{"id":1555,"date":"2011-12-17T10:04:45","date_gmt":"2011-12-17T15:04:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/?p=1555"},"modified":"2011-12-17T10:26:34","modified_gmt":"2011-12-17T15:26:34","slug":"goodbye-hitch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/goodbye-hitch\/","title":{"rendered":"Goodbye, Hitch"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our world is full pseudo-intellectuals, like Chomsky and Krugman and Gingrich and that loud-talker two tables over at lunch yesterday who just would not shut the fuck up<\/em>. Real intellectuals, the people who force us to challenge not just our assumptions but our most deeply held beliefs, who make us think in ways we’ve never thought before, and who do it with a natural eloquence and casual wit that makes them impossible to dismiss, are rare among humans.<\/p>\n

Christopher Hitchens\u00c2\u00a0tackled taboos and dared all of us to challenge our own knowledge and perceptions. This caused great consternation among people who were happy in their unquestioning belief. Some of them are celebrating his death, which tells you all you need to know about their character.<\/p>\n

We’ll never again see him hitchslap another detractor in a calm voice, making him look like a dog stranded on the center lane of the freeway, desperately trying to figure out which direction to take. There will be no more Hitchens books to cover a subject in a way it’s never been covered before. We’ll miss the articles that enlighten and amused and sometimes enraged us.<\/p>\n

But he wrote more than just about anyone of our generation, and so leaves a rich legacy behind. There are enough books and articles and videos from him to keep anyone busy for years.<\/p>\n

His detractors are quick to point out his lifestyle caused his early demise, and it’s the one thing they’re right about. He chose pleasure over longevity, and we should be thankful that he did. The way he lived created the man he became. A sober, serious Hitch wouldn’t have been Hitch at all.<\/p>\n

So let us raise a glass of Johnny Walker Black, not to the heavens, but simply in his honor, and say, “Goodbye, Hitch. And thanks.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our world is full pseudo-intellectuals, like Chomsky and Krugman and Gingrich and that loud-talker two tables over at lunch yesterday who just would not shut the fuck up. Real intellectuals, the people who force us to challenge not just our assumptions but our most deeply held beliefs, who make us think in ways we’ve never […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1555"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1555"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1555\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1559,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1555\/revisions\/1559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.davehitt.com\/blog2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}