Well, it’s been a hell of a summer. Pestilence, economic destruction, bitter partisanship, and now, the politicians descend from their lairs to commence the quadrennial feeding season. It puts me in mind of Merle Haggard’s old standard: “If we can make it through December/ Everything’s gonna be alright.” I’ve been reading a lot, which means …
I guess before you read the rest of this you should decide how you feel about the fact that I didn’t vote for either of them. Nor did I vote for the Libertarian, or the lady who makes Bernie Sanders look like Milton Friedman and whose name I’ve already forgotten. I voted in every other …
Look, maybe it’s time we cash in our chips. Blow this popsicle stand and buy that cabin in the hills we’ve always talked about. Sink a well, set out the rabbit traps, and settle in for a long-ass winter. Don’t get me wrong—our republic has had a fine run. Not so long as some of …
On the radio I heard a shill for some agglomeration of sugary drink manufacturers inveigh against NYC mayor Bloomberg’s attempted regulation of soda sizes. “We believe New Yorkers are smart enough to make these decisions for themselves,” he said. If you’ve been to New York, if you’ve been to America, then you might be tempted …
There is a difference between being anti-intellectual and being anti-intellect, and this is where Russell Jacoby foundered, in his essay last year about the lack of intellectualism among conservatives. As Peter Lawler notes, it’s shoddily done for want of defining terms, which is a frequent flaw in Chronicle of Higher Ed essays about conservatism. There …
Look, it’s not the end of the world, or America, or really much of anything. In fact, it could become the beginning of something. Here are eight reasons you should take heart from what you consider last night’s loss. 1. Congressional Majorities: Understand the bullet you dodged. The president’s party tends to lose seats in …
Hey you. Yes, you, the one poring over push-poll numbers and wondering how you can get more smug college kids to accost people with clipboards in swing districts. We are ten weeks from The Most Critical Election in the History of America, and you are lollygagging to first base. There are mid-level HR hacks in …
In the closing hours the advertisements are redoubled; we see the candidates peddling their functional families, juxtaposed with a grim gallery of closed factories and soup lines and dead children, for which the fresh-faced candidates’ grainy-faced opponents are responsible, either in the past or the future or both. We are urged to vote, because this …
I read once that the historian’s admiration for authority affects his assessments of civilizations past — that oppressive regimes, with their monuments to state power, will draw his eye and his imagination more readily than a nation of citizen farmers. That’s probably true for most people; we can’t help but watch the parade’s prancing exhibition of the …
On a long drive through red-state country yesterday I decided to listen to talk radio. I heard Rush Limbaugh mock the First Lady, in his extended rant about her lobbying Olympic officials to place the 2016 games in Chicago, because she said sports can give children a sense of what they can accomplish, that they …
I don’t know when or how the American experiment will end, but I am fairly certain that the dread day will find most of us texting or carrying about signs or otherwise expressing our deeply felt, ill-reasoned, poorly articulated opinions about it. This nationwide bout of narcissistic expression began, I am certain, with the first …
I can’t abide people who are already salivating at the prospect of Obama’s failure, who are convinced that he is a godless Marxist with a secret plan to steal our guns, open our borders, and make us all work like slaves on wind-energy farms while turning our daughters into lesbians with kindergarten sex-education seminars. The reality is that …
It appears that Republican control of the Senate now turns on Conrad Burns in Montana, and George Allen in Virginia. I have an image of a desperate Snow White, perhaps not so snowy white any more, pinning her hopes for rescue on Sleepy and Dopey. In the House, meanwhile, a host of feckless rulers was …
Last month we got a letter from an organization that calls itself “People to People International.” They were writing to invite our daughter to attend, at our expense, be sure, an educational experience in Australia. The letter assured us that “Caroline has been named for this honor by a teacher, former Student Ambassador or national …
