Some years ago I met Mr. Hitchens lurking outside the Modern Times bookstore in San Francisco, swilling booze out of a Coke bottle. That booze (the ultimate in anesthetics for his deeply felt pain and despair), which, together with his nicotine addiction, appears to be leading to his premature death. A death which one could liken to a slow suicide, unlike the much speedier one of his mother; one wonders how much influence the defrocked priest (who initiated the suicide pact?) had on his perverse views on his Maker. When I attempted to debate with him the influence of his public school and Oxford education on his strangely garbled thinking he became quite abusive, unable to refute any of the points I brought up to defend, among others, Mother Teresa. With the pseudo-Marxism which he embraced now being shown in the U.S. as just another lying politician's vehicular grab for power, the use of which benefits Wall Street rather than Main Street, as he prepares to enter the void I wonder what real reflections he has come up with about the meaning and purpose of life now that his misspent one is almost over. Or, even if he, at the last moment, might take Pascal's wager. Fear is indeed a great motivator.

@Farrell As a Christian and a human being, I am saddened by this news. Cancer is no joke and your response is telling of your own attitude and insensitivity. My hope is that Hitchens has a full recovery. In fact I will be praying that he does. Who knows, maybe this will lead him to belief in God in the end?

@Farrell How wrong you are. See:

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2010/07/13/my-take-why-christians-should-p...

for why.

Hope he gets well and beats this. He is, without a doubt, my favorite atheist, and I have learnt so much from the man.

Hitchens exploited the misfortune and even death of many people (including Edward Said) throughout his career as an apologist for those in power. I have argued in my recent article that in light of the recent cancer statistics coming out of Iraq (higher than Hiroshima and Nagasaki after 1945) resulting from the war Hitchens promoted - that Hitchens being incapacitated and not being able to sell the upcoming Iran war is a good thing for humanity. I think Hitchens getting cancer after he promoted a cancerous war against the people of Iraq is him getting his just deserts. Here is my article
http://www.ourowncbc.info/profiles/blogs/christopher-hitchens-getting

what a guy in a half

Is it just me or can anyone else hear it in the distance...the shuffle of palms being rubbed vigorously together by every frothing Abrahamaniac, confident that the malignant cells were dispatched by He Who Must be Obeyed to silence another critic? They'll be banking that round about now Richard Dawkins will be feeling chest pains and Daniel Dennet pre-stroke dizziness...

May I wish my old comrade at the New Statesman my best wishes. He is such a character and I have followed his career over the years since I left the NSwith great interest Fight on !

Let's hope he pulls through. I disagree with much of what he writes these days - but nothing would stop me reading it. Hitchens has a style that sometimes approaches genius.

I haven't always agreed with his opinions and stance but he is a formidable polemic who has provoked debate on some of the crucial issues and uses the English language quite wonderfully and for that I respect him. But if he's so ill then we should afford to be compassionate...

@Agape Abrahamaniacs, be they the Jewish, Christian or Muslim variety are exchanging 'knowing' smirks even as we type. It's one of the perks of the condition, consolling yourself that all those people who wouldn't bow alongside you will get eternal torture beyond the grave, wth any earthly misfortune (like cancer) a sort of celestial hors d'ouvre for the main event