I have read Christopher Hitchen's articles for many years.Perhaps that is yet another masochistic thing I do to let me know I'm still alive.So many of his pieces affect me like a steely edged razor leaving a cut you're not aware of till hours later.Hitchens is rarely sentiment, unrelentingly cynical and yet profoundly elequent and enormously informed. In a country filled with self-subscribed zealots riddled with no less than other peoples' information I actually savour his unique take on things, even though they attack the inner lining of my optimistic nature. I once had the rare opportunity to sit across from this unique Englishman while delivering a Louis XV chair for his wife, Carol.There he was, sitting like a buddha at the table, all of what Orson Welles might have dreamed of in 30s cinematography as those many phone calls came in, over and over, and the clear liquid in the glass, there to quell his stress was replenished.It was deadline and such a sight to see this near -madman fulfil his publisher's demands.It was, for me, a masterpiece of voyeurism, seeing journalism in it's rawest of states. I'll never forget the richness of it.He didn't take to me at all as he wrote the check for the chair, I suppose he assuemd I was some air-head decorator type..I didn't much care for him either, feeling he was beyond decadence and yet as I reached the door of their large apartment his charming wife, cigarette in hand, apologized. I have seen neither of them since
Today I read Christopher Hitchens' article entitled Obama is no King. I actually read it twice. To be frank I was moved to tears.It is a warm-hearted, affectionate analysis by a loveable devoted emigre', the likes and depth of which I haven't read since de Toqueville..Someone loves America! That someone just revealed his heart, the kind that no doubt makes his wife cherish him; his creativity and his virtue. I can just imagine him reading this and thinking "sychophant!"Say it all you want! I deserve it. And for what it's worth, Mr. Hitchens, I too, a total non-intellectual, am baffled. Anyone who has the 'audacity' to compare Barach Obama to Martin Luther King has not done his homework.Thank God, as usual, you have done yours! Blake in Washington
