 50s and 60s, very much needed -- bill buckley, managing editor priscilla buckley and every other major person they're acknowledged that they very much needed a man just like william rusher to serve as political

eyes and ears, as political counselor, as a link between national review type people as william rusher put it to me the intellectuals and the practical politicians, by politicians he did not just mean people in or aspiring to public office but people like his good friend f. clifton white, mastermind of the draft will water campaign and marshall of the old water campaign, white too with a politician and william rusher was something of a politician, a practitioner of act will politics. william rusher please tremendous value on these people. and he was always trying with some success to get a more philosophical conservatives. classic example, buckley

himself, to appreciate that sort of career, that sort of individual and that sort of effort. a lot of what you will find in the book and some of you have read it is a good deal of back and forth between publisher william rusher, in-house political counselor william rusher who had full privileges of speaking out on any issue, officially and unofficially, in the meeting they held which could be very long and interesting. he had the privilege of speaking out on any at issue, editorial issue, anything involving "national review"'s political position, "national review"'s tone, what it could cover, what is less important, he played an editorial role although he didn't have an official one and they listened to it. at time they got tired of listening to it. but remember any time you read

about william rusher or want to formulate a question, remember that this is another world technologically, and remained so until william rusher retired at the end of 1988, his successors came in right afterwards, still operating in the 1950s, operating in the 1915s with carbon paper and secretaries who are treated as secretaries. that is a polite term for sexist but not the important point. the more important point is carbon paper. william rusher would not be keen on social media himself where he still alive and active today. but he would have appreciated it. it is an important one, this is an era when people communicated on paper. they communicated that went on paper. it was a tremendous resource for my research at the library of

congress where william rusher's papers are. there has been sufficient evidence, sufficient interest in the william rusher papers among scholars who are interested in the development of the conservative movement who more often than not are liberals. in the william rusher papers they removed several years ago from the satellite location in suburban maryland to the actual james madison building on the other side of the hill, that is how much interest there has been in the william rusher papers also the only book about him, will be the only book about him. these people communicated to each other on paper and that is a lot of what my book is based on plus interviews with dozens of people including extensive interviews with william rusher and significant interviews with mr. buckley. they were very candid with each other, william rusher and buckley in particular.

in their differing judgments about what position the "national review" should take, what it should focus on, dr. edwards alluded to the importance of the goldwater campaign to the future of the conservative movement. i don't think there is time or any need to stress that to this audience any further than it already has been. it was the very seminal event. rusher was in the thick of it. more than anyone he probably persuaded goldwater to remain open to the possibility of a candidacy in early 63 when he didn't want to. kept the goldwater campaign going when the head of the cliff white, his old friend and associate was ready to give up for a variety of reasons including financial reasons. one of the great lessons of rusher after rear is he didn't believe in giving up ever.

there was always another bus coming along in 10 or 15 minutes. the son would come up the next morning. there was always something to do. one of the people who knew rusher well as a young conservative activist in the 60s, rusher than being in his late 30s or about 40 said that it seemed to him in his interactions with young americans for freedom and so on that rusher had an extra ten hours a day, someone else said he seemed to be the most organized man in the movement. it was able easier for rusher to play that kind of very energetic and focused role, always on all the time, always giving it his

best, always looking good, speaking well, dressing well, and always, if not always right, always persuasive, always somebody wanted to listen to. it is easier to develop their reputation perhaps if you don't have a family. he never married, never had children, somebody suggested to me very early in my research, rusher is really married to the movement. there's a good deal of truth to that. there's only a limited number of people who would have that kind of white and played that, white that kind of role. the point is rusher did it. rusher had been, he was a graduate of harvard law school, graduated in 1948, worked in a major wall street law firm corporate law and known as chairman sterling on hold and major firm but he was bored by

corporate law practice. he described in his first book in 1968 and not really an autobiography but a lot of chapters that are interesting. he said there were these silent victories and huge defeats and quiet conversations in board rooms of our law firm and he wanted more action than that. he also loved politics so much that he really had in some way, shape or form had to do it full time so he walks away from his wall street law firm in early 1956, comes to washington, lives a few blocks south of here, somewhere near the russell building in little apartment and joins a very important anti-communist investigator named robert morris. robert morris's importance in the anti-communist

investigations of the 1950s was apparently so significant that whitaker chambers said to buckley in a letter around that time that morris really accomplished most of what joe mccarthy is credited with in terms of useful and constructive anti communism. that is credited on the right. rusher was at morris's side on the subcommittee, the number 2 lawyer on the committee. mccarty was still alive. the new mccarthy and believed he had been unfairly railroaded by the liberal establishment. very much along the lines of what stan evans later argued in his 2007 book blacklisted by history. rusher in other words before he came to "national review" was

part of a cadre of very hard and professional anti communists and that was what really got him into the conservative movement. that caused him to transition from generic republicanism which included what i describe as just win maybe attitudes and there's something to be set for that. to an attitude of being willing to lose even a presidential election if it was a constructive sort of loss that one could take pride in like goldwater 64, planted seeds for the future. "national review" did not initially think that way. in 1952 it was just win so he is

all for do we --dewey similarities to the 2012 campaign on our side and the other side. rusher sees that. in 52 he knows eisenhower is a great champion of conservative causes. probably also knew that eisenhower would not be that aggressive and anti-communist but wanted to win. to keep this reasonably concise but to finish the thought because it is important, rusher believed that moderate republican administration under dwight eisenhower, was president for eight years, just wasn't ideological enough, wasn't anti-communist enough either at home or abroad, believed there was a significant communist threat in the united states, more documentation of that has come out in the last 20 years

after the ex soviet archives. buckley also a couple years younger than rusher, all of you know that he wrote god, man and yale after graduating from yale. he has two beasts with yale and rusher was a graduate of princeton prewar and during the war. insufficiently respectful of religion despite religious heritage and religious heritage, most elite academia, they don't present the free enterprise side of economics. they're too keynesian and claw the socialist. "national review" -- rusher agreed with all that, but the greater affinity with buckley can be seen in buckley and his

brother's 1954 book mccarthy and his enemies in which they say mccarty has been a little too rough, made some errors of judgment, but that cause is really important and he is being treated unfairly. that is exactly where rusher is in the years when he turns from generic young republican republicanism to hard movement conservatism. there was a bit of a conservative movement before buckley founded "national review" in 1955 but it was disorganized, the polite term might be a entrepreneur real, individualistic. whitaker chambers had another way of describing it, like people popping out like rabbits, never knew where they were coming from or where they were

going. you might see this today now and then. rusher is thrilled to hear there is going to be a conservative weekly magazine. when he hears about national review being in the works in 1955 he becomes a charter subscriber even before it comes out. he meets buckley with a couple months after the magazine starts, spend a year-and-a-half in washington on the internal security subcommittee but remained in touch with buckley and that circle. he joined the magazine in mid 1957. he wasn't interested in the business side of the magazine which was technical and responsibility, keeping it afloat, finding more subscribers, getting more advertising and all that kind of stuff. they needed someone like that. he was pretty good at that. there is evidence that after

several years for a least a time he kind of neglected because he was so into political thought. as i said he comes international review with -- into "national review" with a rich from editor buckley that he will have free speech rights and argumentation and advocacy in the internal proliferation of the magazine and that was a good part of the book all the why would not say it is the majority of it but a good part of the book and very interesting. rusher advising buckley and the other senior editors, how it should deal with the john birch society, the extremists of the time, how large a deal with troubled with young americans for freedom, a very important conservative organization.

dr. edwards was the first editor of the new guard, the newspaper, the early editors of the newspaper nearly 60s, he started very young and has known rusher for that long. rusher would advise the "national review" people and buckley who was the owner and the man, what was going on out there among conservatives. what problems were in conservative politics, opportunities and challengess and what good things were happening and what ought to be supported. buckley is very interested in maintaining -- developing and maintaining a high reputation for "national review," a reputation as a thoughtful magazine. at one point he writes to his colleagues and says no, it was

an editorial in 1960. he says to readers and his colleagues and our job is not to make policy. it is to think and to write and occasionally to mediate. that is to offer sort of -- to play something of a broker's role among conflicting conservatives, whatever they are conflicted about. buckley sees the need for that. rusher is ideally suited to guide "national review" in that role. there were two factions at "national review". i don't mean to overstate that. i don't mean to overstate the conflict. there's a tremendous amount of respect they all had for each other, but their fundamental

agreement was in "national review"'s importance, very important duties. they disagreed about the right approach and the right tone and the right focus for the magazine. the two factions, it is a perfectly good word if you can get the idea of -- any idea of backstabbing or underhanded approaches out of your heads. it wasn't really like that as far as i can tell but there were real arguments, real arguments, some of which was committed to paper. between a sort of buckley -- priscilla buckley was the managing editor and bill buckley's older sister who passed away year-ago unfortunately, the den mother of the early conservative movement. in the "national review" was a

sort of incubator for young conservatives. the two buckleys and james burnham, who already had a substantial intellectual reputation before he joined buckley in the founding "national review". the three of them really believed in the importance of "national review"'s international reputation. they also believed as burnham put it very early on, that this was a magazine that should be on the desks of policymakers, academics, senators, really important people whether they were conservatives or not. they believed in something of an elite strategy for -- wasn't so

much to make conservatism powerful as to make it acceptable and to get non conservatives, the more important the better, listen to the conservative viewpoint, whether it be on foreign policy and anti communism, economic conservative as some, constitutionalism or what today is called social conservatism more likely than can -- traditional conservatism. the issues were different and less clear back then but there has always been social conservatism. rusher had an important ally named frank meyer remains sufficiently respected and known among at least an older generation of conservatives that there is a frank meyer society in washington which i am going to be a group of conservative leaders who keep his memory

alive. they are going to be meeting monday night and i will be speaking to them. meyer has been described by rusher as the intellectual engine of the conservative movement. he too was an ex-communist as burnham was. but meyer was a conservative activist. a passion that conservative activists. rusher even told me that meyer had once been a militant communist. rusher had been a militant republican, quote, they are not all that far apart except in what they believe. what rusher meant by that was he had it tremendous attraction to and respect for political obsession. maier was intellectually obsessed, had a house that was literally full of books. hard to imagine or describe, the

books were everywhere. some extremely intellectual but also extremely political. as david keene, no longer but longtime chairman of the administrative conservative union put to me and a young conservative in 1960, you can visit myron take a bus from the midwest, come back and two weeks later you get busted out of bed by the phone ringing at 2:00 in the morning, frank meyer would be saying why haven't you done this? the university of wisconsin, why did you do this or the other thing? that style of leadership or mentoring wouldn't be too welcome among conservative today and there were people then who thought it was a bit much even if they admired meyer. there were people like that back then who thought the cause was so important that they could, at least meyer had no qualms of calling someone at 2:00 in the

morning, he was nocturnal anyway. rusher loved this kind of thing. he didn't have that kind of regular schedule himself. >> as i suggested organized, he loved that spirit. he and meyer were allies who believe "national review" should behe and meyer were allies who believe "national review" should be as political as possible. let me say a few words about rusher at last two decade of the "national review" in the 70s and 80s, the intense discussions, arguments within "national review" that i have alluded to work primarily, not totally but primarily in the 60s as they were still feeling their way.

in the 1970s rusher's focus is initially on the possibility of actually replacing the republican party with a new conservative party. i found a letter in which he said to a friend my problem -- in 1975 -- my problem with the republican party isn't that it is not conservative enough. it is that it isn't big enough. he wanted to win and republicans after watergate and the 70s were in terrible shape. and won't recite the details but thefts a lot of them felt they were back where they were in the 1930s, not only minority party -- russia wants to take this opportunity to start a new conservative party, not rigidly

conservative but consciously conservative, one in which the liberal wing of the republican party would not be present and would not have the type of veto power he thought they had. he believed the key to this was not necessarily the most important but an important thing was to moderate economic conservatism little bit and the more populist, recognize the needs, the position of the little guy. he has some of that in him but also to welcome social conservatism, the populist issues, and not only southerners but what were then known as conservative democrats, people who later became reagan democrats, russia was one of the first to note the size and importance of that voting bloc. he was one of the first and most

effective advocates of bringing it into the republican party and he advised reagan to do this, he knew reagan and the first president bush pretty well, had no reagan since the 60s, and vice president bush to do this. he was successful in that although i don't think reagan needed to be -- i'm not sure reagan needed to be told that but it is encouraging to hear it from someone he respected as much as he respected rusher. rusher also wanted reagan to be the head of this new conservative party. to make a long story short reagan refuses probably prudently. most liberal scientists, i have had training in political science to tell you the third party will be big on national level, cannot start small, as to

start big, probably with a superstar like reagan. once a reagan refuse in 75, 75 to join this third party project rusher got going it was probably curtains for that particular idea. but william rusher succeeded in getting conservatives to think more about the need to expand the republican party and for the republican party to be more coherent, not so ideologically coherent that it was willing to forfeit elections. i think rusher was passed that phase of political perspective by then. so he recognize that if reagan wasn't going to head it, it was probably not going to get too far but he stuck with it.

the full details are in the book, chapter 13. he came to see in the late 70s that it really was possible to win the republican nomination and once reagan did win the republican nomination in 1980 and had a totally successful presidency rusher remain to the end of his days an absolute republican party loyalists rightly or wrongly. that is another interesting lesson, a man who at one time could have been a third party advocate comes back to a more conventional political view although he was a strong conservative. in closing i want to say two words about rusher at significance as a symbol among conservatives. he was a very elegant man who was not particularly tall or

athletic. he was wonderfully articulate. he always spoke in perfectly formed sentences in public and private conversation. he was always very well dressed. he loved fine wine and opera and traveled all over the world so this was a little unusual for of a semi populist conservative and a guy as theological as he was. perhaps leading conservatives today could use a few more people like that. hard for a manhattan liberal to say conservatives are hicks or this or that, you couldn't say that about buckley and you couldn't say about rusher so rusher reinforced that sense that they are pretty smart, sophisticated people, fun to have a rounded view cassander viewpoint and rusher was another example of that kind of

conservative. younker conservatives tend to admire it and bring along in that kind of style. and as dr. edwards referred to, rusher was a major conservative debater for quite a while. most prominently on the advocates, he was the conservative advocate, it was a debate show, he did extremely well and a lot of people would watch that and say we can be as good as he is. are have not had time to go into his mentoring role with young conservatives but he loved to advise them. he liked hearing what they were doing. if they were doing something, important to do things. he didn't like people who sat around and talked or didn't really have a lot of patience to sit around and talk.

generations of now senior conservatives will tell you that they knew rusher personally, gave great advice, had time for them. rusher always remained very proud of that. he retired to san francisco, loved the climate, relative sophistication of san francisco. he had fallen in love with it in the 50s so he lived there the last 20 years of his life. i will leave you with this quote which gives a sense of rusher's attitude. perhaps my last interview with him, he said to me san francisco has a dreadful reputation among conservatives and new yorkers are always raising the subject with me, mostly new yorkers.

i am not interested in what people in san francisco think. i like the food, the weather, the ambiance, it is where i want to live. if they want to live there too, the liberals, good luck. i will be eager for your questions as far as we have time. [applause] >> if you will just raise your hand, the gentleman with a microphone, please give your name and ask your question. hopefully a question, not a statement. first question down here. >> you mentioned how rusher wanted to take a populist tone. you think that -- >> speak up just a bit.

>> a more populist tone to the conservative movement. do you see that as a potential lesson to be applied today? >> i am not comfortable trying to say what rusher would say today but it is clear that he always believed and from the 1970s on certainly always believed and never lost his belief that populist and social conservatism of those voters were absolutely essential to success, that their issues had not been dealt with, have not really been dealt with by the

official republican party, sufficiently respected, so he wanted those votes just as he wanted southern vote in nearly 60s. he also believed social conservatism had to be expressed in a responsible and fought way. a good example you can find in a footnote in one of the late chapters is a column he wrote about abortion in 81. it was called something like the problem and strength of right to life. he sees a balance. he says i am one of you, i agree with you on this issue, but we must realize how smug and even offensive or something like that we sometimes appear to others who don't share our viewpoint. we have to be moderate in our

presentation of its. i am confident in saying rusher would absolutely disagree with those who now say in the wake of romney's loss that we should jettison social conservatism. he would remind social conservatives that a lot of people disagree with you. you have to speak to them effectively. does that help? >> i am martin wooster. as i understand it and i think i got this from a biography of frank meyer, there is an ideological dispute when "national review" got started. priscilla buckley and james burnham saying the goal of the conservative movement would be to fight communism, not really caring about the welfare state, people like frank meyer saying

no, we have to shrink fighting communism, we need to shrink government first and rusher among other things acted as a mediator between those two facts. >> didn't get the last half sentence. >> one of rusher's roles was to mediate between two factions, i got the sense that priscilla buckley and burnham were sort of distant ancestors of neo conservatives and meyer, being a fugitive would have disagreements and it was primarily what conservatives should do about the welfare state and i am wondering what rusher's role was in the ideological debates.

>> very good question. i would amend something you said which is i don't believe there was much conflict within "national review". what position to take on a welfare state. there was some. it was not rusher's primary concern. his primary concern in terms of ideology was "national review" must be ideological. the exact positions it took would very often be secondary but insofar as it had certain beliefs on these issues, it should be really serious about holding other conservatives and especially public officeholders

to account in showing leadership on them and supporting candidates most likely to be solid on these issues whereas burnham did in fact say, the example is medicare, 65. it was inevitable. the nature of the health care system, the elderly population and various things going on, maybe it's inevitable, rising mass pressure for it, congress had to accommodate that, the role is to make this new thing work as well as possible. does that sound familiar? it is good that there was a voice saying that. buckley was more free market, more interested in economics than russia was. i don't think there was a big dispute about the welfare state to the extent there was, he would be the advocate of

accommodating at and he is conservative, he was not as libertarian or small government strength, but in general the two of them lined up. >> what about filibuster -- priscilla buckley? >> i don't know. what is perfectly clear, very close in a professional sense, their personalities were just mashed. they were very calm people. they believed in a high literary quality for the magazine. and might be too extreme.

rusher was more accommodating to the hard right in that respect. i am unaware that there was any real conflict between priscilla buckley was the managing editor of the same period 30 years or so,s to mid 80s that rusher was there. everyone liked her, everyone respected her so she wasn't really involved in personal conflicts. there was a personal conflict between burnham and meyer, ideological conflict, neither of them never quit which is to their credit. two more? or whatever, i can do more. >> have i sufficiently convey -- i will take your question. i want to make sure i give a couple more clever quotes from

rusher to share with you his vibrant personality and cleverness. important part of the story. >> you must have had conversations with mr. rusher about ronald reagan's second term. considered the reagan presidency and unmitigated success. word there any reservations about the second term or iran-contra or president reagan alleged declining intellectual capabilities? >> i apologize. i was wearing earplugs earlier today. would you mind restating the question? cloud. >> the question was regarding if he had any reservations about reagan's second term in terms of

his mental capacity declining for the iran-contra issues. >> rusher on reagan's second term including iran contra. russia was one of reagan's most consistent defenders among ideological and leading movement conservatives. during the reagan administration. as richard brooke kaiser, a major figure at "national review" was a rider than and pretty good friend of rusher said to me when reagan was elected rusher decided he would defend him on every single thing. his reasoning was this is the best president we will ever have. it will never be better and it

will never be as good. you have to back him on everything. he had some concerns about reagan's for steve staff, james baker who had come from the other wing of the party. he questioned whether someone like that could put his heart into a reagan program. a couple years after that, rusher is very upset about i guess you could call them technical pr mistakes on the part of communications people in the white house, so and so are to be fired, didn't happen. his main concern in giving advice to reagan which he didn't do a lot of, his main concern seemed to be let's make sure we are effectively communicating with the american people in getting around the liberal media which is a great but of rusher's

and rightly so. on iran-contra what i say in the book is he followed it with a dutiful interests. i don't think he had a great emotional investment but he is a syndicated columnist for over 30 years and wrote a number of columns about iran-contra taking the president's side and it came down to this -- he thought maybe reagan was guilty of a few errors of judgment but he said it seems to have come down to an overly solicitous attitude or over the passionate attitude toward getting the hostages back and he said that is a crime of the heart. from reagan has to have a weakness i can live with that one. he was also damned if he was going to let or enable the democrats in the media who he saw as the same thing to get the republican president.

>> i'm going to take the risk of having another what would rusher think of what is going on today question but i wanted to think of what you thought of rusher might have to say about where "national review," obviously are highly regarded intellectually ideologically conservative publication but it seems increasingly to be positioned, i don't want to say in a more moderate place but a slightly less dramatic place than other outlets that have arisen like andrew bright bart's empire, talk radio. i would be interested in what you think rusher would have to say about that. >> to begin with rusher liked almost any active reasonably

responsible vigorous fearless conservatism. he therefore appreciated talk radio, appreciated the more controversial aspect of fox news, he watched fox news, he specifically admired rush limbaugh, even 20 years ago before rush limbaugh was quite as much of a household name as he is now. i asked him about "national review," which for some time, this is about 2005 or so, for some time it had been news oriented and the event oriented than it once was. there were people who didn't really like that. rusher said he was fine with that. he was for that although he also told me, i don't believe this was really a confidence, that

when buckley himself retired from the actual editorship of the magazine it was in stages. he told them, i don't know if it was personally to buckley or what, it was important in his view that "national review" not be, quote, just another conservative magazine. was very important for it to retain its identity and its brand. it is clear from that, he specifically mentioned its catholic fringe. they are virtually all catholic. rusher was not a catholic but admired and respected, part of "national review"'s message and sensibility. he wanted that to continue and to extend it has. he had no real beef with "national review" in its later years although he did think

there were younger people there who should know more of the right wing side of history that had a relaxed attitude towards that. he didn't have utopian expectations how much people would know or how ideological they would be. in his older years even more than earlier he was very much a team player. that comes out clearly in the book. anyone else? >> example of rusher which. w wit. >> you know the name of ted sorensen who was one of the great wordsmiths for the kennedy presidency. i don't know if he ran for senator from new york but tried to and try to get it going to in 1970. rusher in 1970 is in his prime,

47 years old at that point, he has been a staple on talk radio in new york for the last ten years and he really knows what he is doing and loves to debate liberals on the air. there is a man who is still alive i believe and does a radio show in new york, internet radio, barry farber, very prominent host who greatly admired rusher, had two of them on. sorenson basically accuses "national review" of racism and extremism and associate that with nixon and george wallace and wants it all together, not a very intellectually impressive performance and rusher goes after him and keeps going after him and finally says, based on

your performance tonight, you may think you're qualified to run for senator from new york the based on your hysterical performance tonight you would not be elected dogcatcher. sorensen says it seems to me your a being rather hysterical now and rusher says yes, but i am not running for the senate. he knew when to give just a little bit make the guy looked even worse. earlier on the barter show, south africa was already an issue for many liberals. rusher had not yet been there. somebody said -- is liberal opponents that have been to south africa? rusher says no, i haven't been to south africa but you must have been to south africa or you would not be making such heavy weather of it. what did you learn in south africa that you think is so important for us to know? he turns a weakness into a

strength. don't give an inch. turn it around. it is not the politics of personal destruction but it certainly politics of personal one upmanship. rusher believed in the battle of ideas the noon with more than a battle of ideas. that there was a role for which and drama in politics and a final rusher quote to kick off the top of my head. but we loved to see. he also went one point had a