# Aw, man! Christopher Hitchens has esophageal cancer. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 1, 2010, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152 "2010-07-01T03:08:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/1 "2010-07-01T03:08:05Z")
It seems my favorite leftie journalist, writer and intellectual, Christopher Hitchens has developed esophageal cancer and will have to undergo chemo.[Link](http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20100630/stage_nm/us_hitchens) It’s probably a stretch to call Hitchens the Buckley of the left but he comes closer than anyone else I can think of in terms barbed wit and intellect. And like Buckley, he is on track to be done in by his indulgences. You know, Hitch, you just can’t drink 2 1/2 gallons of scotch and smoke 10 packs of cigarettes a day and not have it bite you in the ass eventually. Here’s hoping they caught it in time and that you’ll recover fully, and that this episode will finally give you the impetus to overcome and kick the harmful addictions that you’ve so joyfully indulged in all these years. ---
**Author:** ![Mahaloth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mahaloth/32/1079_2.png) [@Mahaloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahaloth)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/2 "2010-07-01T03:33:11Z")
Does he really drink a lot? ---
**Author:** ![Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellis_Aponte_Jr)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/3 "2010-07-01T03:41:00Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > It’s probably a stretch to call Hitchens the Buckley of the left It might be a stretch to call Hitchens “of the left” at all. Anyway, according to his memoir he stopped smoking and drinks sensibly. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/4 "2010-07-01T03:43:35Z")
Yeah, he’s been a heavy drinker for decades. Scotch, mostly. He tried to kick it a few years ago but I don’t believe he was successful. In the latest issue of _Vanity Fair_ he somewhat jokingly claims to have cut back to a couple bottles of wine in the morning and a couple more with lunch, with gin taking the driver’s seat the rest of the day. Mostly tongue-in-cheek I’m sure, but still it doesn’t sound like something a freshly-minted teetotaler might say. ETA: Thanks for the update, **Ellis**. I haven’t read his memoir yet. (And I think by most measures he’d qualify as a leftie. It’s just that he occasionally speaks negative truth about the left and so gets disowned accordingly. Same with Camille Paglia. ;)) ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/5 "2010-07-01T03:48:27Z")
> [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](#): > > It might be a stretch to call Hitchens “of the left” at all. I agree. He’s of the Hitchens. I don’t follow his work as closely as I used to, but I’m sorry to hear he’s sick. He’s a unique voice and he’s always interesting. Here’s wishing him the best. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/6 "2010-07-01T03:58:14Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > And like Buckley, he is on track to be done in by his indulgences.. This stumps me. What indulgences did in Buckley? ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/7 "2010-07-01T03:59:27Z")
And, yeah, Hitches ain’t a leftie in my world. He’s just an overthehill alky. \*\* \*\*Not that that’s a bad thing, only if it gets in the way of your thought process. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/8 "2010-07-01T03:59:53Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > This stumps me. What indulgences did in Buckley? It wasn’t what killed him (heart attack), but he was suffering from emphysema at the time, from smoking. ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/9 "2010-07-01T04:14:51Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > It wasn’t what killed him (heart attack), but he was suffering from emphysema at the time, from smoking. Thx. I feel better now. I haven’t smoked in 40 years. I still drinks a bit. You’ll be cursed with me a bit longer. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/10 "2010-07-01T04:20:10Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > I think by most measures he’d qualify as a leftie. Any measure that is actually in touch with reality shows the exact opposite. Case in point: his attitude towards the war in Iraq contrasted with that of the left. The man hasn’t been a leftist for years. Yeah, what’s happened to him is tragic, but there are people better worth the time to shed a tear over (11 men in the Gulf of Mexico, for instance). ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/11 "2010-07-01T04:33:18Z")
**samclem** , Buckley was a proud and longtime inhaler of cigars. He became very contrite about that conceit once emphysema set in, and admitted as much in one of his later columns, stating: \*"Half a year ago my wife died, technically from an infection, but manifestly, at least in part, from a body weakened by 60 years of nonstop smoking. I stayed off the cigarettes but went to the idiocy of cigars inhaled, and suffer now from emphysema, which seems determined to outpace heart disease as a human killer. Stick me in a confessional and ask the question: Sir, if you had the authority, would you forbid smoking in America? You’d get a solemn and contrite, Yes."\* [Link](http://www.nysun.com/opinion/my-smoking-confessional/67349/) By the time Buckley died his emphysema had become acute. I imagine his heart attack was caused by it. > [@Olentzero](#): > > Any measure that is actually in touch with reality shows the exact opposite. Case in point: his attitude towards the war in Iraq contrasted with that of the left. The man hasn’t been a leftist for years. He’s an atheist, an admirer of Marx, Lenin and Trotsky, and said as recently as 2007 _"…that if the Christian right’s agenda were implemented in the United States “It wouldn’t last very long and would, I hope, lead to civil war, which they will lose, but for which it would be a great pleasure to take part.”_ Like Paglia who I mentioned upthread, Hitchens is a not always a lockstep follower of the party line, but his overall attitudes and beliefs align much more closely with the left than with the right or center. Now, having said that, isn’t the more important issue the fact that he’s developed cancer, and not whether he technically qualifies as a leftie? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Speak\_to\_me\_Maddie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Speak\_to\_me\_Maddie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speak_to_me_Maddie)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/12 "2010-07-01T14:37:15Z")
That is sad news, he is great writer. I hope he gets better. And count me in as someone who considers him mostly on the left. Other than his support of the Iraq War, I can’t think of any major positions he holds in concert with the right. If you read through his career he is clearly a leftist, though probably not a liberal, and certainly not a political conservative. He has stated how he resents being labelled a neocon beacause of his support of the Iraq war. I have the suspicion that he wrote _God is Not Great_ in part to re-distance himself from his developing reputation as a neo-con. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/13 "2010-07-01T14:58:15Z")
I’ve always preferred Hitchen’s essays about writers to his polemics. They’re better written and have less of an air of contrariness for it’s own sake. ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/14 "2010-07-01T15:25:43Z")
> [@samclem](#): > > He’s just an overthehill alky. \*\* > > \*\*Not that that’s a bad thing, only if it gets in the way of your thought process. Do you think it did get in the wayof his thought process…I mean, from what we can gleen from his work? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2010, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/15 "2010-07-01T17:54:20Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > Does he really drink a lot? The phrase “drink soaked Trotskyite Popinjay” was invented for Hitchens. Although as others have pointed out, he’s not been a lefty since at least the Clinton administration. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2010, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/16 "2010-07-02T05:16:06Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Now, having said that, isn’t the more important issue the fact that he’s developed cancer, and not whether he technically qualifies as a leftie? :rolleyes: Repeated for emphasis: > [@Olentzero](#): > > Yeah, what’s happened to him is tragic, but there are people better worth the time to shed a tear over (11 men in the Gulf of Mexico, for instance). Honestly, do you think you’re going to get some sort of credit for, deep down, being a sensitive guy who can transcend politics when the chips are down for someone on the other side? That ain’t gonna fly by using Hitchens. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2010, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/17 "2010-07-02T05:17:52Z")
> [@Speak\_to\_me\_Maddie](#): > > He has stated how he resents being labelled a neocon beacause of his support of the Iraq war. I have the suspicion that he wrote _God is Not Great_ in part to re-distance himself from his developing reputation as a neo-con. As long as he keeps supporting the war in Iraq, he isn’t gonna get that stain off. The rep is deserved. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2010, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/18 "2010-07-02T06:02:01Z")
You know, if you’re going to completely villianize anyone and everyone who supported or supports the war in Iraq, you’re going to be villainizing tens of millions of people. Furthermore, you said upthread that Hitchens was the “exact opposite” of a leftie. That would make him a rightie, correct? And yet anyone who knows anything about Hitchens at all knows he’s anything but a conservative. And furthermore again, I think my posting history here pretty clearly shows I don’t give a damn whether people think I’m a “sensitive guy who can transcend politics” or not. Do a search of my board name and Hitchens and you’ll see that I’ve spoken admiringly of him on several occasions going back several years. Answer me this: William F. Buckley eventually reversed himself and became a supporter of the legalization of drugs. By your logic that makes him a liberal, right? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2010, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/19 "2010-07-02T06:40:52Z")
He does not keep his politics a secret. He is a self-avowed Marxist and former socialist. He is a social libertarian, an economic Marxist, a self identified “anti-theist,” and a globalist. The only thing about him that might not seem lefty is that he advocates the use of US military power to squelch despotism in other countries. He also freely admits to being a heavy drinker and smoker, so this is not at all surprising. It’s sad, but he’s done it to himself. I hope he pulls through. I would really miss his voice as a journalist and commentator. There’s no one else out there like him. He has a combination of literary urbanity, verbal facility and the courage to murder sacred cows that I think is singular and refreshing. The guy is never boring. I think he’s the closest thing we have left to Hunter S. Thompson. There is nothing like watching him eviscerate Hannity and O’Reilly on Fox News. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2010, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152/20 "2010-07-02T07:22:45Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > You know, if you’re going to completely villianize anyone and everyone who supported or supports the war in Iraq, you’re going to be villainizing tens of millions of people. There’s a world of difference between villainizing someone and saying a reputation they’re not perhaps completely comfortable with is nonetheless well deserved. Bush should be villainized for starting it, for example. Colin Powell should be villainized for lying about it to get it started, for another. Hitchens, on the other hand, should only be taken to task for abandoning a consistently leftist position and all the hypocrisy that entails: his renouncement of religion as leading to irrationality and violence didn’t seem to get in the way of supporting an avowedly religious President when it came to war. Or deliberate ignorance of the fact that the US tolerates despotism in other countries as long as it’s despotism that is friendly to US interests in the region - need I trot out that old CNN footage of Rumsfeld shaking hands with Saddam Hussein after the massacre in Halabja to illustrate the point? And that God-awful quote about joyfully participating in a civil war over the imposition of the Christian right’s agenda on the US - that’s not revolutionary, that’s buffoonery. Granted, perhaps Hitchens is not the exact opposite of a leftist, but it’s pretty clear that this one major flaw alone doesn’t put him all that near this end of the spectrum, either. If the best you can do is try to trip me up on a bit of excessive rhetoric when the facts are clearly on my side, you’re on fairly shaky ground - familiar territory to you by now, I’m sure. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/aw-man-christopher-hitchens-has-esophageal-cancer/545152.md?page=2)