David Nyhan is dead...

A long time ago, in a venue now defunct, Humble Elias made war on Nyhan, mocking his pomposity and general air of befuddlement.
Ah, but the Owl of Minerva flies at Dusk, and now with the man gone too quickly to dust, one is inclined to recall his virtues and vices in a more balanced fashion.
his heart at least, was in the right place. A proud Kennedy style liberal and an happy inheritor of a Massachusetts political tradition that stretched back to the Grand Days of Tip O’Neill and a rising democratic party. He never backed down and he never won...if that isn’t a Massachusetts liberal then what is?
The sad thing about David was, he came into his inheritance right when liberalism went over onto the defensive locally and nationally. Beset upon by palpable frauds like Ronald Reagan and his local impersonator Ed King, liberals have been on a twenty four year long retreat that shows no sign of ending.
Nyhan’s answer to all this was to bluster ineffectively and constantly promise a new golden era of liberal transcendence that was right around the corner. And yet the disasters and setbacks piled up year after year. A perceptive friend of the franchise once called Nyhan’s writing style “casually frantic” ergo both florid, woodenly glib, and all too often utterly unreadable.
The problem with David was, he couldn’t play defense worth a damn. To be a great columnist and writer he needed the sunshine of an American Liberal Ascendency-which was nowhere to be seen in the 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s. One suspects he knew this, which is why he so often prophesied a miraculous backlash for the left...it still isn’t here as of 7:11pm EST 1-24-05.
Nyhan’s nadir was reached in Campaign 1988 where he devoted reams of copy to the glories of Governor Dukakis’ presidential candidacy. Long about midsummer Humble Elias (safely tucked away in Graduate School don’cha know) suddenly realized poor Nyhan had gone around the bend and desperate to become President Dukakis’ own Ben Bradlee.
And then of course it all went to smash. Still Nyhan soldiered on but the columnist game in Boston was increasingly the preserve of phonies like Mike Barnicle or gruesome bottom feeders like Howie Carr. Nyhan sounded old, forlorn and abandoned. Finally he took the hint and retired to write an occasional column for Salem Times.
And then he pushed things too far with a snow shovel this weekend and POOF he is gone.
Of course the irony is, that with his passing, regression to the mean has taken hold on the op-ed page of the Boston Globe. in his stead we now have the embittered independent Joan Vennochi and the naive’ opportunistic Scot Lehigh. Neither of these two wankers has an opinion motivated by anything except self interest and an desire to strike asinine little poses in the public prints. With David Nyhan, rhetorical, bombastic, lamely glib you always knew where exactly he stood right or wrong.
So long David, the world is a nastier place with little hope on the horizon for any of us; may you rest in peace.