Another reader comments on Safire:

A libertarian is a conservative who’s been wiretapped. Safire has had a

strong libertarian streak at least since he found that Kissinger was

snooping on him, but if you look back, you can find a number of attacks on

police and intelligence excess, and he did a marvelous piece about his

revulsion at the Republican Party in 1992 when Pat & Pat were calling

shots. He’s looked worse in recent years because he’s deranged on the

subject of the Clintons, but so is Christopher Hitchens over on the other side.

I think in retrospect I hadn’t given Safire enough credit, and hadn’t followed his exploits carefully enough, and was tarring him with a broad brush as an unnuanced “conservative”, or I wouldn’t’ve been so surprised at his recent outrage… Thanks to all who wrote to point this out to me, compassionately.