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David P. Goldman is a senior editor of First Things.

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Leo Strauss, Destroyer of Judaism

From First Thoughts

Suzanne Klingenstein of MIT reports on a new cache of Leo Strauss letters today in the Weekly Standard website. They confirm what I always have assumed, that Strauss’ work on Maimonides was intended to prove that the great Jewish legal scholar and commentator was a secret atheist. She . . . . Continue Reading »

Germany’s Multicultural Failure

From Web Exclusives

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel is at once the brightest and least ideologically driven of world leaders. The daughter of an East German Lutheran pastor, she came of age when Protestant churches were the focal point of opposition. She earned a doctorate in quantum chemistry, and rose to leadership in Germany’s Christian Democratic Union through brains and grit, much like Lady Thatcher in England a generation earlier… . Continue Reading »

Who Needs Denominations, Indeed?

From First Thoughts

A friend points out that the rate of attrition of American Jews is much higher than the standard estimates suggest. After a million Russian Jewish immigrants and perhaps half that number of Israelis, the numbers of American Jews remain static — which implies that a comparable number of . . . . Continue Reading »

What Can Iran Do Without Computers?

From First Thoughts

The short answer is: Pelt Israel with unguided missiles from southern Lebanon. In today’s Spengler essay at Asia Times Online, I evaluate Iran’s susceptibility to cyberwar. The Islamic Republic pirates virtually all its software and almost all of its competent software engineers have . . . . Continue Reading »

The Keynes Conundrum

From the October 2010 Print Edition

The most practical man of business is usually the slave of a defunct economist, John Maynard Keynes observed seventy-five years ago, in reference to the theories he proposed to overthrow; and this judgment applies with force to his continuing grip on the minds of the world’s policy makers. Public . . . . Continue Reading »