How stands John Winthrop’s “city upon a hill” this Thanksgiving? How stands the country that was to be “a light unto the nations”? To those who look to cable TV for news, the answer must at the least be ambiguous. For consider the issues that have lately convulsed the public discourse of the American republic....
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Those Were the Days
Things I miss: Boys who carried paper routes and mowed lawns. Women and girls in actual dresses. When you seldom had to call up a corporation, but when you did you reached friendly, helpful Americans instead of recorded messages, Procrustean menus, and Hindu sing-song. Men who walked in a congenial, alert ...
A Cynic’s Dictionary
cynic (’sin-ick) n.—One who no longer believes in the comforting illusions and protective half-truths that others use unreflectively to get through their lives. A administration, n.—An abstract concept that disguises a concrete problem of government; an administration of 4.4 million people, such as the United States has attained, has been found to be incapable of...
Blackface—and White
Dr. Ralph Northam, the Democratic governor of Virginia, aetat. 59, is under enormous pressure to resign his position after a conservative website revealed the fact that his page in his medical school yearbook from 1984 carries a photograph of two men, one in blackface and the other in the robes of the KKK, standing side...
Saudi Bums
As I wrote five years ago in another place, beginning a new column is like the first date with a girl you’ve had your eye on for a long time but never had the courage to ask out. One’s nervous. But this is a new year, 2008, and let’s start it off right by telling...
Lincoln’s Legacy: Foreign Policy by Assassination
“Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” For proof of this axiom, we need only look at the foreign policy pursued by the U.S. government since the end of World War II. The United States emerged from World War II militarily victorious but politically deformed. Instead of a republic, it was now a...
It Takes Smarm
Anyone entertaining an unpleasant thought about the Clinton White House is almost certainly a victim of the “vast right-wing conspiracy” which Mrs. Clinton (formerly Ms. Rodham-Clinton) has blamed for her husband’s travails. For many years, the Clintons have used the word “children” as an odd euphemism for “government,” Joycelyn Elders and Marian Wright Edelman being...
On the American Interest
Srdja Trifkovic’s twin contributions to the April 2001 issue (Cultural Revolutions and “Sharon’s Victory and U.S. Policy in the Middle East,” The American Interest) reveal the two sides of the same sadly debased coinage of mindset which has led the Serbs into their present morass. He writes that Yugoslav President Vojislav Kostunica “is a moral...
Celebrating Defeat
“That is what we honor on days of national commemoration—those aspects of the American experience that are enduring. . . . It will be said of us that we kept that faith; that we took a painful blow, and emerged stronger. ‘Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.’” So said...
Mentor to Chesterton
Encountered in the right circumstances, Belloc’s prose can become a lifelong addiction. Fortunately, the craving can be as readily satisfied as a thirst (if that is the right word) for cocaine in Hollywood. He wrote so much that one cannot easily run out, and the best of his works (Hills and the Sea, The Cruise...
The Soros Left Guns for ALEC
Vote for Chicagoland politics, get Chicagoland politics. Inspired by President Obama’s slash-and-burn tactics on his opponents, Democrats, radical labor, and left-liberal activists have begun full Saul Alinsky-Bill Ayres-style assaults on conservative and libertarian groups. Media Matters for America is the barking brigade leading the charge. A battalion in the war is another website called Color...
Is Trump Right About NATO?
I am “not isolationist, but I am ‘America First,'” Donald Trump told the New York Times last weekend. “I like the expression.” Of NATO, where the U.S. underwrites three-fourths of the cost of defending Europe, Trump calls this arrangement “unfair, economically, to us,” and adds, “We will not be ripped off anymore.” Beltway media may...
Classifying Italy
The neighbor’s house sported a prato inglese that required ostentatious watering at the crack of dawn, and by the reassuring suppleness of the English lawn beneath our feet we all knew that our host was a gentleman, not some television mogul from Cinecittà out of Rome whom, of a morning, one would be embarrassed to...
A Decent Deal
Iran’s nuclear talks with the P5+1 (five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany) in Geneva resulted in an “interim” agreement last Saturday. It obliges Iran to verify the peaceful nature of its nuclear program, and to dilute its stockpile of highly enriched uranium under international supervision, in return for limited sanctions relief....
Staying on the Ground
Donald Trump’s campaign for the Reform Party presidential nomination may never get off the ground, and anyone who has ever visited Trump’s stomping grounds in Atlantic City should not be surprised. The Trump Taj Mahal casino sits alongside the Atlantic City boardwalk, a gaudy reminder of the excesses of its owner. The “Taj,” which ranked...
Brown Revolution in Ukraine: The Neo-Nazis’ Charm Offensive
The radical organization “Right Sector” is the hidden force behind the armed overthrow of Viktor Yanukovych. Even the openly neo-nazi political party “Svoboda” led by the urologist-turned-aspiring fuhrer Oleh Tyahnybok seems almost respectable, compared to the militant thugs of “Right Sector”. That has not prevented such diverse media outlets as New York Times and Steve...
Jon Stewart, Tucker, and the Decadence of the American Regime
Whether he realizes it or not, Jon Stewart is the very thing he accuses Tucker Carlson of being: a toady for an oligarchy, but one right here in America.
The World of the Small Press
If your local bookstore does not stock Wittgenstein’s Mistress by David Markson, Guilty by Georges Bataille, Altazor by Vincente Huidobro, Compact by Maurice Roche, Space in Motion by Juan Goytisolo, I-57 by Paul Metcalf, Concierto Barroco by Alejo Carpentier, or Cold Tales by Virgilio Pinera, you’re living in a culturally deprived area. All these books...
Top of the World, Ma
Black Mass Produced by Cross Creek Pictures Directed by Scott Cooper Screenplay by Mark Mallouk and Jez Butterworth, based on the book Black Mass, by Dick Lehr and Gerard O’Neill Distributed by Warner Brothers Ever since The Great Train Robbery flashed on the screen in 1903, Americans have been enthralled by gangster movies. They not...
The Gentile Church IV: The Apostolic Church
Following the Master’s instructions, about 120 of Jesus’ followers gathered in Jerusalem under the leadership of Peter. The first order of business was the selection of a replacement for Judas. The method adopted shows us something of the way the Church will operate: The Apostles themselves choose the most worthy candidates and then leave the...
Ross Perot and Middle American Radicalism
For a few moments during last year’s presidential election, it appeared that the American two-party system was headed for a meltdown. As the ineffectual Bush campaign drew to its merciful close, the resurgence of support for Ross Perot defied every principle of professional political punditry. In 1992, disaffected Middle Americans were key to the 19...
The Creativity Profession
It has always been my impression that people who talk and write most about the creative process are not usually very creative. It’s sort of like a corollary to that old maxim, “Those who can’t do, teach”; those who can’t create, analyze creativity. Conversely, I must confess that as a book critic who also publishes...
A Closely Watched Term
The Supreme Court’s closely watched October 1999 term came to an end on June 28, and its themes finally became clear: inconsistency, incoherence, and arbitrariness. On that last day, the Court released important decisions on abortion, aid to religious schools, and homosexual rights, and refused to intervene in the Elian Gonzalez case. The Supreme Court’s...
Who Needs Guns?
Australia has something under 20 million people living on a continent as large as the continental United States. It is known as a place where an overseas visitor might, in some regions at least, find a frontier atmosphere. There has been good historical reason for that. Australia has an Outback, unique wildlife, and a legendary spirit...
Negative Capability
So many things have been said in praise of McCarthy’s work that it is hard not to sound like an echo. Inevitably, the reviewer notes the energy and grace of his style, and there is no gainsaying that. The relentless power of his sentences and the tautness of the action can leave a reader emotionally...
Folks, We Have a Brand New Ballgame
Mitt Romney on Wednesday night turned in the finest debate performance of any candidate of either party in the 52 years since Richard Nixon faced John F. Kennedy, with the possible exception of Ronald Reagan’s demolition of Jimmy Carter in 1980. But where Reagan won with style and quips—”There you go again”—and his closing...
Journalism
Neo-Camelot For years supermarket tabloids have shamelessly made merchandise out of John F. Kennedy by promulgating almost every imaginable shred of gossip or speculation about his life and its untimely end. During the recent revival of Kennedy nostalgia occasioned by the 20th anniversary of his assassination, however, antiestablishment journals claiming intellectual respectability have introduced a...
Political Subdivision
Secession, or at least political subdivision, is looking increasingly attractive to many Americans. Both ideas were long considered outre, even unacceptable. But as the Civil War, our last such great experiment, recedes into history, the cries to break away, or at least to break up, are growing louder. CALIFORNIA: Lalaland is the home of full-spectrum...
The Free-Market Populism of Javier Milei
Just as some businessmen who’ve lost their subsidies still back Milei, populist voters in the United States aren’t necessarily looking for handouts. They want a fair shake, not a New Deal.
Trump’s Crucial Test at San Ysidro
Mass migration “lit the flame” of the right-wing populism that is burning up the Old Continent, she said. Europe must “get a handle on it.” “Europe must send a very clear message—’we are not going to be able to continue to provide refuge and support.'” Should Europe fail to toughen up, illegal migration will never...
Everything in Its Place
On December 9, 2008, as I read through the federal criminal complaint against the latest Illinois governor to be indicted for the merest portion of his crimes, I could not help but feel uneasy. Sure, it was great fun to imagine Governor Hot Rod sweating it out in his holding cell, awaiting arraignment later in...
Brexit: What Now?
It’s been quite a summer in the United Kingdom. On June 23, we the British people surprised everyone—including, perhaps most of all, ourselves—by voting to leave the European Union. That wasn’t meant to happen. All year, the E.U. referendum polls had shown a consistent advantage for the pro-E.U. “Remain” side. Celebrities and important people spent...
Trump, Abortion, and the 2024 Election
Overall, the pro-life cause must be less concerned with short-term tactical disagreements and more concerned with unanimity as to the long-term goal.
The Notorious Star Chamber
NAFTA—the North American Free Trade Agreement—is not unlike the notorious star chamber, where the king and counsellors of medieval England secretly meted out justice without concern for precedent. If Congress approves NAFTA, George Bush’s proudest diplomatic achievement, Americans can expect a heavy dose of star-chamber-style justice in the 21st century. For the average citizen, NAFTA...
One More Wallow In Fantasy?
The Patriot, Mel Gibson’s epic about the American Revolution, opened (by an amazing coincidence) in theaters on Independence Day weekend. And cynics complain that Americans don’t take national holidays seriously anymore! Many viewers may regard the film as one more wallow in fantasy and stale popcorn, but among the nation’s literati, it has actually incited...
In the Gutter With the GOP
The Republican Party’s search for a presidential candidate is a bit like a musical revue. As the star (Mitt Romney) goes up and down the chorus line, one after another dancer emerges from obscurity into the spotlight, dazzles the audience for a few moments, before sinking back into the anonymous mass. Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann,...
The Thousand and One Knights
Originally published in Catalan in 1490 and now newly translated by David H, Rosenthal, Tirant Lo Blanc is a prose masterpiece written by the Valencian nobleman Joanot Martorell and completed by Marti Joan de Galba after Martorell’s death. Written when the Catalan influence in Sicily, Rhodes, and other parts of the Mediterranean was still significant,...
Jury-Rigging
Throughout our legal history we are familiar with incidents of jury-tampering, the act of buying off or frightening one or more of the 12 men good and true called upon to decide a case. This is done to predetermine a verdict, usually to assure a “not guilty.” We have heard of vicious gangsters, corrupt union...
Arranged or Not, Marriage Is Serious Business
Nearly every Wednesday night for the past seven years I’ve watched Married at First Sight, a reality show which finds expertly matched couples meeting each other at the altar. My wife finds it inexpressibly tasteless, and two of my daughters who watched it with me, each once, expressed irritation that I made them sit through...
On Excluding Muslims
Srdja Trifkovic’s call to exclude “Mecca from America” (“To Lose a War,” American Interest, November) brings to mind Protestant-nativist attempts to “exclude Rome from America” a century ago. Dr. Trifkovic’s reasons for excluding Islam from American society can be applied to the case of pre-Vatican II Catholicism in the United States. Anti-Catholic literature often expressed...
Bumpy BRICS Road
Until a year ago it had seemed that BRICS, the association of five emerging economies—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—was morphing from a loose economic alliance into a geopolitical force willing and able to challenge the global order. Its members’ potential to do so appeared impressive: They account for three billion people (two fifths...
An Uncertain Trump
During the seemingly endless presidential campaign, Donald Trump was often both courageous and decisive, repeatedly refusing to back down from “gaffes” that were unpopular with the media because they were actually expressions of the populist nationalism that won him the White House. Since entering the White House, though, it often seems that, rather than draining...
Bill Clinton and the Ground Zero Mosque: A Perfect Fit
Former President Bill Clinton declared his strong support for the Ground Zero mosque in an interview broadcast on September 12. He also suggested a clever new spin to the promoters of the project. Much or even most of the controversy, he said, “could have been avoided, and perhaps still can be, if the people who...
Revolution
Times of crisis are not distinguished by respect for rights—although, paradoxically, all revolutions claim to be mounted in the name of rights. During our War of Independence, criticism of the patriot cause was an invitation to a lynching, and Jefferson defined the Tory as “a traitor in thought, if not in deed.” In 1773 George...
‘Brazilian Trump’ Rides Wave of Low Expectations
Jair Bolsonaro’s election to the presidency of Brazil last year provoked a media meltdown similar to Donald Trump’s victory in 2016. Just as in the U.S., journalists in Brazil and abroad predicted the “Trump of the Tropics” was akin to the second coming of Hitler, ushering in the end of democracy, revoking gay rights, and...
In Loco Parentis, Part II
My ten years of research have finally paid off. My article in the February 1991 Chronicles, “In Loco Parentis: The Brave New Family in Missouri,” has led to nationwide opposition to the Parents as Teachers (PAT) program that began here in Missouri. As a result of this article, I have been over whelmed with hundreds of...
L’Ancien Régime Book II
In the second book, Tocqueville tries to demonstrate a double thesis, which may be summarized as: 1) The centralized authoritarian regime installed by the FR represents continuity with the old regime, not a break with the past, and 2) there is, nonetheless a qualitative difference between the benevolent busybodying of ...
Christmas in Sodom
How do you celebrate Christmas in Sodom? I know—it’s not a cheery thought. And by posing the question, I run the risk of anachronism. There were over four centuries between the time when Abraham pleaded on behalf of his favorite nephew’s adopted hometown and Moses’ accounting of it in Genesis. And of course, Christmas was...
Sports and Local Sovereignty
Since 1940, the Batavia Clippers have played baseball in the lowest of the low minors, the Class A (formerly D) New York-Pennsylvania (nee PONY) League. The ballpark, Dwyer Stadium, named for the shoe store owner who served as club president for decades, is just one block from my parents’ house, so I’ve spent many hundreds...
Reflections on the Tragedy of the Hagia Sophia
In the Great Church where the holy gifts were revealed, the King of all, there came to them a voice from heaven, from the mouth of the angels: ‘Leave off your psalter, put away the holy gifts. Send word to the land of the Franks to come and take them: Let them come and take the...