Category: Imported

Western writers as an intellectual “heavy dragoon” (“take allnthe remarkable people in history / rattle them off to anpopular tune”): the joint incarnation of Shakespeare and St.nJohn of the Cross, with a little Montesquieu thrown in fornseasoning.nReading Russian literature only in translation, I havenfailed to discover the qualities that are supposed to elevate itnabove the...

and manufacturer, as a fight for a sound,n• wholesome, economic national life. … It is a fightnfor clean politics and for free government. Whennyou have destroyed small business, you havendestroyed our towns and our country life, and younhave guaranteed and made permanent thenconcentration of economic power. . . . Thenconcentration of wealth always leads, and...

institutions of self-government, they have remained innhiding. For all I or most Americans might know, thensoundest elements may be loyal military men and CommunistnParty stalwarts in the bureaucracy — people who shownup for work in the morning and know how to take orders.nThese are the so-called “conservatives” that Americannjournalists are fond of deploring, if only...

being served by Red hands. The ideologists of thisnmovement were adherents of such conservativenthinkers as Konstantin Leontiev and Joseph denMaistre. They accepted bolshevism because thenidea of liberty, so crucial to the left-wingnintelligentsia, was a secondary matter to them.n”There is no need to be finicky about this,” Enoch Powellnmuses. “People who find it surprising and inconsistent...

don’t know what we have found. 4. If we figure outnwhat it is, there’s nothing we can do about it. Inneach case, the “it” is an SS-20, the fundamentalnSoviet system constrained by the treaty.nIn other words, the assertion that the INF treaty isnenforceable by the American side is as meaningless as thenproverbial medieval calculation of...

than the seed coat’s ingredients, and usually after it hadnalready been changed. While Western observers were stillnreiterating the “changing landmarks” platitudes of de factonSoviet agents about the “Reds,” lo and behold, “RednRussia” returned to “capitalism.” While they talked of then”future of Communism after the death of Lenin,” in camenStalin and unveiled a comprehensive program for...

there were 143 registered private publishing houses and 35nregistered periodicals, most of them privately owned),nunderstands full well that only a military deterrent in thenhands of nations and individuals is an obstacle to globalnexpansion. The rest is more or less a fiction, and consequentlynsomething to which the attention of democraciesnThat even under totalitarian controlnindividuals are likely...

individuals are likely to misperceive the regime’s tacticalnconcessions to them for their own impact upon the regime’snstrategy is not surprising, since the same misperceptionsndominate the pages of the West’s “quality newspapers” innthe absence of such control. In rare cases, the control isntaken for granted, as for instance in the pages of SergeinGrigoryants’ dissident magazine Glasnost,...

enforcing the command economy.nGorbachev received the Nobel Prize for events in EasternnEurope, which were real, but unintended from Gorbachev’snstandpoint. His strategy was to replace shaky Communistsnwith younger ones like himself whom he assumed would benmore popular and more capable of saving socialism. Unfortunatelynfor him, the KGB did not tell him just hownvulnerable the entire communist...

always lagging six months behind.” But far more sensiblenpeople also developed a faith, if not in Gorbachev himself,nthen in his reformist intentions.nAt a time when the Soviet economy is dead in the water,nwhen a majority of its republics are seeking their freedomnfrom the Kremlin, former Prime Minister Thatcher told anWashington audience on March 8:nWe should...

reformer. But Lukacs writes ofnChurchill with real understanding andna warm sympathy, as he does of thenBritish and West European milieu innwhich Churchill worked. He remindsnus that Churchill, for much of the 20’snand 30’s, was generally regarded as anhas-been and widely distrusted as anmaverick, or even a nut. His few admirersnand supporters were an equallynunpopular fringe...

war; the war waged by the aged andncorrupt British and French empiresnagainst Germany and the inclination ofnRoosevelt and others to side with thenformer. A very frequent element in thisnkind of thinking was anti-Communism.”nLukacs notes that Joseph P.nKennedy’s so-called isolationism, innparticular, was based on his anticommunism.nThere are more errors, here, thanncan be analyzed properly in a...

wulf,'” he recalls telling her. “‘Boy, Inam your English teacher, and I’ventaught you better than this. How darenyou talk to me with ‘I ain’t’ this and ‘Inain’t’ that. . . . You know what reallyntakes guts? Refusing to lower yournstandards to those of the dumbncrowd.'”nHe did refuse, and so advanced to ansegregated college, where he...

Rowan says he replied. (“What a pity,”nhe writes of LBJ in a rare meditativenmoment. “A man so great in so manynways, and so mean and petty innothers.” By contrast, Adlai Stevenson,nwho refused Rowan a car and drivernduring the latter’s brief stint at thenUnited Nations, was well-meaning butnunfit to be President for the unfortunatenif plausible reason...

famous witticism — one that marked ansea cliange of style and performancenpractice. Elman attended the CarnegienHall debut of Jascha Heifetz (Octobern27, 1917) in the company of the eminentnpianist Leopold Godowsky; andnwhen Elman remarked “Isn’t it awfullynhot in this hall?” Godowsky replied,n”Not for pianists.” The humor of thatnanecdote has masked its reality; and in ansense, there...

Letter FromnCalifornianby Jay KinneynSoviet Agitprop ImplodesnThough it gets harder to remembernwith every passing day, one of thenlong-established premises of the recentlynended Cold War was the notion thatnboth the Soviet Union and the U.S.A.nwere engaged in an ideological battle fornthe minds and souls of the worid’snpopulation. In line with this the Westnused powerful transmitters to beam...

sudden terror that I might be forced tonqueue up for six hours only to be toldnthat bread was unavailable, I tried toncatch the eye of one of the women innorder to make a quick inquiry aboutnNew Times. I should have known better.nAfter ten minutes of waiting nearnthe cash register, I was told that theynwere, of...

up to? This stuff only made sense asnpropaganda if the intended themesnwere talking up capitalism and castingnthe Soviet Union as a backwater hasbeen.nThe only overt suasion I couldnidentify was a tendency to rattle onnabout “Our Common EuropeannHome,” in an obvious Soviet effort toncourt favor with Western Europe.nTo be honest, I was rather charmednby New Times’...

Letter From thenLower Rightnby John Shelton ReednCardinal SinsnAfter sharing my ill-informed impressionsnof California with you last month,nI should probably just let it be. After all,nonly fools think they understand thenSouth after a few months, and I presumenthe same is true for California.nBut expatriation here in the SpandexnState seems to have dried me up on thensubject...

direction, a group of software engineersnand aging hippies get together tonsing the old Primitive Baptist shapenotenmusic. There are weekend subculturesnof witches, nudists, skateboarders,nand owners of Amiga computers—neach with its own computernbulletin board.nThose of us whose development wasnarrested in the 50’s can listen tonKOFY, 1050 AM, a radio station thatnplays only songs from that era. (Onenlistener...

had sailed the Indian Ocean and evennreached Africa and the Persian Gulfnwere scrapped. The industrious (andnindustrializing) Europeans who reopenednChina were called “barbarians”nby a decadent court.nIn India, regard for individualnachievement was also low, reserved fornleaders in religion or philosophy. Thosenin the West who were motivated bynscience, personal gain, national ambition,nand the quest for glory (usuallynseen as...

POLITICSnEZ Livingnby Jeffrey A. TuckernEnterprise Zones and thenWelfare StatenEnterprise zones have been a pillarnof the Republican antipovertynagenda for at least twelve years. Butntoday enterprise zones (EZs) representnlittle more than government welfare bynanother name. As such, they symbolizena general Republican ideological declinenfrom free-market conservatism tonbig-government welfarism.nOriginally, the idea was to use freemarketnforces, not subsidies, to mitigateninner-city...

ployee insurance costs (New Jersey)nand even oflFers free child care (Kansas).nIt’s easy to see how these subsidies willn”reduce unemployment.”nNearly all states with an EZ plannoffer business loans at below-marketninterest rates. Some grant 15-year interest-freenloans (Florida), and some offerna “guarantee” against business failure sonthat businesses can operate in the rednindefinitely (Maryland). That’s a quicknway to boost...

ice support,” including “provisions ofnsupporting public facilities and infrastructurenimprovements.”nThis bill will only bolster the worstnhabit of state governments: spendingntax dollars on favored interest groups.nThese subsidies are paid for by taxpayersnoutside the state by launderingnthem through various federal grantgivingnagencies. But why should thengovernment loot taxpayers so corporationsncan go on the public dole in theninner city? This...

corpses all told. It brings out the best innus.” Rosencrantz counts them up, andnsays, “Six!” and the player glares atnthem and insists, “Eight.”nThey don’t know that he’s talkingnabout them. They don’t know, can’tnknow, anything. Indeed, one of thensublime elegances of this film is itsnrepresentation of stupidity, of amazingninvincible ignorance, over and overnagain. It is the...

humane feeling. The comedy dazzlesnall the more brightly for its woeful cast,nas it did with Keaton and Chaplin, as itndid with Jacques Tati. The undergraduatensend-up of this monstrous culturalnicon, which is what Stoppard begannwith in his original one-act burlesque,nhas deepened and darkened, has become,nitself, a more than respectablensuccess (with a Tony and a New YorknDrama...

transactionnNew and Recent Books on Family and PolicynThenSwedishnExperimentnin FamilynPoliticsnAllannCarlsonnr^nThe,. .npoliticsnHumannfeaturenThomas FlemingnFamilynQu^tjpiisnIk • -3^?/.nReflectiDns on thenAmerican Social CrisisnAllan C. CarlsonnTHE SWEDISH EXPERIMENT INnFAMILY POLITICSnTHE MYRDALS AND THE INTERWAR POPULATION CRISISnAllan CarlsonnThis devastating account of the work of Gunnar and Alva Myrdal portraysnhow two young scholars used the power of ideas to help engineer a newndomestic order...

1 U-A’f Mni’l .,-••”ifvrtlFnI.IIEIIMLnfiunilyninvestmentn• 2 massive volumes — eachnbook weighs over 4npounds!n• 2,226 oversized 7 x WAnpagesn>• Tough binding to lastnseveral lifetimes of heavynusen*• Stamped in goldn• Extra! 4 beautiful endpapernmaps in colornV>NSd:9SnijcnletnCT^ivVn.«9:nHow the Chib WoiksnEvery 4 weeks (13 times a year) you get a free copy of the Qub Bulletin, which offers younthe Featured...

EDITORnThomas FlemingnMANAGING EDITORnKatherine DaltonnSENIOR EDITOR, BOOKSnChilton Williamson, Jr.nASSISTANT EDITORnTheodore PappasnART DIRECTORnAnna Mycek-‘WodeckinCONTRIBUTING EDITORSn]ohn W. Aldridge, Harold O.J.nBrown, Samuel Francis, GeorgenGarrett, Russell Kirk, E. ChristiannKopff, Clyde WilsonnCORRESPONDING EDITORSnJanet Scott Barlow, Odie Faulk,nJane Greer, John Shelton Reed,nGary VasilashnEDITORIAL SECRETARYnLeann DobbsnPUBLISHERnAllan C. CarlsonnASSOCIATE PUBLISHERnMichael WardernPUBLICATION DIRECTORnGuy C. ReffettnCOMPOSITION MANAGERnAnita FedoranCIRCULATION MANAGERnRochelle FranknA publication of The Rockford Institute.nEditorial and...

so. But in addition to being an economicnflush whose value you consistentlynunderappreciate, this tidal flownreflects a force of human spirit sonpowerful that bedrock conservatives, ofnall people, ought to be daunted by thenprospect of outrightly resisting it.n— Tim W. FergusonnHermosa Beach, CAnOn ‘History’nForrest McDonald’s “On the Study ofnHistory” (February 1991) was stimulating.nHis quick survey of our...

As THE SHOCK OF Americanncluster bombs and the distinctive rumblenof Abrams tanks fade from thenArabian nights, we world-citizens mustnbegin to sort through the events of thenlast eight months. Many lessons couldnbe drawn. Allow me to suggest two.nFirst, it seemed clear by the sixthnweek of open combat that Americannconservatives had succeeded in onentask beyond their wildest...

around. Before the New World Ordernhere in the United States we had thenNew Age, which was OK, but therenwasn’t enough order in it. That’s overnnow. Throughout history there werenmany attempts at New Order. Therenwas Hitler’s New Order, there wasnNixon’s Law & Order, there wasnNovus Ordo Seclorum — that we stillnhave, it’s on the dollar bill...

lesbianism (no troublesome pregnancies,nno abortions, no children, and nonAIDS). Perhaps the only thing wrongnwith this vision is that in a few scorenyears, if adhered to, it would mean nonpeople. This might seem unfortunate,nbut at least it would leave the environmentnto proceed on its way untroublednby human manipulation, and thusnachieve one of the goals of ourn”greens”...

THE ARTS OF LYINGn’ “^’W-V^’nLying is a fine art. But there is also the art of teUing the truth. In an agenwhen Arthur Schlesinger Jr. counts as a major historian, and Philip Roth isna literary giant, Chronicles is for its readers a real alternative.nThis monthly “magazine of American culture” offers essays by George Garrett,nJames Stockdale,...

^ ^ T n the government of Virginia,” said John Randolph innX 1830, “we can’t take a step without breaking our shinsnover some Federal obstacle.” Randolph’s metaphor was anminor exaggeration 160 years ago; today, it would be a grossnunderstatement, because today that federal obstacle hasnbeen erected so high, so deep, so strong, that we can...

between Ronald Hamowy and William Buckley on theninfluence of National Review, as well as article after articlenby competent scholars honestly coming to grips with thenreality of the New Deal revolution.nThe richness and variety of the right in those days isnastonishing. What is especially striking is the absence of anparty line that could keep out serious...

have no ready answers. What I do know is that we neednmore, not less discussion from journalists and scholars whosenchecks are not signed in Tokyo or Seoul. In the not distantnfuture, we hope, these discussions.will lead to the formationnof a new political coalition that will not be content withnslowing the federal government’s rate of growth;...

The VengefulnWe deem it meet and orthodoxnto store our hearts in Reynolds wrap,nto hunt the cow, to milk the fox,nto think of anger as a map.nThe end of life is commonplace;nwe stack our weapons in the hall.nWe dress for love as outer space.nOur saint is Simon Wiesenthal.nWe sleep awake, we dance The Torque,nOur eyes are...

the enhancement of economic opportunity through onenkind or another of social engineering (enterprise zones, fornexample) and the establishment of an ethic that regardsnequality (usually disguised as “equality of opportunity”),neconomic mobility, affluence; and-material- gratification asnthe central meaning of what their exponents often call “thenAmerican experiment.”nSuch goals are not conceptually distinct from those of thenProgressivism and liberalism...

function and occupational calling in the new order was tondelegitimize the ideas and institutions of conservatism andnprovide legitimization for the new regime, and its power andnrewards as a class depended upon the very bureaucratizedncultural organizations that conservatives attacked. Only ifnconservatism were “renovated” to the point that it no longernrejected the cultural apparatus of the revolution...

the grounds of anticommunism. The war itself was a resultnof misconceived liberal policies and was effectively lost bynliberal mismanagement, and there was no good reason fornthe right (even the anticommunist right) to support it. Yet, asnthe New Left mounted an attack on the war and broadenednthe attack to include the bureaucratized university and partsnof the...

DONALD DEVINEnAsking what is wrong with the conservative coalition isnputting last things first. There cannot be a coalitionnunless there is something around which it coalesces. Andnthere is no “there” there for a conservative coalition.nThere is no center. Yes, there are millions who holdnconservative values, and there are scores of organizations,nperhaps hundreds. But there is no...

blasphemies, still smoking with sufferings and crimes.”nAmes was not alone in his fears. Burke in Englandnreacted the same way. The French’ Revolution probablyncreated more misanthropes than any other event in history.nIn other bloodbaths the evildoers have been exotic foreignnmarauders or nations within nations — Huns, Bolsheviks,nNazis, Khmer Rouge—but in the France of the Terror theynwere...

country. I am no Atlas, and my shoulders ache.”nIn the end, he seemed to adopt a broader misanthropynextending beyond American politics to the entire race ofnmankind: “Indeed I consider the whole civilized world asnmetal thrown back into the furnace, to be melted overnagain.”nMost people know that John Adams and Thomas Jeffersonnboth died at a ripe...

is to women. When women are defined as helpless, whennthey are treated as if they are helpless, when they go alongnwith the charade and pretend to be helpless, they eventuallynbecome helpless. One would expect feminists, of all people,nto grasp this simple analogy, but like most free Americanncitizens nowadays, they go along to get along, and...

simply grumble in private until they wake up one morningnand find that Afro Ed has become a required course in everynschool in America, and nobody will know how it happened.nHatred of truth is misanthropy in the fullest sense becausenit denotes a hatred of the human spirit at its most noble. ThenAlice-in-Wonderland insistence of IQ-test innovators...

raison d’etre.” And: “[Nothing] innStimson’s long experience — from thenaffair of General Ainsworth by way ofnthe Versailles Treaty and the foreignnpolicy of the Hoover administration tonhis own recent confirmation hearingsn[at which the Senate isolationists hadngiven him a rough time] — [had] imbuednhim with any very high regard fornCongress’s prerogatives in foreign affairs.”nHenry Stimson was a...

polity of American government—werenhistorically “inevitable.” Yet man doesnnot live by concepts of inevitability, andnAmerican isolationists in the interwarnperiod especially ought not to be faultednfor their fears and reservations based,nperhaps, for the most part on a perceptionnof historical forces they recognizednonly dimly. Certainly they do not deserventhe obloquy heaped on them bynColonel Stimson when he wrote...

place for himself.nHe saw Japan from the inside, allnright: the inside of an imperial jailhouse,nwhere for seven months he wasninsistently but gently interrogated bynofficers of the Tokugawa shogunate,nthe dynasty that had ruled Japan sincen1600 and that would endure but angeneration more. Satisfied that he wasnnot a spy, the shogun’s agents in timenreleased McDonald, returning him...

awesome a statement as it might seem.nMost of the variants, as the differingnreadings are known, were quite minornand unimportant. Some of the variationnwas due to differences in scholarlynmethods or in competence, some tondenominational diversity, some to thenwar between religious liberals and religiousnconservatives. In the course ofnthe past generation, however, a coupntook place. There are now...