While Gaza is being bombarded by American-made F-16’s, here’s some food for thought: During the German occupation of Greece, the occupiers posted the following rules: If any German soldier was found murdered, 10 Greeks would immediately be rounded up at random and executed; if there was a repetition, the number would go up to 100. This draconian measure was not put … [Read More]

In the The American Conservative, Dan McCarthy presents as a hero of the antiwar Right former South Dakota senator and onetime Democratic candidate for the presidency, George McGovern (1922- ). From Dan’s account, it seems that McGovern is a “temperamental conservative, an antimilitarist, and a committed decentralist,” and the GOP, by demonizing his person, has rendered itself “repellant” to “most Americans, … [Read More]

I have never liked New Year’s Eve. Americans might have voted for “change” recently, but I’ve rarely desired it, always finding the same-old, same-old to be as bright or brighter than any new horizons. As a child on New Year’s Eve, when everyone was looking toward a better new year, I was always wondering what was wrong with the last one. … [Read More]

Unwilling to control its fighters, who fired scores of missiles into Israel at the end of their six-month ceasefire, Hamas gave Israel the provocation it needed to deliver a savage blow to the Palestinian enclave in Gaza. Saturday was the bloodiest day in the history of the Palestinian people since being driven from their homes in the War of 1948. One … [Read More]

Under Consideration: The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World, by Niall Ferguson, Penguin Press (2008),  442 pages. In The Pity of War, Niall Ferguson asked a penetrating question: What would have happened had Britain remained neutral during World War I? Agree with his answer—history would probably have turned out better—or not, of one thing there can be little … [Read More]

A “Guardianista” is, in the English variant of our common language, someone who ascribes to the general viewpoints of The Guardian newspaper. It’s more than just reading it (as I do) or writing for it (as I occasionally do, they use me as their rhetorically bomb throwing rightist occasionally), it’s really buying into that pinko leftie mindset where everything America does … [Read More]

President Bush recently had perhaps his last sit-down as president with friendly movement conservative journalists (see accounts here and here) Nothing said then or in reaction since will change anyone’s mind about the man (my own included).  Nonetheless, the session is remarkable, for a number of reasons. First, Bush admits that he called the meeting in order to start building a … [Read More]

December not only marks the advent of “the Holidays” but, for America’s growing population of undergraduates, is a time of exams, papers, and NoDoz-assisted “all-nighters.” The following selections come from the final examination for “Western Heritage,” offered at the State University of New York, Oswego. The students were asked to write an essay discussing the theme of “order” in the course’s … [Read More]

It won’t come as a great shock to anyone that the current state of the financial markets shows that we’ve still quite a bit to learn about economics. While there were indeed those observers (some of them even economists!) who pointed to the housing bubble, its unsustainable nature and the oddity of funding it by borrowing back the money we’d sent … [Read More]

As we clear away all the wrapping paper and wonder how long to leave up the decorations, the deeper meaning of the season easily eludes us. So it’s good that Friday’s New York Times addressed the question that nags at the back our minds this time each year: Could “over-commercialization spoil Kwanzaa?” It’s best not to read such a sentence with … [Read More]