Notes & Asides.

-- Dear Mr. Buckley: I am concerned about the subliminal campaign waged by left-leaning authorities to move us into a mindset that resonates with their cause.

Three such phenomena come to mind:

1) On highways: When a road narrows, the signs invariably command us to merge left;

2) At table: A trained waiter/waitress serves from the left, takes from the right. You can see the effects of this happening, meal after meal, on the political philosophies of Ted Kennedy and Jon Corzine;

3) In writing: This note, like all Western writing, starts each line with reference to the left margin.

We should list all such subliminal schemes so that our unconscious is not trained to accept that left is right. Perhaps your readers could help. Unfortunately we cannot inventory our own offerings in this area; to do so would make the Left aware of what is subliminally Right.

Sincerely,

Evan Schulman

Boston, Mass.

--Dear Mr. Schulman: Yes, it is certainly a swindle you've got your eyes on. Up dextrosinistral reform!

Cordially, WFB 

-- Dear Mr. Buckley: I seek your blessing on a new word: hippiecrit.

A noun. Usage: Confound these hippiecrits who roar off in their SUVs from the Wal-Mart protest, trunks filled with bargain booty paid for with Daddy's Platinum Visa.

It arises from a certain gnawing angst for those hypocritical hippies, who, in the midst of IMF protests, yak on their cell phones about their stocks withering into oblivion while brushing off the mud caking on their $95 Nantucket Red pants. I mean the word to be a close cousin to "trustafarian."

I crafted the word for one of my Live Free or Die college newspaper columns entitled "The Wal-Mart Confessions," in which I explored some of the acres of good brought by a new Super Wal-Mart to our depressed area of Maine.

As you might imagine, this was dicey on a small liberal-arts campus where Nader and Gore were the majority-party candidates, Bush the vote- siphoning distraction.

Respectfully,

Jay Surdukowski

Washington, D.C.

--Dear Mr. Surdukowski: If you think it's rough where you are, think of Vermont!

Cordially, WFB

-- Dear Mr. Buckley: Do you think that Hollywood would be so worried about oppression in Tibet if the country were predominantly Christian?

Sincerely,

John Lockwood

Washington, D.C.

--Dear Mr. Lockwood: A sensitive point. But I don't see that Hollywood (or anybody else) is all that distracted by the continuing oppression in Tibet.

Cordially, WFB

-- Dear Bill: I have puzzled for years over the proper locus of the closing quotes for an idiomatic phrase or word at the end of a sentence. Herewith two examples from the NR Letters section of Nov. 11:

-- I will grant their "courage" . . . but "nobility"?

-- Ponnuru refers to critics . . . as "Cassandras."

I therefore derive the following rule: When a non-dialogue sentence ends with a quotable idiomatic phrase or word, the closing quotation marks should always be placed after the sentence-ending punctuation, except in the case of an interrogation mark, in which case it precedes it. The same obtains with an exclamation point!

Grammatically yours,

Jim [James C. Neely, M.D.]

Napa, Calif.

--Dear Jim: I wish I had said that. I bet Fowler wishes he had!

Cordially,

-- WFB