Articles Archive

Kearneysville, WV. At 10:00pm on New Year’s Eve 2008, just as his shift was ending, Patrick McCarron was asked to turn in his badge and keys and to clean out…

Virginia schools are opting for local produce and ingredients over cellophane-packaged mystery meals. Are these elementary schools adopting a version of localism?

As the heat of late summer subsides here in Nanjing and our university settles into the new semester, many look forward to the annual “Golden Week” holiday in early October. …

That's the point made darn well by Stefan McDaniel as part of his response to globalization defenders (the link will take you back to the whole debate). A while back,…

This article caught my attention yesterday - our hunger for electricity to power our "personal electronics" has grown so insatiable that very soon the United States will need to build…

Jon Stewart's take down of ACORN is quite funny, but as a friend of mine said this morning, the real story is that anyone is shocked or suprised by this…

Devon, PA. Everyone knows the "secularization hypothesis" of the West; the only difference between one person and another is whether one also knows that it is garbage.  According to secularization…

Henry County, Kentucky. Last week here we buried our 97-year-old neighbor, a woman named Thelma Chilton Moody Clark.  Until this spring she had never been sick, “and I don't know…

Kearneysville, WV. Barack Obama was swept into office as a firm and unmistakable repudiation of George W. Bush. After enduring the longest war in our nation’s history, after cringing at…

Russell Arben Fox has treated us to his reflections of the recently concluded APSA annual meeting here. It would be surprising if there were anything as thematic as what he…

Hillsdale, MI. It is said that Aesop, despite making all his characters animals and thus avoiding being Nathan to his contemporary Davids, was finally thrown over a cliff by the…

Holland, MI The present age remains haunted by the specter of “atheism,” with significant consequences for our understanding of politics. I think we can distinguish between at least three different…

Rod Dreher says Pelosi is right to fret about political violence.  He argues that it is evil to "lead people to believe [Obama is] a socialist conspiring to install an oligar(c)hy to rule…

Norman Borlaug has died, and Joe Carter calls him the world's greatest unknown hero and says that "few men have ever done more good for the human race."  He links…

A couple of years ago, I wrote a piece on Philip Rieff for the American Conservative. One of the themes of Rieff’s work on which I focused was his concept…

Via The American Conservative, a few thoughts on the land of three downs: www.amconmag.com/article/2009/oct/01/0050/.

made once again by Jesse Walker, in re the prez and the kids. He says here in about 400 words just about everything that needs to be and should be…

“The Christian right,” says Jacqueline Salmon of the Washington Post, “has found new life with Barack Obama in office, particularly around health care.” Salmon points to the bevy of "Christian…

Mt. Airy, Philadelphia, 9-11-09. Eight years ago today, and in the days immediately following, Americans found themselves bewildered. An unprecedented mood had fallen upon them, an unfamiliar atmosphere surrounded them.…

Devon, PA.  This week marks my daughter's third birthday.  As a way of tossing a little Front Porch confetti her way, I reprint here  "A Prayer for Livia Grace at…

It has been a year since the collapse of Lehman Brothers, and the subsequent near-collapse of the international economic system followed quickly by the massive increase of (at least visible)…

This post is dangerously close to turf already claimed by Bill Kaufman and Jason Peters. But the appeal of Richard Russo is so strong that if FPR readers do not…

  Jefferson County, Kansas. The following is a short excerpt from a longer essay in the forthcoming book The Humane Vision of Wendell Berry, co-edited by our own Mark Mitchell.  Mark…