The Editors

On James Webb, novelist-politician.

If you come across articles I should include in this weekly round-up, email me at bloom.jordan[at]gmail[dot]com or tweet me here. The City of Detroit is pettifogging one of the best…

[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] On next Tuesday’s ballot here in Wichita, KS, voters will be able to, whether they realize it or not, directly contribute to an ongoing struggle…

I’ve caught a lot of lucky breaks (or unmerited graces) in my life. For instance, I had two superb editors at Henry Holt, which in 2003 published Dispatches from the…

Ask an American of even above-average intelligence what happened in 1964, and the predictable answer would be “Beatlemania” (although the politically sensitive conservative might cite the stirring defeat of Barry…

Matthew Crawford, about whom we have talked a good deal before here at Front Porch Republic, is back with a new book. Like so many other wise observers of our…

Part of the pushback against the notion that groups can make decisions comes from the fear that we already use groups to absolve ourselves of individual responsibility. James Buchanan made…

I have a long piece up at TheDC, more words than you probably wanted to read on the New Republic's cover story on Pope Francis, but it touches on certain…

Mike Munger was recently on EconTalk, where he is a very regular guest. This time the subject of discussion was his latest book Choosing in Groups. Munger is an excellent…

In this excerpt from America Moved: Booth Tarkington’s Memoirs of Time and Place, 1869–1928, Tarkington reflects on the changes he observed in America following the end of the Great War.…

The stylish crowd that walked the red carpet to the Oscars likely had not donned their Sunday best earlier in the day for a trip to church. Even so, the…

Dillon, MT Having a personal and professional interest in what people think history is for, I read The History Manifesto with great interest. Jo Guldi (Brown) and David Armitage (Harvard)…

From Reason, the excellent Jesse Walker locates American Sniper within a semi-nativist (if sometimes anti-native) American antiwar tradition. For what it's worth, I found it a powerful film, and not…

Manchester, CT I am grudgingly accepting that you don’t choose the place; the place chooses you. I’ve moved around a lot during my time on the planet, first as luggage, then…

As he began making the early “exploratory” rounds, a smiling Mike Huckabee recently reminded Martha Raddatz on ABC’s political Sunday show This Week that in 2008 he had run a…

Hillsdale, Michigan. The Paris killings a few weeks ago have unleashed a number of reflections about Islam and its tendency toward violence. Robert Tracinski makes a point that I have…

A mainland Chinese student visited my office last week, asking for a letter of recommendation for his transfer to another university. It is hard to lose a student like this—enthusiastic…

Here's Jack Ross over at the Mitrailleuse: The taxonomy by which the DC establishment made sense of the Democratic victory that year [2006] on the strength of antiwar sentiment was…

From The American Conservative, the art of Alexander O. Levy, who painted the street where he lived.

Here in the Air Capital of the World, the Wichita City Council, in response to the second attempt by dozens of local volunteers to gather thousands of signatures in less…

Just over a year ago John Zmirak caused a stir with his Aleteia article “Illiberal Catholicism.” In it, Zmirak excoriated a fairly broad range of Catholic academics and commentators for, among other…

My review of 'American Sniper' is up at TAC: The New York Times review of “Lawrence of Arabia” from 1962 complains that we don’t really get to know the titular character, a fault…

By now you’ve already forgotten last month’s most important celebrity cause, namely the embodiment of freedom of expression known as The Interview. Hollywood has too, of course. It's so 2014.…

A plea for pastors to remember their audience.