SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS—It’s good to be in Texas. To a European like me, Texas is why we came to America. It’s a huge state, but more important, it’s a state of mind. It is a fount of freedom and imagination. For most of the inhabitants of America’s two coasts, Texas is worse than flyover country. Texas represents everything they hate about … [Read More]

NEW YORK—At an outdoor luncheon party in Sussex celebrating Willy Shawcross’s birthday some years ago, I asked his then 95-year-old father whom did he find the most interesting man at Nuremberg. “Goring,” was the monosyllabic reply. “I mean from both sides,” I said. “Goring,” said Lord Shawcross. He later told me how the Nazi would catch the American prosecutor Jackson in … [Read More]

Viva Mexico! Never mind the H1N1 or La Familia Michoacana. There’s more to Mexico than swine flu and drug trafficking, though I never realized it until I traveled to Mexico City for my cousin’s wedding last weekend. Obviously it is hard to ignore the poverty and corruption, especially when cops jack your wallet on the way down to Baja.  On the … [Read More]

NEW YORK—One felt the backlash against the BNP–BBC fiasco all the way to the Big Bagel, with local papers commenting on the lynching of Nick Griffin by rent-a-crowd minorities. Even people who think England is in Canada heard about it and called the freak show unfair and stage-managed, confirming the perception that Britain is a nation that has totally lost its … [Read More]

NEW YORK—Something’s bothering me about the Polanski business. No, unlike Harvey Weinstein and Bernard-Henri Lévy—not to mention that Mitterrand paedophile—I will not defend Roman’s actions with a 13-year-old, but I will say that, with friends like his making fools of themselves defending him, it will be a miracle if he gets off with a slap on the wrist. Although this may … [Read More]

NEW YORK-They found this place 400 years ago this year among the Indians in the marches, and no one’s looked back since. Some of the Dutch descendants are still around but you wouldn’t know it by reading the gossip columns or celebrity blogs. This is immigrant paradise, and the less European one looks and sounds the better. It’s the nominally post-racial … [Read More]

NEW YORK–Cement barriers, stanchions, cop cars, motorcycles, black SUV’s, flashing lights, bullhorn warnings to move to the side or else, mean-looking dudes in dark suits, dark glasses and talking into their cufflinks, a hobbit named Sarkozy jogging in Central Park to the exclusion of the rest of us, African dictator kleptocrats emptying jewelry shops on Fifth Avenue, Netanyahu walking down Park … [Read More]

New York—Irving Kristol who died last week was generally seen as the father of neoconservatism, a non-existent concept in Europe where we’re steeped into more traditional and less opportunistic politics. I once sat with him at a dinner in honour of William Buckley given by Drue Heintz in her east side townhouse. We were four, Kristol and his wife, Teresa Manners, … [Read More]

Nowadays, “art” is a rather broad concept, whereby almost anything is considered art so long as someone considers it art. While some of the more famous living artists are certainly talented, their work often seems more inspired by the puerile desire to shock, and earn a quick buck, than the higher creative impulses. And for those who have apprehensions when it … [Read More]

There is a mordant Eskimo proverb that says a good butler is worth at least three wives. The only trouble being I’ve never heard of an Eskimo with a butler. Gianni Agnelli had two he couldn’t do without: Pasquale, until he reached 40, and then Bruno, until the “avvocato’s” death. I inherited mine from the Agnelli household. His name is Andrew … [Read More]