Category: Imported

8 / CHRONICLESnpopulation explosion of academics innthe 50’s and 60’s operated along thenlines of Gresham’s law: bad mindsndrove out good. The real problem withnuniversities is the degree to whichndisgruntled semi-literates take out theirnfrustrations on their students. In thisn”revenge of the nerds,” anti-Americanndiatribes play a prominent part. Wencan remember any number of studentsncoming up shyly after...

quires lawyers to assist clients whonwish to perjure themselves). But millionsnof other Americans have likewisenlost any sense of right and wrong notnenforced by the judge and policeman.nIn his 1978 Harvard CommencementnAddress, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn complainednthat in America “voluntarynself-restraint is almost unheard of:neverybody strives toward further expansionnto the extreme limit of thenlegal frames.” When voluntary selfrestraintncollapses, the...

10 / CHRONICLESnPERSPECTIVEnCONSPIRACIES AGAINST THE NATIONnby Thomas FlemingnThe Reagan Administration’s Baby Doe policy is finallynbeing tested in the Supreme Court. Supporters see thenlaw as a neeessary guarantee of the rights of handicappedninfants whose lives are threatened by selfish parents andnamoral physicians. The Federal government has a positivenobligation, they insist, to send investigation teams—BabynDoe Squads, as...

by adopting their views. The Administration’s rhetoric onnthe rights of handicapped infants is only the most recentnexample of a conservative adopting liberal slogans. It is hardnnot to endorse Halifax’s assessment of the best political partynas “but a kind of conspiracy against the nation.”nMost conservatives prefer Edmund Burke’s more generousnview of the party system as an...

This alchemy comparison may sound farfetched, but itncontains a hint of the sort of process of intellectual and evennspiritual transformation I’m going to talk about today. Anperson’s ethical nohons tend to crystalize in the hermetic.nMine did. The pressure chamber in which my most deeplynfelt ideas were forged was not a surgical operating room, notna pressure-packed...

14 / CHRONICLESnlying low and staying out of trouble by not communicating.nEverybody had to get on the line and take the torture afternbeing caught because we had a civilization to build, ancivilization of Americans behind walls, a civilization ofnpolitical autonomy that had the courage to responsibly rulenitself with its own laws without contact with the...

children stranded at the bus station waiting for a parent toncome and take them home.nAmericans don’t seem able to grasp the politics andnpsychology of terrorism and hostage taking. After the Popenwas shot, the papers were full of thoughtful reflections andnpredictions by informed people. Their message was that thisnage will be the age of terrorism and...

16 / CHRONICLESnwould never guess how. It was not messages of gloom, butncheery messages of hope, persistently drummed into himnmonth after month that eventually did him in. He internalizednand took seriously those surefire, upcoming releasendates. After a number had eventually passed, his mindndrifted away, he couldn’t hold his rice down, and he died ofna broken...

transaction booksnPEOPLE IN SPACEnPOLICY PERSPECTIVES FOR A “STAR WARS” CENTURYn}ames Everett Katz, editornForward by Hans MarknU.S. military strategy, particularly the “Star Wars” scenarios, has generatednrenewed interest in outer space. The implications for the security of nationsnon Earth and other emerging space policy problems are examined innthis volume. People in Space is organized into three sections...

It is the bathos, the theory, the art, the skill of diving andnsinking in government. It was taught in the school of folly;nbut alas! Franklin, Turgot, Rochefoucauld, and Condorcet,nunder Tom Paine, were the great masters of that academy!”nAs word and as concept, ideology has been suspect innAmerica and Britain ever since John Adams’ time—or atnleast...

20 / CHRONICLESnpoints out, “a feature which is paradoxical in view of thenideological insistence upon the merely derivative status ofnideas. But then, ideologies are, of all intellectual creations,nthe most riddled with paradox and deception.”nIntensely theoretical, yes, the inner circle of ideologues;nbut employing as their instruments men indifferent ornhostile to intellectual pursuits, those “streamlined men whonthink...

22 / CHRONICLESnin sum, younger is indisputably better.nIndeed, in a 1953 Commentary piece, the drama criticnHenry Popkin pointed to several popular novels and plays—nincluding Truman Capote’s The Glass Harp—which centerednon childlike men and women and which tended tonurge “a wholesale flight from the reality of our lives”—anflight to “the solace of sentiment, childhood, and the...

now in their forties have scarcely known a moment in ournmature lives when we have not been obliged to seek andnshape our identities in the face of enormous moral andnemotional pressure from the adolescent or preadolescentnyoung.” Observed Aldridge: “By now the young have sonintimidated us with the sheer weight of their physical andnmoral presence that...

241 CHRONICLESnof ritual and lore to their community’s younger members.nNow television imparts general values and—through itsncomedies, dramas, and advertisements—reveals which patternsnof behavior are socially acceptable, and which willnlead to failure or success. In the television age, the oldnfunction as just one more demographic block to be luredninto collecting an endless stream of “new” products thatnpromise...

Conspiracies Against the Nationn(continued from page 11)nand call for the dismantlement of entitlement programs,nsome of them seem perfectly willing to push their ownnagenda at the Federal level. Some think the governmentnshould provide a nondenominational school prayer. Othersnwant an anti-gun-control amendment. Still others want tonuse the NEH or Department of Education to supportnconservative ideology. Writing recently...

26 / CHRONICLESnthe leadership for our escape from the wilderness, they willnhave to recognize that people don’t want them sticking theirnnoses into decisions which only families and communitiesncan make. They didn’t like Lyndon Johnson interfering inntheir business, and they don’t want Ronald Reagan lookingnunder their beds. If we start legislating for other people’snScripture for SkepticsnThe...

Expect the unexpectedn^ …from reasonnil II ^nt&mnWHnHOW to secure P»aKn»MMW«st ^ •n•””-HKtSAM COIJP”niSsWM***nIMMMUMVn«r» ••*«•’*’••*nWho writes for Reason? Some ofnAmerica’s best writers and most incisiventiiinlcers—including Tom Bethell, EdithnEfron, James Oberg, Alan Reynolds, WilliamnTucker, and Walter Williams, tonname a few. It’s no wonder a recent surveynshowed that Reason is America’s fastestgrowingnmagazine of ideas.nYou can ry Reason now...

sive social ideology in our society.”nIndeed it is, as anyone who has evernspent time in the academy quicklynlearns. Capaldi sees in contemporarynliberalism a psychologistic view ofnman and society, one that presupposesnan individual motive behind all thatnexists. If there is injustice or inequalityn(regarded as synonymous), someonenmust be to blame. This is the mentalitynthat sees discrimination wherevernthere...

their lives, a middle ground betweennindividual rights and material interestnon the one side, and religious andnsocial obligations on the other. Americansnhave chosen heroes who seem, innsome way, to have risen above thencontradiction between material rightnand moral duty.nSignificantiy, Diggins’ saintly Lincolnnillustrates his view of Americannheroes as bridges between self-interestnand duty. His Lincoln has nothing inncommon with...

gue views ideology as “a purportedlynscientific doctrine which reveals thensecret of the human condition” and isn”associated with a specific class ofnperson nominated as the bearers of thenmotor of history.” “Ideology explainsnevil and facilitates change” and announcesnthat “the business of life isnliberation,” even if most people livenunder the illusion that they are freenand do not realize...

attention. Usually my poemsnare very difficult for me tonwrite. Poets often admit, withnsomething like a parental sensenof surprise, pride, pleasure, thatnonce a poem is finished itnbecomes someone else’s,nbecomes something else. Likenmany other writers of thisncentury, my obsession has beennwith the lost and neglectednforces of the world, what isndark and hidden, and unseen,nalthough I’m not sure...

been born in these latter daysnwhen the morals and mannersnof the country had beenncorrupted, born in a time whennwe could see upon thenmembers of our ownnfamilies—upon our sisters andnbrothers and aunts andnuncles—the effects of ournfailure to cling to the teachingsnand ways of our forefathers.nAnd he was saying that it wasnour duty and great privilege, asnBoy...

46 / CHRONICLESnSTAGEnWhat Became anLegend Most?nby David KaufmannLillian; Written by William Luce;nDirected by Robert Whitehead.nPoor Zoe. Poor William. Poor Lillian.nAs if it were a conspiracy to compensatenfor what they deemed a distortionnof the facts, the critics seized ZoenCaldwell’s one-woman show Lillian,nwritten by William Luce, as an occasionnto say more about Lillian Hellmannthan to discuss the...

M.C. Escher engraving: a shadow boxnof elusive geometry and inverted staircases,nserving the play’s motif ofnsmooth yet nightmarish “concealment.”nBut Yeargan translated hisntheme into stainless steel and backlightednglass, in the same chic blend ofnart deco, japonaiserie, and storewindowndisplay that has marked hisnwork for a decade. Upstage centernloomed a large, blood-red moon thatnwaxed and waned through the coursenof...

SO / CHRONICLESngrown to know and love from the daysnoi Babes on Broadway or Forty-SecondnStreet. Mikhail Baryshnikov is a greatnRussian ballet dancer who defected tonthe West’s freedom and wealth; GregorynHines is a Black American tapndancer who deserted to Russia fromnour army in Vietnam. Baryshnikov’snflight from London to Tokyo crashlandsnin Russia. (The plane crash,nincidentally, is very...

from other distinguished British collections,nsuch as those of the Duke andnDuchess of Devonshire, the Duchessnof Westminster, and other lenders.nThe works of art in this catalog revealnthe imaginative genius of Faberge andnthe unmatched skills of the hardstonencarvers, enamelers, and goldsmithsnwho fashioned these intricate, invariablyndelightful objects, admired andnLetter From thenSouthwestnby Odie B. FaulknUnto the Least of These...

521 CHRONICLESnstate or Federal government wherenthey supposedly can get help.nRecently I had a conversation with anminister of the gospel who asked me ifnI tithed. I responded that I did, butnthat I did not give it to the church.nRather, said I, my tithe went to thenFederal government.n”But the tithe, by definition, belongsnto God!” said the minister...

tency here. “You can accuse me ofnbeing a bleeding heart,” the local newspapernquotes Keeshan as saying,n”but … we should be raising ournchildren to be good taxpayers.” It’s thatnsimple. ccnHerbert Schlossberg, an investmentnadvisor in Minneapolis, is the authornof Idols for Destruction: ChristiannFaith and Its Confrontation WithnAmerican Society (Thomas NelsonnPublishers).nLetter Fromnthe Heartlandnby Jane GreetnSome of us come...

54 / CHRONICLESnRainbow or Thunderstorm?nReaders of American newspapersncould easily conclude that racialnand ethnic conflicts are peculiar tonSouth Africa and the United States,nwith an occasional flare-up in Londonnor India. The truth is thatngovernments everywhere find it difficultnto superimpose the modernnidea of nationhood upon the ancientnrealities of race and tribe. AsnDonald L. Horowitz points out innEthnic Groups...

or testify to the union’s larger significance.nJust yesterday, though, weddingsnwere community praisefests (asnwell as deeply religious ceremonies),npublic evidence that there would be anfuture. Marriage was a promise to thencommunity, as the community was anpromise to the nation. A young wife’snprivacy, and probably her civil rights,nwere routinely violated as her communitynsuffered over her childlessness orncongratulated itself...

56 / CHRONICLESnbooks to write, sick people to healn—and if they don’t have somethingnbetter to do, they’ll find something.nThey tend to think that politics are notnimportant (mistaking ideal for fact), ornat least not worthy. In any case, fewnhave enough sense of duty to overcomentheir distaste for Washingtonians,nor the instincts to flourish amongnthem if they do....

ry, the Washington Post, New YorknTimes, Los Angeles Times, and thenmajor networks have defied establishednlaw, court orders, grand jury subpoenas,nmilitary secrecy, and elected officials.nPerhaps most notorious was then1981 Janet Cooke case, when WashingtonnPost editors defiantly proclaimednthat they would stand on theirnFirst Amendment rights in refusingnto reveal the whereabouts of theneight-year-old heroin addict describednin Cooke’s feature...

S8 / CHRONICLESngress only as a revocable privilege),nand almost nothing remains of the oldnrights of sanctuary or the privilege ofnthe confessional. But when a ministerngoes to jail for refusing to betray hisnsources, don’t expect it to make thenheadlines: the Fourth Estate is jealousnof its privileges.nThe establishment of the FourthnEstate as priestly class might benacceptable—or at...

the last President who tried a directnconfrontation. In the present context,nattacking Dan Rather makes as muchnsense as writing an expose on the FivenFamihes: Your career ends up wearingna cement overcoat. Conservative journahstsndo attack the media bias in thenpress but do not generally engage innwholesale denunciations of FirstnAmendment privileges. They are, afternall, journalists.nDespite the lack of...

The book that continues to be a centralnreference in a great moionam^iate—nRicharHJohn Neuhau^ best-skiing anaiy^nof religion ami ileniocracv In America.nThe NMliPublic SquarenDffiector Of TAeAocMioftf/flst/riire’s center onnReligion & Societv, JVeuAaus ciialienges AmericantotmagtheVitaimoraianilreiigioustiuestionsnbacft/ntotAe “fwA/fcsaifaie.”nFmm the critics:n• “The book is elegant in execution and sweeping in scope.”n• “A large and sympathetic book, it stretches the mind.”n-Michael Scully, innThe...

6/CHRONICLESnFreud was a man. So was Jung. Sonwere Adler and Sullivan, to say nothingnof Rollo May and Carl Rogers.nPerhaps that explains why psychiatristsnand feminists are at odds over how tondefine the mentally ill. In 1983 thenAmerican Psychiatric Associationncommissioned a special Work Groupnto update and revise the Association’snDiagnostic and Statistical Manualn(DSM-III), the official catalog of recognizednforms...

The German Marshall Fund of thenUnited States was established by thenBundestag in 1972 as an expression ofngratitude for the Marshall Plan. Itsnmission, never very clearly articulated,nwas to support comparative study ofnproblems in industrialized nations, internationalnaffairs, and European studies.nThe Fund has received criticism,nfrom time to time, for the trendiness ofnits commissions, but it retains the solidnbacking...

8/CHRONICLESnPERSPECTIVEnSUCCESSFUL CRIMESnCrime is big business in the U.S. It is bigger than thenbilHons of dollars that are made in the drug trafficnevery year and the astronomical revenues from prostitution,ngambling, and armed robbery. (Robbers alone are estimatednto cost us $355 thousand a day.) Even honest citizens get anpiece of the action: law enforcement professionals, judgesnand lawyers,...

sin are “social problems,” demanding solution. But beforenthe problems ean be solved, they must first be studiedn—scientifically, no less—by psychologists, sociologists,ncriminologists, and urbanologists. We used to be told therenwas something called a criminal personality. Psychologistsntermed him psychopath, sociologists preferred sociopath. Innany event, it was reassuring to know the experts had anhandle on things. All they...

out of nothing and by nothing.nAssessing the new theory, however,nrequires not only careful study of itsnspecific features, but a correct understandingnof the nature of science itselfnOne of the most popular misconceptionsnof science is the notion thatnscientific theories are based entirely onnobservable fact. This empiricist fallacynis traceable all the way back to FrancisnBacon, the first of...

12 / CHRONICLESnhim that “we do not know the reasonnfor this” and that adherence to “mathematicalnbeauty and elegance” oftennconstitutes “a sort of irrational faith.”nBut why choose this irrational faithnover other faiths—say, theosophy ornMoloch-worship? Davies explains:nonly through mathematics are scientistsnable “to understand, control,nand predict the outcome of physicalnprocesses.”nHere then is the crux of the matter.nMathematical science...

141 CHRONICLESnOne would expect a novelist to seizenupon this unusual and complex personality,nbut in this novel the Counselornplays only a minor role. Thenfocus is on the people he inspires andnthe events generated by their attachmentnto him.nThe War of the End of the World isnlarge and panoramic, displaying extraordinarynimaginative inventiveness,nthe kind of fertile inventiveness demonstratednin the...

for representing reality or that realityncan be represented at all, while levelingncharges of the most grievous crueltynand barbarism. The lure of purennarrative lies behind this cheating.nThe contemporary writer, defensivelynrecoiling from the oppression, exploitation,nand violence in modern life,nseeks to escape complicity by repudiatingnrationality and representation andnperhaps even meaning itself But mennand women being what they are.nThe...

observing the Bolshevik, National Socialist,nand sexual revolutions. OutgrowingnDemocracy is the work of anEuropean, friendly to the aspirationsnof the American people, but distantnenough and culturally conservativenenough to observe the blemishes asnwell as the accomplishments of America.nThat is, the work examines usnsympathetically, but with historicalnperspective and from outside rathernthan inside the accepted conventionsnof American thought.nIt is just...

18 / CHRONICLESnKing, Queen, Knave—Mind, Brain, and Bodynby Thomas Flemingn”Where so’er I turn my viewnAll is strange, yet nothing new;nEndless labour all along,nEndless labour to be wrong. “nStephen R. L. Clark: From Athensnto Jerusalem: The Love of Wisdomnand the Love of God; ClarendonnPress (OUP); Oxford.nOwen J. Flanagan Jr.: The Sciencenof the Mind; Bradford Books/MITnPress; Cambridge,...

clouds and naturalized it, it is also truenthat James preferred to write aboutn”conscious mental life,” which he regardednnot as the brain itself but as thenproduct of interaction between thenbrain and the world. Freud also began,npromisingly enough, as a student ofnneurology, but soon took flight intonhigher realms of mythology—imaginentrying to falsify the superego.nThe most amusing case...

20 / CHRONICLESnof the social scientists who make upn”laws” about law or marriage or evennmoney. Since our mental states (byndefinition unknowable) remain “crucialnto social phenomena,” social lawsnare impossible: In order to get marriednor buy property, you and other peoplenhave to think that is what you arendoing. Enormous advances have beennmade in the study of the...

consciousness is alien, but one foundednon the very patterns to be foundnalso in our intellect.” If we are able tonunderstand the world, it is only becausenour minds “mirror or share innthe pattern and life which is the foundationnof the world.”nIn the course of these essays, Clarknconfronts most of the popular accountsnof conscious life, all of...

row and tomorrow may creep into the present, but so do allnour yesterdays. Nothing is more important to the creativenprocess than the conception of the past. Cultures havenbecome ossified from too strict a veneration for the past; butnthey have been turned to cultural froth by ignorance ornneglect of the past. If a culture is absolutely...

distrust the process of reducing individual men and womennto equally weighted “cases,” forcing considered opinionsnand the variety of human characteristics into Procrusteann”response categories.”nWhatever the objectors might think, though, these arennot objections to survey research in principle. Withoutnexception, in my experience, they can be translated intontechnical terms, and they turn out to be valid criticismsnonly of...