One of the juiciest pleasures of life is to be able to salute and embrace, as elected leaders and honored representatives, people whom you first met when they were on the run or in exile or (like Adam) in and out of jail. I was to have this experience again, and I hope to have it many more times in the future: it sometimes allows me to feel that life is full of point.

In November 2010 Hitchens cancelled a scheduled appearance in New York where he was to debate writers David Hazony and Stephen Prothero on the subject of the Ten Commandments. He also criticised Bush's support of intelligent design and capital punishment. He will tell it really well.

His anti-religion polemic God Is Not Great sold over 500000 copies. Hitchens died on 15 December 2011 from complications arising from oesophageal cancer a disease that he acknowledged was likely due to his lifelong predilection for heavy smoking and drinking.