William F. Buckley Would Call Gore Vidal A Little Queer, But Then He'd Have To Go To Rehab
Awful, just awful video with worse sound of this, um, notorious "debate" at the 1968 DNC.
Just so you know what you're listening for -- Vidal fillibusters for a while, Buckley says that little hooligans encouraging enemy troops to kill American soldiers and Marines (sound familiar?) ought to be ostracized, at which point Vidal calls him a "pro-war crypto-Nazi" (sound familiar?) and Buckley says "Don't call me a crypto-Nazi, you little queer, I'll punch you in your goddamned head."
JackStraw suggests this belies the claim that American discourse has never been more incivil. Well, perhaps... but this was a particularly angry period, and if we've merely returned to 1968's level of civility, it's small comfort.
BTW, Buckley should have punched the little queer in the goddamned head.