James Poulos

to all for making September our biggest month of visits ever. . . . . Continue Reading »

Rod tells me that Nate Silver, who gained fame as the best, most readable electoral statistician around, has made a mistake . And so he has: Beck is a PoMoCon — a post-modern conservative. And his philosophy is not all that difficult to articulate. It borrows a couple of things from . . . . Continue Reading »

Here’s Steven Menashi in Forbes on IK as moral critic. Here’s David Brooks giving IK three full cheers. Here’s me locating IK mostly in the American mainstream — today, even! — with Mark Schmitt in the opposite corner at Bloggingheads. I say a little more about . . . . Continue Reading »

Michael Gerson’s latest column bemoans the death of historical meaning in our personal romantic narrative. It’s true that the therapeutic historicism that still seems to undergird a lot of popular culture — people telling their stories to one another — is actually being . . . . Continue Reading »

In comments below on my post about Yuval Levin’s book, Imagining the Future , Michael Peterson asks : “Will someone, somewhere, define human dignity?” Not me, at least not in this post . . . but here’s an account of what needs to happen first. One of the best passages in . . . . Continue Reading »

My review of Yuval Levin’s excellent and thought-provoking book, Imagining the Future: Science and American Democracy , is up now at First Principles. Yuval’s closing exhortation to conservatives, to write more clearly, probingly, and persuasively about human dignity, is problematic, . . . . Continue Reading »

The heir to The Public Interest , a new journal by the name of National Affairs , is now living and breathing and live on the web. The sharp and judicious Yuval Levin has brought together a team of great minds, including Adam Keiper, Reihan Salam, and a Publications Committee full of heavies like . . . . Continue Reading »

Yes, it’s a bit quiet around here — that’s the sound of the school year beginning anew. You’ll notice that we’ve added, at bottom right, some choice selections for your own personal reading list. Have a nice long Labor Day weekend. We’ll see you in a few. . . . . Continue Reading »

George Will wants to leave Afghanistan. As I detail over at The New Atlanticist , I’m not there yet. . . . . Continue Reading »

A semi-tangent apropos of the thread developing below on Reagan’s is-it-or-isn’t-it conservatism: it’s true that Reagan’s public brew of conservative moralism and vigilence combined with western-libertarian free-range thought, inclusive of religion, reflects in telling or . . . . Continue Reading »