Safire retires...

The news is all a-quiver with the announcement that Bill Safire, the New York Times resident conservative columnist is at long last retiring come January. What, he finally ran out of lies and hyperbole at the tender age of seventy-something??
Humble Elias is not one of those smiling dishrag liberals who thinks Big Bill is great opponent and a wunnerful word-smith. Nope Bill was always a arrogrant pompous irresponsible jerk-off of the highest order. Much as Muhammad Ali stole his bumptious persona from wrestler Gorgeous George, Safire derived his smarmy self congratulatory writing style seemingly from Stan Lee's Soapbox in Marvel Comics.
Glib and frequently wrong, a list of the nations that Big Bill advocated invading and conquering would make long and interesting reading. But ah...in so many ways it is Bill's world now...fear, debt, and lies all Safirean mainstays rule the day. What else are we to expect? The man got his "win at any cost" ethos from his old boss Richard Nixon...and spent years refining it in the public prints until at last the perfect inheritor came along George Bush Jr. a lout simple and crazy enough even to destroy a great nation.
Nothing else to do but retire quite frankly.
Still for all that there is one thing Safire never achieved he never quite drove a democrat out of the White House. Not that he didn't try...year after year he kept trying to puff Bert Lance, Billy Carter, Vince Foster, and Whitewater up into impeachable offenses. His monomania on the subject no matter which democrat held office must been an inspiration for the Rick Santorums and Tom Delays out there in the Heartland. Bill threw many a tantrum in those years and movement conservatism learned quickly how to placate him-or else. How can anyone forget the forty eight hour fugue Safire indulged in the public prints to get Ken Starr to withdraw his resignation in 1996?
in the end, Safire was a dangerous demagogue and power mad dickheaded columnist straight out of the pages of Allen Drury. Except Mr. Drury's villains were all eggheads and liberals...

So farewell Bill...enjoy retirement...there will never be another like you and if there is then God Help the Republic.