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Obama: “never missing an opportunity to miss an opportunity” by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
Last month in this space, I asked “How Stupid Do They Think We Are?” — “They” of course being our minders in Washington. One of the things I had in mind was Obama’s proposal to set up a special debt and deficit reducing commission that, Imagine!, would only skim the froth off the gargantuan deficit [...] Small earthquake in la-la land, or, Why is Sarah Palin Smiling? by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
There is a great story about the journalist (and Communist) Claud Cockburn that while a journalist at The Times in the 1920s, he won a competition for devising the most boring headline that actually made it into the paper. His winning entry: “Small Earthquake in Chile, Not Many Dead.” According to Wikipedia, the story is [...] “Sadists who were trying to be nice” by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
“Sadists who were trying to be nice”: that’s George Will’s characterization of the folks who devised the current tax system. “Every wrinkle in the code was put there to benefit this or that interest,” Will notes: that’s the “trying to be nice” part. But “since the 1986 tax simplification, the code has been recomplicated more [...] by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
New York Democratic Congressman Anthony Weiner precipitated a raising of the eyebrow yesterday when he appeared on the Jon Stewart comedy show and, in response to Stewart’s question “is [Senator Joe Lieberman] a dick?” said “Yes, Jon.” Yuck, yuck. What a card! It’s nice to see another Democratic politician do his utmost to combat “the erosion [...] by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
Ayn Rand is one of those writers who divide the world. There are partisans, who are utterly smitten by her message, and then there are the rest of us, who can’t fathom the fuss. The former find it very hard to forgive the latter, about which more in a moment. I have read some of Rand’s [...] by James Bowman
In today’s Washington Post, Kathleen Parker has the columnist’s bright idea of putting together the near-coincidence of the death of J.D. Salinger and the publication by Andrew Young of The Politician, a tell-all book about the former presidential candidate, John Edwards, and especially his affair with and child by a woman calling herself Rielle Hunter, for which Mr Young was once the fall guy. With such a high concept the column almost writes itself: a man obsessive about his privacy is juxtaposed with a man whose picture future generations will find when they look in the dictionary under "Too Much Information." He seems not to care, so long as the price is right. As Miss Parker notices, the symbolism of the one’s death’s coinciding with the other’s commercial triumph must also call to mind ideas of what Florence King calls "that nightmare alley of the Western world known as the American mind."
We've got an excellent debate going on, with contributors from all sides, in the comments section of Anthony Daniels's Febraury piece, "Ayn Rand: engineer of souls". Whether you think Ms. Rand was a visionary philosopher and prophet or a threat to everything upright and decent or maybe just an overrated hack, I urge you to join in. And, in answer to Peter M. (#39), I'm sorry to say we do not currently have any "seminar" trolls in our employ. In these strained economic times, we found we could no longer afford their costly diet of controversial literature.
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Confidence building at the Department of Justice by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
I guess Rahm Emanuel didn’t get this bulletin from the Department of Justice advertising for some trial attorneys to work in their Civil Rights Division. If he had, he presumably would not have been so quick to refer to certain left-wing activists as “f – - – ing retarded.” (You’ll be happy to know that [...] by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
Last week, Howard Zinn, reigning anti-American historian of America, died of a heart attack. He was 87. Zinn’s gift to posterity was A People’s History of the United States, a book that has done more than any other textbook to instill hatred and contempt of America in the nation’s teachers and their students. No wonder [...] by Roger Kimball | from Pajamas Media
Remember the Contract with America? That was the pact that Newt Gingrich and some of his pals put together during the campaign of 1994. Some people think it won the Republicans the House that year. Why? Chiefly because it demonstrated an awareness of fiscal reality that had been missing in Washington. I thought about the Contract [...] |
About ArmaVirumque ( AHR-mah wih-ROOM-kweh) In the Aeneid, the Roman poet Virgil sang of "arms and a man" (Arma virumque cano). Month in and month out, The New Criterion expounds with great clarity and wit on the art, culture, and political controversies of our times. With postings of reviews, essays, links, recs, and news, Armavirumque seeks to continue this mission in accordance with the timetable of the digital age.
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