RIP Hitch

**rb336** · December-16-11, 08:24 AM

Christopher Hitchens died last night. beyond his most famous book, "God is not Great, how religion poisons everything" he wrote great books about George Orwell, Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson

**ordinary** · December-16-11, 02:08 PM

For some reason I was listening to Michael Medved's show on the way home from work one afternoon and he had Christopher Hitchens on. Medved said something that pissed Hitchens off and he [[Hitchens) said, "You take that back right now or I'm ending this interview". It was just very polite the way he did it and Medved did take it back.

Occurrence · December-16-11, 02:38 PM

As someone who is very anti-organized religion myself, I always liked that guy.

I always used to like when he was be on Bill Maher's show. It always made for an interesting hour of entertainment. He someone had the ability to calmly get others riled up.

**Detroitnerd** · December-16-11, 07:04 PM

I liked him almost right up until he became a defender of empire. After that, he was one big steaming pile of crap...

**ordinary** · December-16-11, 08:50 PM

Originally Posted by Detroitnerd

I liked him almost right up until he became a defender of empire. After that, he was one big steaming pile of crap...

Explain "defender of empire".

**Pam** · December-16-11, 08:56 PM

Originally Posted by ordinary

Explain "defender of empire".

He supported the Iraq war in the beginning, but supposedly later changed his mind.

Ravine · December-17-11, 03:09 AM

Kinda makes me wonder where the dividing line is, between admiring a person for their mind and admiring them because they think as we think.

**rb336** · December-17-11, 08:18 AM

it's the old saying "great minds think like me"

I think the line is drawn when someone whose mind you admire says or does something with which you strongly disagree. do you think that person is wrong on that issue and still respect the body of the person's work, or is everything that person does now tainted?

**oldredfordette** · December-17-11, 10:10 AM

He never changed his mind, but he did try and deny he said some things [[even though they were in print with his by line).

For me, it became hard to take seriously the work of anybody who loved George Bush the way Hitchens did. His boy crush helped kill untold civilians and soldiers. It puts his other work in a different light, he certainly wasn’t as smart as he thought he was.