Happy Birthday, Bill S.!
I have something very special for you this year, Bill - a lovely photo of the adorable James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal.
I knew James Taranto from when he lived in Phoenix, Arizona, attending Arizona State University and living in an apartment on Terrace Ave. near campus. [...] Taranto was one of the most obnoxious people I've ever met, which I found incredibly amusing at the time (end of my high school career). He enjoyed pushing people's buttons on the BBSes, taunting people, and posting under false identities to screw with them. [...]
It's sad to me that Taranto's become such a conservative. He seemed far more libertarian back when I knew him, though a look at 1987 Apollo BBS postings shows him already a defender of Reagan and Oliver North. From what I've read of his writings, he has retained his nasty streak, but now seems to have become a prude, a homophobe, and a rather blindered supporter of the Republican Party, and even of morons like Michael Savage. I wouldn't have thought to apply those labels to him at the time, though he certainly displayed strong misanthropic tendencies which seem to me rather common for extremely intelligent people. I never knew him to have a girlfriend, and his interactions with females that I observed I could perhaps characterize as misogynistic in hindsight--he seemed to enjoy demonstrating lack of intelligence and naivete on the part of females, though he enjoyed doing the same to males as well.
So, Taranto was a jerk back in college. Plus ca change . . .
Anyway, happy birthday, Bill. I hope it's a good one!
12:38:31 AM
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