For all of Hofstadter’s partisan distortions, he was right to note that paranoia, anxious defensiveness, characterizes American politics. But this paranoia is more deeply rooted in American character and institutions that Hofstadter imagined. America has regularly seen itself as the guarantor . . . . Continue Reading »
“It is a notorious fact that the Monarchs of Europe and the Pope of Rome are at this very moment plotting our destruction and threatening the extinction of our political, civil, and religious institutions. We have the best reasons for believing that corruption has found its way into our . . . . Continue Reading »
Some early modern thinkers saw the American Indians as exemplars of natural man, but JQ Adams believed the opposite: “Shall [Indians] doom an immense region of the globe to perpetual desolation, and to hear the howlings of the tiger and the wolf, silence forever the voice of human gladness? . . . . Continue Reading »
John Quincy Adams was stung by British sneers that the US was a “peddling nation” with “no God but gold.” But we’ve shown them: The Brits are now attempt to “alarm the world at the gigantic grasp of our ambition.” This is America’s future: “If . . . . Continue Reading »
In his latest book ( Migrations of the Holy: God, State, and the Political Meaning of the Church ), William Cavanaugh offers an intriguing analysis of the liturgy of war memorials. Drawing on Marvin and Ingle’s Blood Sacrifice and the Nation: Totem Rituals and the American Flag (Cambridge . . . . Continue Reading »
The similarities between religious and nationalist rites are often noted. But this is no mere analogy. Francis Bellamy, who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance, intended the Pledge to function as catechesis through repetition: “It is the same way with the catechism, or the Lord’s . . . . Continue Reading »
Kevin Bywater of Summit Ministries adds this to my comments about Glenn Beck’s “9 principles”: “Beck, being nestled within the Mormon worldview, has no problem conjoining inspiration with imperfection. That is the Mormon understanding of the Bible, is it not? And the . . . . Continue Reading »
At his recent DC rally, Glenn Beck unveiled “9 principles” that Americans should be fighting for. The first is: “America is good place, not perfect, but good.” What might this mean? It could mean that America is a good, if imperfect, place to live. . . . . Continue Reading »
Jim Rogers of Texas A&M writes in response to my post on the pledge of allegiance: “the Supreme Court overturned Gobitis just three years later in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, thus making it one of the most short-lived precedents ever. “That does . . . . Continue Reading »
Islamicists are often accused of elevating political conflicts into cosmic ones. They can’t help “religionizing” conflict, given their pre-modern, irrational, non-secular assumptions. Then Andrew Sullivan writes, shortly after 9/11: “What is really at issue here is the . . . . Continue Reading »
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