Jay Currie

Mr. Kristol was a man of ideas who believed in the power of ideas, an intellectual whose fiercest battles were waged against other intellectuals.

A major theme of The Public Interest under Mr. Kristol’s leadership was the limits of social policy; he and his colleagues were skeptical about the extent to which government programs could actually produce positive change. new york times

Kristol was a huge influence on the conservative movement in the United States. An elegant writer and a deeply acute thinker, Kristol could marshal facts and arguments to call out the happy clappy lefties who were convinced that welfare, not work, was the way forward.

Yet underlying the invective was an innate skepticism, even a quality of moderation and self-mockery, which was often belied by his single-mindedness. This stalwart defender of free enterprise could manage only two cheers for capitalism. “Extremism in defense of liberty,” he declared, taking issue with Barry Goldwater, “is always a vice because extremism is but another name for fanaticism.” And the two major intellectual influences on him, he said, were Lionel Trilling, “a skeptical liberal,” and Leo Strauss, “a skeptical conservative.”

“Ever since I can remember,” he said in summing himself up, “I’ve been a neo-something: a neo-Marxist, a neo-Trotskyist, a neo-liberal, a neo-conservative and, in religion, always a neo-orthodox, even while I was a neo-Trotskyist and a neo-Marxist. I’m going to end up a neo. Just neo, that’s all. Neo-dash-nothing.” new york times

Kristol made you think. Which is important. He will be missed.