Uncovering the roots of the disastrous home mortgage bubble that popped last year will keep economic historians busy for decades. Yet, one factor has so far been largely overlooked: the bipartisan social engineering crusade to drive up the rate of homeownership by handing out more mortgages to minorities. More than a negligible amount of the blame for the mortgage meltdown can be traced back to multiculturalism: government-mandated affirmative-action lending, demographic change, illegal immigration, and the mind-numbing effects of political correctness. The chickens have finally come home to roost.

For years, neocons and Beltway types have refused even to attack The American Conservative–preferring to pretend that it simply doesn’t exist. Now the Washington Monthly is going after TAC and Steve Sailer, accusing them of–you guessed it–racism for criticizing the racial nationalism of Barack Obama. Their hit piece, by a leftie who worked at TAC for a while, offers a fascinating inside glimpse of the editorial workings of the magazine. Let’s hope it boosts TAC’s subscriptions.

Why are the Arab citizens of Israel so much less homicidal toward Jews than their non-citizen cousins in the West Bank? So far, at least, Arab Israelis have not proven a dire threat, engendering few suicide bombers. By contrast, the rage of West Bank Palestinians is legendary. Here’s one important reason: the Israelis let Arab citizens keep their homes. The victorious Israelis permitted many Arabs who hunkered down in their houses during the 1947-48 fighting to stay where they were, and keep their farms. In contrast, those who fled were dispossessed. Not surprisingly, the descendents of these families, still living on their old acres, seldom go off and become terrorists.