Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees that Christopher Hitchens has died. (Good WaPo obit here.) Actually, your Maximum Leader learned of this earlier today. But he wasn’t sure what to write.

Your Maximum Leader thought of titling this post “Hitchens - RIP” or “Fare thee well Christopher Hitchens” or any one of a number of other normal titles that include some variation of resting or moving on. But in the end your Maximum Leader decided that all these potential post titles implied some sort of belief in something more beyond death. Of course, Hitchens did not believe in God, the afterlife, or anything like that.

So your Maximum Leader decided that the best thing to do was to just announce it. Christopher Hitchens is dead.

As Anthony Bourdain tweeted earlier, the world got a whole lot dumber today. That is true. The world was better off for Hitchens being in it. Your Maximum Leader didn’t always agree with Hitch, but he was thoughtful, exciting, combative, entertaining, and a hell of a writer.

Because your Maximum Leader can’t help it… Rest in peace Hitch.

Carry on.