Gore Vidal Has Lost His Mind

Last week when Gore Vidal said a bunch of stupid things about Barack Obama, I left him alone. He's old and prone to saying anything that will get his name in print. Remember, he was completely inconsistent during the primaries, flip-flopping between Obama and Clinton. He said things that many people observed were racist. Everyone left him alone.

Today in The Atlantic, Vidal said he never should have supported Obama and "experience mattered." He then went on to suggest that the 13-year-old girl Roman Polanski had sex with was a "young hooker" and that Roman was only persecuted out of anti-Semitism.

Why does this guy still get interviewed? Can't someone stop him from embarrassing himself? Doesn't someone have power of attorney? Isn't there anyone concerned with this guy's vanishing legacy?

What's even worse is that since Sept. 11, 2001, Vidal has been a leading "intellectual" of the 9/11 Truth movement, giving countless interviews to lunatic fringe correspondents like Alex Jones. He'll tell anyone who will listen about how George Bush personally planned 9/11. Seriously, Google has 140,000 pages on Vidal's paranoia.

So please, legit reporters -- stop asking this demented man questions. It's over.

Originally posted on The Hill.

Follow Ryan J. Davis on Twitter: www.twitter.com/RyanNewYork

Comments

[Jimboy17]

It is easy to sit in bland condemnation of one the greatest minds that America has ever produced. Even more so while that mind is in its decline. He has always been incendiary, always a firebrand, and always has stirred the pot. This offering is no different. Except perhaps to a myopic generation of politically correct hacks who care more about bearing the standards of a confused and watered-down ideology than really grabbing life by the neck and giving it a good shake. Vidal's comments certainly are reprehensible. They were intended as such. He is, after all, shilling a book.

[OnReflection]

Gore Vidal is a quintessential American and human being, the best of us,who has given and contributed his whole life to the betterment of this nation and the greater good, to dismiss him, is contemptuous!

[stillfresh]

Be careful, it can be proven in court that calling someone insane is defamation, a libel if it's malicious.

[gs-425]

You think that is bad, go look at what he was spouting on Joy Behar's show...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4O2ke-AuJkQ

[Terypat]

I can think of a bunch of "important" people whose nonsense we have to listen to on a daily basis. So I say let Gore say what he wants. He doesn't sound any crazier to me than say Glenn Beck, and I'm sure Mr. Beck has a lot more listeners than Mr. Vidal. So I would suggest that the author of this piece just "chill"!

[FTracy3]

Sometimes the greater the mind the more astoundingly stupid foolishness that comes out of it. Anti-semitism? I can just see LA District Attorney Steve Cooley chewing out his staff a couple of months ago . "Hey, is Polanski Jewish? Why didn't you guys tell me before! Now who wants to go to Switzerland?"

[Jeff Norman - Huffpost Blogger]

Vidal clearly was talking about 1978, not "a couple of months ago."

So "astoundingly stupid foolishness" was expressed by whom?

[deezus]

Ryan, he lost his mind a long time ago.

[activateduser]

"It's over" according to the writer, a self-described theatre director/p­rogressive blogger, so I guess that's that, then, right? I think not. Vidal in his dotage could and will run circles around this guy. Watch.

[DissedBeliever]

I saw Vidal in a lecture at the 92st Street Y in New York last week and he was, as always, a brilliant raconteur. He's seen everything of American history over the past 6 decades, was at the center of much of it and has a story about most of it. He is also, famously, a provocateur and very hard to interview. Take him or leave him but we ignore him, and his consistently, stridently liberal body of work, at our own impoverishment

[DreamerWeaver]

Gore Vidal can keep right on talking until he can't talk any longer, I'm listening.
He makes me laugh. Do you know how precious that is?
I don't have to believe everything he says to be able to appreciate a lot of what he says.
And his wit is as natural to him as breathing. May he breathe a while longer ....

[ccoppe]

He was once so amazing.

I recently viewed a videotape of a masterfully nasty argument he had with William F. Buckley. Sharp wits with barbed, high-flying vocabulary literally ripping each other apart. No foul language used, yet they expressed the malevolent intent toward each other with riveting intensity. The power of words, indeed.

My opinion: Gore won that argument.

Now, however, that sharp mind and acerbic wit are no more. All that is left is bitter dissatisfaction, misanthropy, and paranoia.

May the mind of Gore Vidal Rest In Peace.

[Chblotm]

Davis is a li'l behind the times; Vidal hasn't made sense for 45+ yrs!

[Acleacius]

I have to agree Ryan, vidal defiantly crossed the line by aattacking a 13 year old girl. His revisionist history of poor ppersecuted polanski (The 3 P's?) ONLY being sought due to being JJewish. This is aabsurdest as aattacking an Intentionally DDRUGGED and IINTOXICATED 13 year girl, who was luredd with the promise of possible fame as a model.

DDisgraceful? No it's ddisgusting and ppathetic.

[Enliberate]

We all get a little touchy when stretched to the limits of our understanding. The War on Terror is exactly as GV calls it- a complete sham. We have been looking down the barrel of a military dictatorship for some time now. Perhaps, Mr. Davis, you might show a little respect for some one who has been around the block a few more times than you. Heck, you might learn something.

[TheBaffler]

Our nation's greatest essayist, wit, and intellectual deserves a hit-piece like this from a hypersensitive Obama fan, does he, HP? How did this get posted? Disgraceful.

Vidal greatly preferred Kucinich in the primaries. He then backed Obama by default; he never considered supporting Clinton at all.

He never said anything remotely racist regarding Obama or anyone. Certain unobservant Obama supporters tried to make some things Vidal said sound racist.

[DreamerWeaver]

I'd rather listen or read Gore Vidal than almost any one else. I don't believe a lot of what he says today. I think for myself. But he has my respect and interest until he speaks his last essay or final word. He still has things to tell us. We best listen up!

[janejoad]

Thank you.