K-Lo:
He died while at work; 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.
He seems so anachronistic now, in this age of blogs and non-stop cable news. Amidst the shouting matches, spin, and ad hominem attacks that dominate our political debate today, it's difficult to remember that a man like Buckley and forums such as Firing Line ever existed.
Rod:
He was the kind of man who, though absolutely clear in his dismissal of liberal ideas, would not stoop to trashing someone's character for the sake of political gain.
His was a conservatism of doubt.
His book, The Unmaking of a Mayor, an account of his own wry run for mayor of New York in 1965, is not only hilarious but also an early - and accurate - critique of the political correctness, unionized sclerosis and wasteful bureaucracy that almost killed the world's greatest city in the 1960s and 1970s.