December 8, 2006
Jeane Kirkpatrick, 1926-2006 Posted by John Steele Gordon at 04:30 PM EST Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ronald Reagan’s first U.N. ambassador, has died, peacefully in her sleep according to reports, at the age of 80. Like Daniel Patrick Moynihan, she represented the United States in that body with intellectual force, wit, and honesty, and, as a result, she earned many enemies both abroad and at home. Why, can be seen clearly in the speech she made to the 1984 GOP Convention, in which she pointed out, over and over and over, how the “San Francisco Democrats” (the Democrats that year had held their convention in San Francisco, but the phrase has lived on, thanks to that city’s famously liberal politics) always blamed America first. Liberals never tire of using the phrase “speaking truth to power,” almost always in a context in which the phrase is utterly empty of real meaning, but Jeane Kirkpatrick was one of those people who spoke truth to jerks, such as those who threatened her safety at Smith College, as was recently discussed on this blog. Jerks are an unforgiving bunch. It is ironic that when she made the speech Jeane Kirkpatrick was still a Democrat, not switching her registration until the following year. In her student days she had been a Marxist. She will be missed. If a person can be measured by his or her enemies, Ms. Kirkpatrick stood tall.
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