Joseph Bottum

One reference to a “culture of life,” buried in a laundry list in the twenty-fifth paragraph? That’s it in John McCain’s acceptance speech ? The sole mention of abortion in the combined hour and a half of oratory from the two Republican nominees over the last two nights? . . . . Continue Reading »

I’m not sure why no one believes that I mean the actual words I write , but all I said was that the “red meat” talking point of the anti-Palin press was wrong: She didn’t mention the word abortion in her speech last night. Yes, the picture she presented was pro-life: . . . . Continue Reading »

At the Democratic convention, Bill Clinton declaimed that the world is more impressed “by the power of America’s example than by the example of America’s power.” At the Republican convention, Sarah Palin declared, “In politics, there are some candidates who use change . . . . Continue Reading »

Well, Sarah Palin’s acceptance speech seems to have been rapturously received among conservatives. So much so, that you don’t have to go far to find sneering comments about Palin’s delivery of “red meat” to the conservative base. Here’s the curious thing, though: . . . . Continue Reading »

Has everyone read ” A Vote for Sarah Palin ,” the Daily Article here at First Things this morning? I’m not sure what to make of the nomination and would be interested in your thoughts. Email us here . . . . . Continue Reading »

From a religious publisher, an email just arrived urging me to take advantage of a sale on “End Times Books.” Why are they so heavily discounted? What does the publisher know that the rest of us don’t? The whole thing makes me a little nervous. . . . . Continue Reading »

I enjoy Clive James, but in a recent issue of Times Literary Supplement , he casually remarks that the composer Arnold Schoenberg “actually had to concentrate quite hard to stay unpopular.” No, man, let’s not start thinking down that road. Unpopularity came as naturally to . . . . Continue Reading »

The argument is being made that the Palin grandchild shifts the election from the economy and the war, two grounds on which Republicans are losing in public polls, to cultural issues, the one ground on which the Republicans are winning. Maybe—though surely it’s an odd moment when an . . . . Continue Reading »

Film-maker Michael Moore has apparently praised the gulf weather for its chance of disrupting the Republican convention: “This hurricane is proof that there is a god in heaven.” Another low point in politics, though possibly one that could be passed off with a laugh—a partisan . . . . Continue Reading »

Actually, Amanda, I think I said those lines from Robert Frost were hendecasyllabics , not hexameters . Or I may have misspoken. Regardless, hendecasyllabic they are, the eleven-syllable line passing into English ultimately from Latin. Here, for example is the meter of Horace’s alcaic stanza . . . . Continue Reading »