Leftist of Privilege

Theodore Dalrymple, writing about the death of Paul Foot, a lefty journalist, sums it up neatly.

The Guardian also informed us that Foot died aged 66 going on 21. The paper obviously meant this observation admiringly, as if eternal adolescent rebellion were the highest state of wisdom that a man might aspire to, and immaturity were a virtue. On this Peter-Panic view of politics, the intellectual's role is never to sustain or contribute to a tradition but always to destroy it and replace it. Youthful egotism becomes the beginning and end of political wisdom.
This attitude may mark the fundamental difference between the modern conservative and the modern radical: the conservative thinks he is a drop in a stream; the radical thinks he is, or ought to be, the stream itself.

City Journal and Dalrymple's essays are wonderful reading.