Top 100 Public Intellectuals

A reader emails;

Foreign Policy is having a poll of the top 100 intellectuals. The vast majority of the names that I recognized in their top 100 list are lefties. However there is a provision for writing in a candidate. The criteria is: “Although the men and women on this list are some of the world’s most sophisticated thinkers, the criteria to make the list could not be more simple. Candidates must be living and still active in public life. They must have shown distinction in their particular field as well as an ability to influence wider debate, often far beyond the borders of their own country.”
Under this criteria, I chose to write-in Mark Steyn, Canada, Author.

If ever there was a poll to go horribly wrong… here’s the link; http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4262

75 Replies to “Top 100 Public Intellectuals”

  1. LMAO… Iggy made the list as a Human rights theorist/politician.
    No Dion on the list as an environmental crusader… yet

  2. Steyn got my write-in as well.
    Other choices were Petraeus, Vaclav Havel and Hirsi Ali.

  3. Done; I wrote in Steyn, and chose Hirsi Ali, Hitchens, Bjorn Lomborg (The Skeptical Environmentalist), and Vaclev Havel.
    And dammit, I just see that I missed Gen. Petraeus!

  4. You know it’s a farce when Al Gore is listed as a choice of top 100 intellectuals worldwide.

  5. Iggy and the Goracle, fer g*d sakes, please give us a break. I’d pick Peewee Herman over those two clowns.

  6. I added Mark Steyn a few days ago. I bypassed Hitchens, but I guess he has had quite a lot of influence. Gore’s inclusion made me gag. What a joke.

  7. Steyn is no intellectual. You can relate to him because he talks in terms you can understand but that does not make him an intellectual. Intellectuals are capable of considering both sides of an argument, not making gross generalizations about the other side and dismissing it summarily.
    Steyn’s credentials are ?
    He’s just your run of the mill journalist whose polemic is popular with right-wing simpletons. I am willing to wager 100 dollars that most right-wing intellectuals wouldn’t consider him an intellectual.
    Besides he started of as a theater critic which makes him about as qualified to talk about global events as Barb Streisand. But since the great minds here agree with him, he must be an intellectual.

  8. I will take it one step further and suggest an alternative to Mark Steyn – a conservative intellectual journalist worth his salt.
    Charles Krauthammer. Pullitzer – Awardee. McGill/Oxford/Harvard educated. Conservative. And reasoned, well-written work. None of the conjectural bs that Steyn is so popular for.

  9. ‘dubious’ chose a name representing his own critical thinking skills?
    Oh, and I wrote in Rush Limbaugh. Take *that*.

  10. dubious you state Intellectuals are capable of considering both sides of an argument ,making no generalizations blah blah blah. I guess you would agree POS Gore qualifies.

  11. How does a general qualify exactly?
    Charles Taylor is a giant.
    I’d never even heard of Ignatieff until a few years ago, not even from friends who had actually studied under him. His op-ed recently about his Iraqi turn-about was the most shameless thing I’d read since university. A complete cop-out, and if was his student’s parents, I’d demand a complete refund on my child’s tuition for his classes.
    His writing is actually worse than Ralston Saul’s, And that is stretching it to my absolute limit of what I would describe as “liberrish”.
    Steyn gets a vote for threatening to expose the CHRC as a corrupt body of censorship, and I’d say that takes a good deal of courage. As was defending that pompous boor Black to the end.

  12. criterion sing. criteria pl.
    I’ll be writing in Mark Steyn, and voting for Hirsi Ali and Bernard Lewis. I’m thinking of writing in Patricia Crone, as someone who influences the influential.

  13. I guess by “dubious”‘s definition, then very few of the people listed deserve to be called “intellectuals”.
    I question why the list was pre-selected rather than having all write ins.

  14. Did anybody write in Limbaugh yet?
    He’s not a “great intellectual” for sure, but he’s Numero Uno in radio for 10+ years now and he pretty much sets the public debate on the Right in the USA.
    Plus it’ll piss those guys off something ferocious. ~:D I’m such a devil. Hee hee!

  15. What? No Warren Kinsella? Does the Human Rights Commission know about this? Does Michael Ignatieff realize that he’s considered smarter than Warren? Is Warren going to accept this without filing a Statement of Claim with co-plaintiff Lucy Warman? This looks like a job for Babs Hall, champion of sensitivity, compassion and truth. (Well two out of three ain’t bad)

  16. My choices:
    Hirsi Ali,
    General Petraeus,
    Pope Benedict,
    Kasparov,
    Steyn write in
    All qualify under the criteria of advancing difficult intelligent debate and action while risking potentially severe consequences.

  17. I’d suggest… just a few I did not see yet…
    Carl Rove
    Stephen Harper
    Ben Steyn
    John David Lewis
    David Bukay

  18. Victor David Hanson, Charles Krauthammer, Mark Steyn, Martin Amis, John Q Wilson…here were so many good ones left off the list. Too bad it was only one write in vote. I wrote in Victor David Hanson.
    Rob C – Al Gore, an intellectual?, please, there hasn’t been a thought in that fool’s head that his handlers didn’t put there. The guy has regurgitated scripts all of his life like the weatherman does.

  19. Conservatives on the Foreign Policy list, like Niall Ferguson, Robert Kagan, Fareed Zakaria, and Thomas Friedman have been the owners of some rather dubious writings and pronouncements, but placing them in the same category as Steyn and Limbaugh is actually quite laughable, and an insult to reasoned conservatives anywhere.
    In fact, I can hear the roiling waves of laughter from Foreign Policy HQ right now…especially at the dunderhead who wants to submit (dear jeebus) Stephen Harper, “Carl” Rove and Ben “Steyn” – shurley Mark’s older brother, yes?

  20. You’re right of course, Mr. Ringo sir. Putting those guys in the same class as Limbaugh is silly.
    I mean, which one of those guys gives marching orders to 25 million Americans every day from noon ’till three? Plus books, magazines and internet?
    I should nominate Drudge too. He nearly got a whole President impeached all by his lonesome.

  21. ANN COULTER!!!
    That should make a few lefty heads explode!
    Might I also add Judge Judy, Laura Ingraham and Dr. Laura!

  22. My Choices: Amartya Sen, Lee Kwan Yew, David Petraeus, the Pope, and Bernard Lewis. My write in was Hernando de Soto (Peruvian economist).

  23. Hernando de Soto, good one, DrD, if the principles of his writings were applied to SA countries he could single handedly bring them out of poverty. I couldn’t think of his name when I was looking at who was missing.

  24. The first clue that this list is a farce is that Gore is one it … the nail in that coffin is that Mr.Ringo takes it seriously… very full of yourself today Ringo …. fresh meds?
    Although I can see from some of the more well read commenters that I’ve got some authors to explore… which is good enough…. cheers.

  25. In what world is Fareed Zakaria a conservative? All his writing has the common them of “Everything is America’s fault, always.”

  26. I read about this poll about a week ago but laughed it off when I saw that Iggy, Gore, et al were on the list.

  27. How about Havel’s favourite american composer,free speech crusader,and guitar master,Mr. Frank Zappa?

  28. Frank Zappa?
    “Candidates must be living and still active in public life.”
    So, unless you have some news about Frank that you’d like to share with the rest of us…

  29. Aw come on, you’re joshing us.
    There isn’t 100 lefty intellectuals in the world.
    Obviously, lefty intellectual is an oxymoron.

  30. Another write-in vote for the inestimable Mr. Steyn!
    (I don’t particularly care for most Canadian beers I’ve tasted, so keep your beer but send us your steyns. 🙂

  31. “Besides he started of as a theater critic which makes him about as qualified to talk about global events as Barb Streisand. But since the great minds here agree with him, he must be an intellectual.”
    And Suz U ki started out as a biologist which makes him about as qualified to talk about global warming as Aristotle. But since the science is settled, he must be right.

  32. just a guess, but i’d bet some of the stupidist people on the planet will be on that list.

  33. Wilson, Dawkins, Hitchens, Dennett and Diamond.
    Steyn?!? BAHHHA HAAAA HAAAA! It is to laugh. The Pope?!? Maybe if running a diddling empire is the next great intellectual battleground.

  34. After only a quick scan of the comments it seems you have all missed Christopher Monkton, 3rd Viscount of Brenchley, of Great Britain. He posseses a towering intellect and has generated the most effective attack on AGW that I have seen. Google his name for lots of information.

  35. OMMAG: Ben “Steyn”?!? I suggest you cut down on the either the crack, or the creationism. Both of them rot your brain.

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