PERSPECTIVE The Suicide Strategy of the Westby Thomas Fleming Turkish bizarre. VIEWS The Emerging American Empireby Douglas WilsonMammon versus Allah. The Rise of Chinaby William R. HawkinsSeeing is believing. Transforming the Middle Eastby Ted Galen CarpenterWashington’s high-stakes gamble. Getting Europe Straightby Srdja TrifkovicSlouching toward Eurabia. NEWS Why Russia Does Not Fear an Iranian Bombby Wayne...
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Losing the War—February 2005
PERSPECTIVE Selling Muhammad the Ropeby Thomas Fleming Cutting off our nose . . . VIEWS War on the Home Frontby Wayne AllensworthReal homeland security. Is There a Khilafah in Your Future?by James George JatrasThe coming Islamic revolution. NEWS The Saudi Presence in the United Statesby Robert SpencerThe most lethal terror front of all? Islam: Africa’s...
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Down But Not Out
NRA “Extremism”—down but not out. A year ago the National Rifle Association’s internal politics, by tradition kept out of the public spotlight, erupted into the mainstream press. According to NRA management and Beltway spin doctors, a group of extremists on the NRA Board of Directors was trying to fire NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre...
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On Saving Private Ryan
Wayne Allensworth, in his poignant and beautifully written review of Saving Private Ryan (“The Face of Battle,” January), focuses on what is right with the film. However, I find much that is wrong, and, for me, the wrong outweighs the right. Nonetheless, Steven Spielberg makes an important contribution to the making of war movies by...
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An Historian of Imagination
Forrest McDonald, the great historian of the American founding and early Republic, passed away on January 19 at the age of 89. Born in Orange, Texas, McDonald earned his doctorate from the University of Texas-Austin in 1955, and taught at Brown University, Wayne State University (Michigan), and the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. He retired to...
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On Today’s Heroes
In “A Place to Stand” (Views, July), Wayne Allensworth asks, “How will our sons become men in the bureaucratized, risk-averse, feminist post-America our elites envision for us?” Certainly, this is a grave concern for anyone thinking clearly about our nation’s future. One can add a concern about how our daughters will become women, and how...
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Tea Party Animals—July 2010
perspective Lighting a Candleby Thomas Fleming views The Tea Party: A Mixed Bagby W. James Antle III The New American Mobby Chilton Williamson, Jr. news Democrats and Jihadists: A Love Affairby R. Cort Kirkwood reviews Who Won the Cold War?by Wayne Allensworth [David Priestland, The Red Flag: A History of Communism] Chorus Linesby Clark Stooksbury...
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To Hell and Back
“Will no one tell me what she sings? Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow / For old, unhappy far-off things. And Battles long ago.” Wordsworth, perhaps, was prompted by recollections of an age before warfare meant the mechanized destruction of all in its path. Yet war, to paraphrase an American precursor of Zhukov and Guderian, has...
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The Tory Contest Is Bad TV
“Excruciating” was the verdict on the TV debate of the five remaining candidates for the Tory leadership. They were perched on stools, like five barflies in search of a bar. I regretted the absence of a woman, though not for the standard reason. It would have been diverting to see a candidate clad in a...
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The Day of Conception
In Russia’s Ulyanovsk region, the birthplace of Lenin, the regional government has declared September 12 the “Day of Conception,” throwing in a promise of time off work for couples striving to make that day a success. Such programs have been instituted more frequently since Russian President Vladimir Putin made boosting the country’s birthrate part of...
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Bowling Alone in Columbine
Politics are over in America. Political maneuvering will go on, of course, but the old civics class view of American political life was based on a set of assumptions that are no longer operative. First, America was far more homogenous before the 1965 Immigration Act and the “New Left” political and social revolution of...
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A Crisis of the Heart and Soul: Trump’s Border Wall Address
Last night, President Donald Trump hopefully set the stage for taking measures to protect America’s borders that are long overdue. Though his brief address sometimes lapsed into the sentimental bromides realistic patriots have long grown weary of, Trump, in the end, told us what this struggle is all about. After correctly diagnosing the border crisis...
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Divided Loyalties—April 2003
PERSPECTIVE Remember From When Thou Art Fallen by Thomas Fleming Lessons from Old Europe. VIEWS
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The Real War
In a small café in Belgrade nearly 20 years ago, I had a drink with a young man named Michael. He was an architect and, like many people I met there, was no friend of the Soviet regime, which was the subject of our conversation. I had just visited the Soviet Union, passing through Belgrade...
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The Neoconservative Delusion
The Neoconservative dream of spreading “democracy” in the Middle East, a delusion wholeheartedly embraced by President George W. Bush, is rapidly becoming a nightmare. Pursuit of this utopian vision has already strengthened the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, propelled Hezbollah into the Lebanese government, and brought Hamas to power in the Palestinian Authority. In Iraq, it...
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The Con Man
“The more identities a man has, the more they express the person they conceal.” —John le Carré, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy Fifty years ago, The Spy Who Came in From the Cold completed the most successful transformation of David Cornwell’s shape-shifting life. The son of a war profiteer and con man became John le...
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American Artisan
Whenever Robert Valade embarked on a commissioned piece, or simply took his hammer and chisel to cut an exquisitely fashioned design into a gift for a friend, he first bowed his large head and prayed to God to help him finish the job right. It was a simple ritual Robert performed some 14,000 times during...
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The “Russian” Mafia in America
In October 1996, during testimony before a congressional committee, FBI Director Louis Freeh spent a good part of his time discussing international organized crime. Freeh, pointing to the FBI’s arrest of one Vyacheslav Ivankov—the reputed “godfather” of the Russian mafia who is now serving a ten-year sentence in a federal pen in New York—emphasized the...
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What Victims?
Natural Born Killers Produced by Jane Hamsher, Don Murphy, and Clayton Townsend Directed by Oliver Stone Story by Quentin Tarantino Screenplay by David Veloz, Richard Rutowski, and Oliver Stone Released by Warner Brothers The release of Oliver Stone’s new film Natural Born Killers was heralded by the sort of publicity barrage that arouses the skepticism...
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Importing Multiculturalism—June 2010
perspective Cursing the Darknessby Thomas Fleming views Immigration: A History Lessonby John Willson Cannibal Statisticsby Chilton Williamson, Jr. news Double Down: Illegal Aliens and Crimeby Roger D. McGrath reviews Great Cooptationsby W. James Antle III [Edward M. Kennedy, True Compass: A Memoir andSarah Palin, Going Rogue: An American Life] Past, Present, and Futureby Darío Fernández-Morera...
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A Crackdown On Christians
Nursultan Nazarbayev’s regime in Kazakhstan, a recipient of U.S. foreign-aid funds, is cracking down on religious groups it disapproves of, as the congregations associated with Grace Presbyterian Church discovered firsthand this past August, when the KNB (the Kazakh successor to the Soviet-era KGB) raided churches in Karaganda and Oskemen. Since then, raids, detentions of church...
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What Might Have Been
The America First Committee was part of democracy in action during one of the most terrifying times in human history. It was the leading pressure group appealing for mass support in opposition to involvement in World War II before Pearl Harbor. When America First saw the light of day in September 1940, Poland, Denmark, Norway,...
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The End of Politics
Politics are over in America. Political maneuvering will go on, of course, but the old civics-class view of American political life was based on a set of assumptions that are no longer operative. America was once far more homogenous than she is today. But the passing of the 1965 Immigration Act and the political and...
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Target: Iraq—February 2003
Perspective Imperialism From the Cradle to the Grave by Thomas Fleming Mesopotamia, the graveyard of empire. Views Our Yesterday and Your Today by Michael Stenton A tale of two empires. The Justification for War by Srdja Trifkovic It’s the oil (and the ...
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Johnny Cash, R.I.P.
John R. Cash went to his reward on September 12. His beloved wife, June, preceded the “Man in Black” in death on May 15. His friends report that Johnny Cash was at peace and ready to meet his Maker. Cash himself had calmly stated, “I don’t have long to live, now,” during his last TV...
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A Christmas Miscellany
Peter Brimelow has written a discussion of the War on Christmas for VDARE.com that is well worth reading. In it, Peter puts me in the unusual role of optimist. There are still many people in this country who want to suppress the public celebration of Christmas, and the situation in the schools, where culture is formed...
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Silver or Lead: The Reverse Assimilation of the Southwest
Texas attorney general and gubernatorial candidate Greg Abbot committed what is commonly called a political gaffe earlier this year when he said what every thinking person this side of the Rio Grande already knew: Mass immigration from Mexico means the importation of Mexican corruption and the steady erosion of law and social trust that too...
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Preaching to a Strange Nation
“Receive me, then, O Lord and lover of Mankind, even as the harlot, as the robber, as the publican, as the prodigal . . . “ —The Prayer of St. Basil the Great The Law on Religion passed this year by the Russian State Duma restricts the activities of “non-traditional” religions...
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The Economic Impact of Immigration
I stopped paying attention to Time many years ago. My twin brother and I, already plotting our emigration to the United States, subscribed as college students in England in the 1960’s to get some sense of this world-straddling “indispensable nation”—as Clinton administration Secretary of State Madeleine Albright later called it, possibly not for our reasons—and also...
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The Bubble Economy
“Why,” Sheila Ramus asked, “if there are so many pro-lifers here, does Rockford have an abortion clinic?” Sheila, my wife and I, and our pastor, Fr. Brian Bovee, were waiting to check in at Rockford’s annual Pro-Life Banquet. An hour before the dinner was scheduled to begin, the Holy Family ...
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Georgians In Londonistan
In February, when 52-year-old Georgian billionaire and political exile Badri Patarkatsishvili died at his Surrey mansion, British media wondered if this might be a Georgian version of the Litvinenko affair. Patarkatsishvili had been a supporter of President Mikheil Saakashvili’s 2003 “Rose Revolution” but had lately been in opposition to the Georgian president, running against him...
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Those Deadly, Depressing, Syncopated Semiautomatic Assault Rifle Blues
An Exercise in Calculated Hysteria The semiautomatic rifle has been part of the American scene for nearly a century. In 1903 the Winchester Repeating Arms Company marketed the first commercially successful semiautomatic rifle. It was not designed as a military arm, and no sales were made to the US Army. The new rifle was marketed...
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Peace in the Promised Land
Almost three years have passed since the unseasonably warm day in June 2002 when a number of the authors who have contributed to this issue of Chronicles met near O’Hare Airport to sketch out one of the most ambitious projects that we at The Rockford Institute have ever undertaken. We approached the project with a...
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You Had One Job
Our southern border is being overwhelmed by waves of “migrants” and interior immigration enforcement has collapsed, as the president continues to threaten closing the border. Trump has made plenty of threats before, threats about halting the “caravans,” making Mexico pay for a border wall, forcing “migrants” to wait in Mexico, and refusing to sign any...
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America: From Village to Empire—October 2004
PERSPECTIVE The Call of Bloodby Thomas Fleming Old Europe versus the New World Order. VIEWS There Once Was a New Englandby John WillsonTimothy Dwight’s New England catechism. Tocqueville’s America and America Todayby Claude PolinLiberty, Equality, Materialism. NEWS H.R. 3313 and the Imperial Judiciaryby William J. QuirkA welcome constitutional crisis. What? Are You Crazy?by B.K. EakmanThe...
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Managed Democracy
Russia’s parliamentary elections, held December 7, produced a wave of alarmed reactions in the Western press that betray the ignorance and hypocrisy of Western elite thinking regarding Russia and the West’s—particularly Washington’s—relations with Moscow. The Kremlin-backed United Russia party carried the day, winning nearly 38 percent of the vote, while other Kremlin-backed—or created—parties (the Liberal...
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Obama’s Manufactured Border Crisis
This summer’s border crisis—the near total collapse of any controls or security at our southern border, especially in South Texas—was manufactured by the Obama administration as a means of forcing through a mass amnesty, either via Congress or by executive fiat. Legalizing millions of illegal aliens now resident in these United States is the immediate...
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The Rise and Fall of the Evangelical Elite
The current evangelical elite came of age at a time when secular influences tried to stay neutral toward Christianity; The faith competed as an equal in the marketplace of ideas. But those days are over. In our age of secularist hostility, evangelicals need new tactics.
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The Face of Battle
Saving Private Ryan Produced by Steven Spielberg Directed by Steven Spielberg Screenplay by Robert Rodat Released by Paramount and DreamWorks SKG If you visit the American cemeteries near the beaches at Normandy—there are two of them—you may pick up a booklet describing the landings of June 6, 1944, as I did over 15 years ago....
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American Babel
Back in June, a belligerent New York City attorney briefly became a symbol of “xenophobia” for those who make it their business to deconstruct what’s left of American identity. Viral video of his tirade in a restaurant over staff speaking to customers in Spanish served as but the latest example of what the media portray...
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We Happy Few
Regarding Jeff Minick’s April 2019 article, “Happy Warriors:” The reason the Left is winning is because they actually fight for their side in the culture war while the Right does not. And since, as the saying goes, politics is downstream of culture, the winner of the culture war is going to dominate the political system....
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Something Big
We passed the hand warmer around on a cold day in December. Matthew, my 11-year-old son, got creative and stuck the thing in his shoe. Rachel, who was spotting for us, didn’t like it much, but she used the hand warmer anyway. It was that cold; our fingers and toes burned. I look through the...
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The Little People
Dunkirk Produced and distributed by Warner Brothers Written and directed by Christopher Nolan Chuck Produced by Millennium Films Distributed by IFC Films Written by Jeff Feuerzeig and Jerry Stahl Directed by Philippe Falardeau You wouldn’t think a director who’s made three extravagantly fanciful Batman movies would be interested in turning his hand to a realistic...
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Sterile Prairie
“Look how wide also the east is from the west: so far hath he set our sins from us.” —Psalm 103 It has been said that an intellectual is someone who can listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger. But the life of the mind hardly requires that William and...
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Think Locally, Act Locally
The reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last June in Kelo v. City of New London has largely been edifying. Most commentators, and even many politicians, have greeted with horror the news that local and state governments are free to take property from one private owner to give it to another, as long as...
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Against the Barbarians
The 21st century is a return to the Age of Walls. As historian and archeologist David Frye writes in his important new book, Walls: A History of Civilization in Blood and Brick, few have noticed that a new era of wall building is now upon us, driven by mass migration and Islamic terrorism. While the...
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Firing the Government
Vladimir Putin’s surprise firing of the Russian government on February 24 and his appointment of “technocratic” Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov on March 1 had Western officials and observers buzzing about another round of “reform” and Russian cooperation with the West, while Western investors were optimistic that the new government would favor them. Nevertheless, Washington should...
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An American Tragedy
American Sniper has generated more commentary, both scathingly critical and laudatory, than any film in recent memory. The story of “America’s deadliest sniper,” Texas-born and -bred Navy SEAL Chris Kyle (credited with more than 160 “confirmed” kills), himself shot down in 2013 by a disturbed war veteran he was trying to help, has become a...
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Sources of Contention
Cultural symbols are sources of contention everywhere. In Russia, a squabble over a monument rings a bell with this proud Southerner. The powerful Communist (CPRF) faction in the Duma recently raised the question of returning “Iron Feliks” Dzerzhinsky, the Soviet Unions first secret policeman, to his pedestal facing the Lubyanka, the one-time home of the...
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Talking Facts: The New Anti-Semitism
In October 1992 Commentary printed an “observation” by David Glasner, “Hayek and the Conservatives,” which abounded in glaring disinformation. The pictures there given of the America First movement as a rallying point for anti-Semitic kooks and of the Old Right as a collection of bigoted psychopaths, pending the arrival of the neoconservatives and their Hayekian...