[I]n full view of ten million people, the little door in William F. Buckley Jr.'s forehead suddenly opened and out sprang that wild cuckoo which I had always known was there but had wanted so much for others, preferably millions of others, to get a good look at. I think those few seconds of madness, to use his word, were well worth a great deal of patient effort on my part.Although I'd seen the video before I wasn't aware the Esquire article even existed. It was apparently in response to Buckley's piece "On Experiencing Gore Vidal" over which Vidal lost a libel suit only to have Esquire settle out of court in response to Buckley's suit against Vidal over the response. And yet today I can link to the one Esquire caved, twice, into suppressing, while the court-approved polemic published first is nowhere to be found*. The internet is so unfair!
Via Mal de Mer commenting at Sadly, No! where you can also find links to YouTube feeds of Buckley versus Chomsky from the next year.
*Well, apparently if you ask National Review nicely they'll mail you a copy. (Update June 2016: Or you can read it here, for now. [I just purchased Best of Enemies, in case you were wondering why I was fiddling about with this decade old post.])