The region of France with the oldest claim to civilization is Provence, whose Mediterranean coast was honeycombed with Greek colonies as early as 600 B.C., of which the most important was Massalia (later Marseilles). The Hellenes brought with them the written alphabet, diverse and (ahem!) innovative sexual practices, philosophical discourse, and the art of making wine. Since these are precisely the … [Read More]

The mother of my children rang me from Deauville and for probably the first time in her life asked me to retract something I had written. It was about Pal Sarkozy’s wife, Christine de Ganay, whom I described last week as the worst of a bad bunch. Well, I’m not exactly pussy-whipped, but Alexandra does have a point. I mixed up … [Read More]

The New York Times’ firing of Judith Miller, allegedly for bad reporting, served the same purpose as the paper’s daily “Corrections” column: It suggested that everything else in the newspaper of record is pretty bloody good. It isn’t of course. Manufacture of news, faithful service on behalf of powerful interests, editorializing masquerading as reporting, mischievous misinterpretations and double standards pepper the … [Read More]

A recent exchange held on WDAY’s Hot Talk with Scott Hennan between Serb journalist and author of Sword of the Prophet, Srdja Trifkovic and best-selling neocon celebrity Dinesh D’Souza underscores the silliness of what today passes for high-toned political discussion. In a widely discussed book, The Enemy Within (Doubleday, January 2007), D’Souza, a John M. Olin Scholar at American Enterprise Institute,” … [Read More]

Let me tell you a sad tale of Russian politics. In July, 1990 I attended a conference in Prague on the emerging democracies in the former Soviet orbit. Most of the speakers told the audience that the Soviet Union would live forever; but that it would lose Eastern Europe. When I got up to speak, having been there since 1989 and … [Read More]

The Feast of Pentecost is one of the most important to Christians, for a number of reasons. First, it marks the birthday of the Church, the day when the Holy Spirit came down on the Apostles and Mary, and gave everyone the nerve they needed to preach the risen Christ to a hostile mob.   Pentecost also reverses the story of … [Read More]

The funny thing about Sarkozy being president of France is not his size, but his family. His father, Pal Sarkozy, used to frequent the same nightclubs I did back in the early Sixties. Of the beau monde he was not. Pal was rather sleazy, a bit of a conman, and something of a playboy. None of us knew what he did, … [Read More]

Perhaps Baby Boomers were earmarked to shrug off tradition in order to do away with the restraints that had sidelined many Americans for centuries. For all one knows though, it could it be that that remarkable epoch of the 20th Century, known as the 1960s, was merely one of many infinite calls to the man, if there is one, running the … [Read More]

The attempt by Congressman Ron Paul of Texas to discuss what happened and why—to account for the 9/11 terrorist attacks—is an enormous breakthrough on the American political landscape. The incident occurred during last week’s Republican “debate” among Presidential hopefuls and was aired live on Fox News from Columbia, South Carolina. This may be the first time that the subject has been … [Read More]

I’ve already briefly mentioned my recent trip to West Point for the funeral of Timothy J. Vogel, one of America’s greatest warriors. Tim meant a lot to me, so please forgive me if I repeat myself a little. Before I go on, however, a brief and nostalgic look at the soldiers of another war and their representations in celluloid. The film … [Read More]