Category: Imported

In the European case, however, the peasantry’s conservatismnwas overshadowed by the more visible aristocracy.nSocial classes in America were in contention, but, unlikenEurope, the nascent American aristocracy was easily vanquished,nleaving only the national bourgeoisie and thenprovincial commons as the contending forces.nAmerican conservative localistic forces are often transmogrifiedninto radical progressive forces. There should benno confusion here: The...

explicitly rejected.nThe third dogma central to conservatism is the complexitynthesis, the center of conservative epistemology. Abstractnrationalism and all arrogant attempts to use rational modelsnof human and social behavior to construct political andnsocial institutions are inherently based on a most imperfectnunderstanding of extremely complex systems. All socialnprojects must be approached with difiFidence and constructednby slow adaptation...

32 / CHRONICLESnistic systems embodied in the empirical causal logic of thenmodern scholarly humanistic disciplines, hi other words, ifneven the sciences themselves no longer insist on a causalnmechanism for events (and its attendant rules of objectivenand positivistic empirical evidence), then it is high time thensocial, historical, and humane studies reevaluated theirnscholarly methods. The indeterminacy of...

not atypical; the narrative and dramatic arts are full of thisnsort of thing, and Erving Goffman and Thomas Scheff,namong others, have provided close analysis of it. Nownimagine it extended to the billions of dyadic relationships innthe human world, and the trillions of larger group relationships.nNor are such strategies unique to intimate relationships.nOne could easily demonstrate...

34 / CHRONICLESnresultant and living history of a cosmic evolution whichnpitted many forms of reflection against each other; thenmarvelous cooperation of nature is a prudent and subtlenform of mutual feedback. Even so, when we find we cannreduce another organism to a successfully testable set ofnlaws and predictions, it is a sign that we are dealing...

some of the criticisms we leveled earlier at history and thensocial “sciences.”nBut in doing so it abdicates that very activity—holisticnunderstanding and the enrichment of the world byninterpretation—that characterizes the human Umwelt itself.nThe admonition not to totalize is the most totalitarianncommand of all, since it essentially dehumanizes history.nThe feedback process of human culture is a feedback...

36 / CHRONICLESnquestionable and fugitive of all concepts, seemingly so solidnat one moment but blown away by unpopularity the next?nWhat is war in an age of terrorism, export dumping,nmilitary computer games, and nuclear standoff?nSuch questions are not intended to induce the aporia ofnthe mole-historian we depicted earlier, trying to definenthose troublesome ideas by the mere...

game, in the long run adaptive success attends thosenversions of our partisanship which have the widest, panhuman,nappeal Let us not seek to avoid bias but to widennour bias in favor of the whole human race and beyond.nThis approach especially questions the apparent straightforwardnessnof the notion of political power. Events occur,nand their meaning is rich and...

societal issues are at stake.nThe Supreme Court’s recent decision in Johnson v.nTransportation Agency, Santa Clara County, Californianillustrates this point. The Court in Santa Clara reviewed annaffirmative action plan that was challenged under Title VIInof the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The affirmative action plannwas not intended to redress identifiable discrimination;ninstead, the plan was intended to...

401 CHRONICLESna different course if it so chooses.”nBut by 1987, Congress had not set a diffierent course. ThenSanta Clara Court was quick to regard this as support for itsninterpretation of Title VII; “Congress has not amended thenstatute to reject our construction, nor have any suchnamendments ever been proposed, and we therefore maynassume that our interpretation...

WHO BETRAYEDnTHOSE WHO DIEDnIN VIETNAM?n”::-*:^:H^^”^nr’v,:f^V- ff^*^nJames Reston of The New York Times has suggestednthat it was the reporters and cameramen who forced thenwithdrawal of American power from Southeast Asia.nRobert Elegant, who covered the Vietnam War for thenL.A. Times, says that the fate of Vietnam was determinedn”on the printed page and the television screen.”nReed Irvine, chairman...

Moviegoer was Percy’s The Sun AlsonRises—that is to say, his most originalnand perhaps most singular piece ofnwork—it is necessary to identify thenbody of his novels since then, to suggestnwhy this body of work will nondoubt become increasingly important.nThe titles are as follows: The LastnGentleman (1966); Love in the Ruinsn(1971); Lancelot (1977); The SecondnComing (1980); and...

servatismen i USA, published in 1971nin Sweden, and Democracy and thenEthical Life (1978). He is coeditor ofnIrving Babbitt in Our Time (1986) andnhas published significant articles innscholarly journals. His writing hasncentered on large philosophical andnliterary matters rather than on practicalnpolitics.nWill, Imagination and Reason is notnsimply a study of Irving Babbitt. Thenmotive underlying the book is...

have lost his faith when the battle isnover but has clearly been defeated onnthe field. In playing the Devil’s advocate,nRoger, like Chillingworth, turnsnhimself into the Devil but unlike Chillingworthnsuffers no final penitence.nPaula (Pearl), the truth-teller, callsnhim the “Bad man”; Verna (Spring),nthe niece he debauches, says that he isnevil.nReaders of Updike’s past work knownhow important Karl...

Letter From thenNorth Polenby William R. HawkinsnCounterrevolution in ToylandnAmong the hottest sehing items in toynstores across the land is the “G.I. Joe”nseries of military action figures. Sincenthe “Star Wars” movies, war toys havenmade a strong comeback from theirndepressed levels during the “antiwar”n1970’s. Model figures based on “StarnWars” characters proved so successfulnthat others quickly entered the...

SO / CHRONICLESn”ruthless terrorist organization determinednto rule the world.” It is anrootless evil identified with no particularncountry or ideology (though mostnof its leaders are obviously foreign). Itsnagents can spring up anywhere. Therenis a strong antidrug message present innthat many of Cobra’s schemes involventhe use of mind-control chemicals tonbend honest citizens to their will. Onenof Cobra’s...

ERN TRADITION,” the ad suggests.n”VISIT WITH YOUR FOLKS THISnSATURDAY.” “Visiting is a favoritenpastime in the South. Southernersnlove to talk.” Announcing cheapnweekend rates for in-state calls, it goesnon: “This Saturday, swap stories.nShare a secret. Visit with your folks.nIt’s a custom worth keeping.”nAmen to that, I say, but my man innMississippi spells out the irony; “Whonwould have...

52 / CHRONICLESnsomething like that—or this splendidnstory, sent my way by Laurie Hibbettnof Nashville (whom regular readersnwill recall as a runner-up in our “PoeticnGems” competition of a whilenback).nSeems there was something of anparking problem last June in EstillnSprings, Tennessee. It was caused bynseveral thousand people who came tonsee the face of Jesus revealed on thenside...

ed like all the other teachers in thendistrict. Parents, however, couldnchoose to enroll their children in, ornwithdraw them from, the teachers’nclass, and the teachers’ compensationnwould reflect those changes. Walkernleft all other options open. The teachersncould, if they wanted, use part ofntheir budget to pay aides or specialistsnin music, art, and phys. ed. Theyncould buy materials...

541 CHRONICLESnwho benefited most from Breton’snopaque theorizing, from vague Freudiannnotions then in the air, from Marinetti’snNietzschean gesticulations.nThroughout his hfe, DaH lectured andnwrote extensively, producing a novel,nHidden Faces. Although, as literature,nthe novel is highly derivative, a clumsynattempt to dress the sensibilities of anHuysmans in the idioms of a Musil, itnreveals a facile. Protean talent for verbalnmanipulation....

Letter From thenSouthwestnby Odie FaulknFast-Food RegionalismnEvery day we hear references tonNorth, South, East, and West, tonMidwest and Southwest, to PacificnNorthwest and, lo, even to Ozarkia,nCascadia, and Siskiyou. All of us speaknor write of these geographical areas asnif they had narrowly prescribed boundariesnreadily meaningful to everyone.nYet in reality these designations, asnHumpty Dumpty would say, meannonly what...

56 / CHRONICLESnSCREENnNetting Reagan, ornAll the President’snLegsnby Gary Houstonn”Ronald Reagan,” the Movie: AndnOther Episodes in Pohtical Demonologynby Michael Paul Rogin, Berkeley,nCA: University of CalifornianPress; $25.00.nCity of Nets: A Portrait of Hollywoodnin the 1940’s by OttonFriedrich, New York: Harper & Row;n$25.00.nWhen Thomas Mann joined the WestnCoast galaxy of refugees from Hitler,nhe was writing Doctor Faustus —...

Century Fox, Harry Cohn at Columbia,nand the rest rather hke overlords,nwith stars in their vassalage. JacknWarner demonstrated this conclusivelynwhen Bette Davis fought him inncourt to sever her seven-year contract.nTheir power did not only make thenstudio bosses feel God-like over writersnlike Faulkner, Chandler, Cain,nDreiser, and Brecht, or composers likenStravinsky and Schoenberg—but itnalso gave them a feeling...

S8 / CHRONICLESnHouse” demands upon the currentnchairmen of both the NEA and thenNEH to reverse more peer panel decisionsnthan they do, and I’m glad thatnhe finds such vetoing to be, in principle,nas objectionable as I do. Replyingnfrom West Berlin, where you get anvisceral sense of the profound differencesnbetween East and West, I tooncommend both chairmen...

4 I CHRONICLESnConvicted traitor Clayton Lonetreenwept as he described his upbringing onnan Indian reservation orphanage andnwith his father, a brutal alcohohc. ThenMarine Corps was, he said, a way outnof his misery, although his principalnreasons for joining were patriotic. Thenmilitary jury, unmoved by his argumentsnand those of his celebrity lawyernWilliam Kunstler, sentenced Lonetreento 30 years. Why...

may be in for trouble.nThe first signal may not come untilnreport cards arrive. Little Johnny, itnturns out, gets a C— in reading. SincenJohnny is reading four years abovengrade level on all the tests, you wondernwhat is going on and arrange for anmeeting with Miss Muggs. Rathernnervously, she says she’s glad you’vencome, because she can’t do...

6 / CHRONICLESnsubject and in whatever way we choosenfree of every sort of governmental restraint.”nThe members have reason tonworry. Since so much of their hvehhoodncomes from government grants,nwho knows what might happen if anhterate man entered any branch of thengovernment? Even the directors of thenAmerican Booksellers Associationnhave joined the side show by votingn19-0 against Bork.nThe...

“^ give you morenquality services than aiq^nother discount broken”n”Commission discounts arenimportant. But there are manynservices that are just as important.nWhen you choose a brokerage firm,nyou should get a complete package.nThat means discountsnand service”n—Charles R. Schwab, ChairmannCharles Schwab & Co., Inc.nWe give you these quality services:nu^ 24-hour order entry so you can place your ordersnat your...

8 I CHRONICLESnON MIGHT by Momcilo Selicn”I chant the new empire …”nPERSPECTIVEn—Walt WhitmannWalt Whitman sang what he saw—in 1860, he gave anname to Madison’s and Jefferson’s vision of the newncommonwealth. “[Our success],” Jefferson had said inn1801, “furnishes a new proof of the falsehood of Montesquieu’sndoctrine, that a republic can be preserved only in an%:niAn•it^^F ”•0i^^-n*...

posed to the U.S. entry into World War II, both mennbecame loyal workers in the war effort—the AmericannRepublic, they felt, must show itself different from oldnEurope, which had debauched itself into self-immolation.nBut if President Jimmy Carter ever read his predecessor’snwords, as he put in motion his hostage policy, we do notnknow. What we are aware...

because the contest is hard, treacherous, and risky? In thengame of survival, second places often do not count. Wherenare the Armenians today? Or Dacians? Or Burgundians? Orneven the European Jews?nFor the soft, the record of oppression by the weak shouldnsuffice—mob rule in the French Revolution, Soviet RednTerror, the Cambodian self-genocide, to go no further. Inncomparison,...

special Holiday TraditionnIs Now A Tierrifk Hol^nChronicles Gift Subscription has long been a <nAnd now, our specianriftSubscrip ” 4.” • * rn^^ ‘^^i^’^^r^f^^’m^^mn*•’ Jj’ ^ 1* – • • • •• JC ‘ V _ • “W ” :nJust complete and mail the adjoining postage-paidnorder card, or use this coupon. We’ll promptly sendneach recipient an...

example for a vibrant patriotism based on a militaryndemocracy, a Mdnnerbund (male league), an Eidgenossenschdftn(its ofEcial title referring to binding oaths), thenmonarchical form of government, is a much more suitablencoordinator of patriotic fervor. The old order, we have tonbear in mind, was vertical; as God the Father in Heaven,nthe Holy Father in Rome, the monarch...

t4 I CHRONICLESnjoining the “Watch and Ward Society.”nThe unfortunate mistake of the Danubian Monarchy wasnits veering towards poHtical democracy. Ever since thenmiddle of the 19th century the constitution provided for annever-increasing suffrage, and by 1907, earlier than innEngland (or America, with its poll tax), the one man-onenvote system was adopted, thereby rendering parliamentarismninoperable. The warning...

Russia should draw together in independence from Berhnnand Moscow. This, however, leaves the question open howna central, but not a centralizing, government ought andncould, at least theoretically, be constituted. Again a onenman-one vote parliament? Should that failure with thenceaseless, idiotic, and offensive talk about “majorities” andn”minorities” be repeated?nI remember my childhood days, when above the...

service. To make a bad pun, I jumped the gun and abruptlynvolunteered for the Marine Corps.nBy summer, I was on my way to the V-12 ofEcer trainingnprogram at Emory University in Atlanta. No sooner had Inarrived at Emory, received my uniform, learned the rudimentsnof marching and military procedure, engaged everynday in hateful unit calisthentics, than...

18 I CHRONICLESnin the “butts” behind the targets was unpleasant duty.nAfter the final boot eamp parade, we were mustered ontona field to reeeive our assignments. That was a turning pointnin life for us, and, for some, a turning point towards death,nfor a number of Marines in our training eompany werenassigned to replacement battalions. That is...

of these communities in the South had a prewar economynin which cash played only a small part. Public educationnwas marginal. Contacts with a larger world did not exist.nThen, in a burst of nahonal activity, came the campnconstruction, the building of new roads and airfields, andnthe honky-tonks that kept the troops amused. Many meager,nhalf-forgotten communities had...

and ideology. Academics have been repulsed by the carnagenof war, a reaction that has blended with the liberal beliefnthat wars are “fuhle,” a waste of blood and money. It is notnwar but the “invisible hand” of economics or the civilizingntrend of enlightened philosophy that changes the world.nWar is a phase that man will outgrow. To...

221 CHRONICLESnrespect. Unlike the liberals, they at least know what they arendoing.nLenin claimed that it is the “men with ideas” who arendangerous to society. But without Trotsky’s creahon of thenRed Army and its victory in the Russian civil war, thenBolsheviks might have found in the end that their ideasnwere dangerous mainly to themselves rather than...

country.nAmong the debates within the right are the use ofnmihtary conscription, troop commitments to NATO, theneffectiveness of anti-Communist guerrilla movements, theneffectiveness of a “world democratic-capitalist revolution,”nand the play of the “China card.” Like the debates betweennright and left over such topics as the use of covert operationsnand assassination, the Strategic Defense Initiative, supportnfor authoritarian allies,...

24 I CHRONICLESnescape their parochial view. The current position of thenU. S. in the world is different from what it has been for mostnof American history. Only by learning from the experiencesnof other world powers through history can Americans comento terms with what is necessary and expected of them. AsnA.T. Olmstead argued in his History...

the bitterness of ideological and religious rivalries—are allnmoving away from stability and peace. In such an environment,nself-sustaining national power is critical.nAnother element of instability is the technological advancenin weaponry. Human nature may hold constant overnthe centuries, but weapons and their modes of employmentnchange constantly (though at different rates in differentneras). Indeed, the advantages that innovations...

26 I CHRONICLESnthought strategy was merely “common sense appHed to thenart of war,” but it is clear that today’s political leaders andnthe journalists who set the parameters of public debate knownlittle of these men or their work. Thus Moltke’s “commonnsense” is anything but common.nSince change is a vital lesson of history, skepticismnshould meet any notion...

New From Hillsdale College Pressn blink ilic Itki’^ ul ulijili vM have mn ^’i-n mninMr!> J ti’iHur; a Ki’riuLJu- mural lUliiir.il o>jn!Kl tthjl tivnrjii- K(K’lif li:is in “..u i^ ri>)r mihnpinfiiunilli triri it J^ ilicirnunhl. ••iiiriji/irii: jiiiin||l^|)]^](ll1!;nMiilj.f Ihihr Ixtcuinc lirnvfirnIh, I ammilliv liir ,i Inr nhriilnALSO BY GEORGE ROCHEnMlillin_-«i3;ntasB^nAmericanBy The ThroatnA bUstering attack on red...

Waldheim cannot have a visitor’s visanto enter the USA, because of unrefutednallegations about his World War IInrecord.nWhy does there so often seem to benopen season in the media—and innCongress—on America’s national interests?nThe American public is usednto it and takes it for granted, likenmuggy weather in Chicago in thensummer. Ostensibly, it is a quest forntruth. To...

30 I CHRONICLESnphenomenon if not a way of life in thenWest. But how can this be explained?nWerner’s answer deals with France,nbut it is thought-provoking—andnalarming — when applied to thenEnglish-speaking world, particularly tonBritain, Canada, and the UnitednStates: Treason exists only where therenis something to be betrayed. We nonlonger take treason seriously becausenwe no longer believe that...

32 I CHRONICLESnhead, in a way that would have lastingn(and unfortunate) intellectual impactnthroughout the 20th century.nThe context was another furiousnBritish political debate, this time overnthe Boer War (1899-1902). The warninspired J. A. Hobson to write Imperialism:nA Study (1902)—an absolutelynseminal book. Hobson fiercely op­nposed the war, and from what henbelieved to be the circumstances of itsnoutbreak,...

capitalism, this meant that a “socialist”nstate such as the USSR could nevernbe guilty of imperialism—no matternhow far it expanded or how violent itsnmethods. That is, the reality of Sovietnimperial expansion was denied by definition.nSecond, since “imperialism”nwas the final stage of capitalism, asnlong as capitalist states and societiesncontinued to exist they were “imperialist.”nThus, the reality of...

34 I CHRONICLESnboth to “explain” and simultaneouslyndevalue European empire. “Empireas-neurosis”nsuited this need perfectly.nIf anything, the idea is more prominentnnow in the 80’s than at any timensince Schumpeter came up with it,nfitting as it does the current fads fornpop psychoanalysis and smug literaryn”deconstruction.”nA typical product of this tradition—nmentioned here because of its enormousninfluence as well—is DominiquenO....