Politics & Power 483
Hospitality and the Hopi: Fragmentation and Hope
“Pray for the foothills,/goatherds and windmills/and satellite dishes” – Mark Heard Cincinnati, OH. A comment on my recent post on Hopi hospitality referred to “…satellite dishes on the stone and…
Characteristics of the Modest Republic
Erie, PA. Readers of the Front Porch Republic are likely looking for new ways to conceive of American politics and culture. They are in search of alternative categories to the…
“On the Grid”: When Electricity (and Other Things) Came to the Countryside
“Come in and look,” Quintín urged me, as he disappeared with a shuffle through the low doorway in his adobe house. I got up from the wooden bench on which…
When Lawyers Catch the French Disease
Devon, PA. No observer of American culture grasped its implicit contents better than did Alexis de Tocqueville, and no one since has better grasped its potencies as they have actually…
The Red Tories and the Civic State
Phillip Blond Irving, TX. It has been sometime since I have called myself a “conservative.” It is not that any of my opinions have changed, but rather that conservatism forgot…
On Feeling “Forgotten”: Agrarian Aspirations in the Andes
“The more things change, the more they remain the same.” The villagers of Pomatambo, Ayacucho, Peru, did not coin the phrase, though it has captured their lives with eerie precision…
The Tacit Dimension of Shop Class
Kearneysville, WV. Whenever I pick up a book dealing with ways of knowing, I invariably flip to the index to see if the author refers to the work of Michael…
The Daily Yonder
Thanks to FPR reader and my fellow Hoosier Brandon Seitz for pointing us to The Daily Yonder, a webzine dedicated to writing about and analyzing what's going on in rural…
My Own Little Corner of the Right
Rome, Kentucky. This week my dear Cousin Kate is otherwise occupied Marie Antoinetting around that patch of pigweed and thistle she calls her garden, and has decided not to post…
No Angel: Second Thoughts on Sarah Palin
East Lansing, MI. Mark Mitchell's brief essay on Sarah Palin reminded me of a Treasonous Clerk installment I wrote back in November, contemplating the significance of Palin's persona for American…
The Alternative Tradition in America
Alexandria, VA Since Caleb has posted his lecture from a legendary conference a few years ago that a number of future Front Porchers attended in Charlottesville, VA, I've brushed off…
Broken Connections
"We live on the far side of a broken connection" Wendell Berry has written. One of the greatest obstacles resulting from our current circumstance is our inability to make the…
Justice and Community
The conversation between Rusty Reno, Jody Bottum, and Caleb Stegall prompted me to revisit a recent post from "What I Saw In America" in response to a reader reply who…
On Canada, Conservatism, Tories, and Blackberries
Wichita, KS In honor of Canada Day, in the fine federation (though these days, in the eyes of a majority of Canadians, less a federation than an Americanized nation, or…
What’s Modernity Marx Got to Do With It? (FPR vs. PoMoCon, Part Drei)
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Wichita, KS Blogger though I am, I can't deny that there is a major advantage to arguments conducted through the slower media of paper (to…
Aristotle and the Cult of the Immediate
In the current economic and political crisis, Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is not likely to be one of the first places that Americans go looking for wisdom. It should be. Throughout…
FPR v. PoMoCon, Part Deux
Some heat and even some light have been generated in the numerous comments that followed upon my original posting in which I threw some gauntlets around. However, some inevitable reductionism…
Southern Adulteration
Devon, PA. I have had only a few hours to appreciate the spectacle of talking-heads devouring the carrion of South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's political career, but have heard thrice…
Let’s Get Rid of the Economy of Growth
Cold Spring, NY--It's getting worse and worse, and the wizards don't have a clue. They don't even know the economy is broken-and can't be fixed. That's why they keep doing…
Capitalism as an Unnatural System
Ever since capitalism made its appearance in the late Middle Ages and came to dominate both production and politics in the late 18th century, there has been a vigorous debate…
Notes from the Congress for the New Urbanism
DENVER, COLORADO. It seems like only yesterday that the New Urbanism was really new. But this weekend, with its annual meeting here in Denver, the Congress for the New Urbanism…
Communitarianism, Conservatism, Populism and Localism: An Updated Survey
Wichita, KS [Cross-posted to In Medias Res] Michael Sandel's giving of the prestigious Reith Lectures for the BBC (hat tip: the ever-watchful Harry Brighouse at Crooked Timber) has prompted me…
Face Right, Move Left
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is probably the most popular center-left leader in the world, with an approval rating hovering near 75 percent. Elected in 2007, Rudd is more popular…
With Malice Toward None (Well, Maybe Toward the Thought Police)
Check out this exceptionally fine speech http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ronald-maxwell/on-the-occasion-of-presid_b_212674.html by film director Ron Maxwell (Gettysburg, Gods and Generals), who refused to allow William ("inherited utility monopoly wealth means never having to say…
