Uncategorized 1265
On the 800th Birthday of Magna Carta
At least we can still do this: http://abcnews.go.com/Weird/wireStory/iowa-supreme-court-affirms-drunk-front-porch-31721986
Palmyra, Centurions, and Fighting ISIS from the Bottom Up
The fact that the chattering classes outraged by ISIS’s atrocities would unleash the latter-day centurions of the air so eagerly, while leashing ordinary people so cavalierly, should give pause to…
Localist linkfest
Why Evelyn Waugh stopped voting Parochial plug for the best state, from Nathaniel Beverley Tucker: The Virginian is a Virginian every where. In the wilds of the west, on the…
Saving the Liberal Arts
Damon Linker had a piece at The Week yesterday, explaining "How to save liberal arts education." From the article: The structural trends working against the humanities are just too strong. There…
Cheap Gratitude
Yesterday, The Atlantic ran a piece called, "'I've Never Thanked My Parents for Anything.'" The author--Deepak Singh--explains the differences between "thank you"s in the States, and expressions of gratitude from his…
Localist linkfest
Adam Gurri on persuasion and economics Henry George vs. Jane Jacobs The Upper East Side housewife: a pop-anthropological study With friends like these, the humanities don't need enemies: Enrollment in…
Scary Students
There's a piece at Vox by Edward Schlosser (a pseudonym) entitled "I'm a liberal professor, and my liberal students terrify me." In the piece, the author confesses his own terror of…
New Author Site and Archive
Somewhere between three and seven readers of FPR will be pleased to hear that I have launched a new website that serves to archive publications from various magazines and journals,…
The Philanthropic Revolution
Founding editor Jeremy Beer has just had his very important The Philanthropic Revolution: An Alternative History of American Charity published by UPenn Press. Walter McDougall called it "a synthetic masterpiece,"…
Double Feature
Two articles caught the attention of my Porcher sensibilities today. The first was a piece in the New York Times on urban gardening: Kerry Trueman and Matt Rosenberg began by growing tomatoes…
One Faithful Bee
“Some have affirmed that bees possess a share Of the divine mind and drink ethereal draughts; For God, they say, pervades the whole of creation." …
The Celebratory Layoff
The Atlantic ran a piece this morning on how a California-based company called HopeLab is trying to make layoffs and firings more enlivening: Chris Murchison, the company’s vice president of…
Localist Linkfest
From "Homeschooling and Christian Duty," by Sally Thomas, in First Things: The idea of sending a child daily into a hostile environment—if not actively hostile, as in bullying, then certainly philosophically…
The Mythology of an Anti-Christian Bigot
Though far, in its main argument, from the central concerns of the Porch, some readers may be interested in my account of mythos and the nature of culture as an…
High Salaries, Low Corruption?
I read a piece in The Week today, provocatively entitled "Pay politicians like movie stars!" The author, Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry, has taken aim against cronyism: But much of it, as you already…
The True Conservative
Writes Pat Buchanan of his work these last ten years: Our agenda in that decade was—stay out of wars that are not our business, economic patriotism, secure borders, and America…
Localist linkfest
Patrick Deneen in First Things, on Indiana's RFRA fight: This past spring, we saw something quite different and revealing and worrying. With the imprimatur of American elites, which was clearly given…
Hanging Out with, and Learning from, Some Thoroughly Material Benedictines
[Cross-posted to In Medias Res] A few weeks ago I was able to, once again, do something that I enjoy doing immensely--take a group of students out on a local…
For the Sake of the Children
“… but the soul of the hearer must be prepared by good habits to rejoice in the good and hate the evil, just as the soil must be well tilled…
The Trouble with Limits
Modern persons have a problem with limits, three in fact. They want every good thing to be unlimitedly available for their desires, and scarcity is taken for a cause of…
The Gentlemen from Indiana
Booth Tarkington and Jeremy Beer, that is. From The American Conservative. And what the hell, here's R. Dean Taylor (a Canadian) too.
Localist linkfest
Sarah Perry, who appeared in these pages this week, has another piece at Ribbonfarm on "weaponized sacredness": Preference falsification is a mechanism by which sacredness can operate. But sacredness is…
Silence of the Forest
“The treasures within the earth were long hidden, and trees and forests were thought of as her ultimate gift to mankind. … Even images of shining gold and ivory are…
Localist Linkfest
The John Jay Institute's symposium on home is online now. Go read it, lots of great stuff in there. The State Dept won't let an Iraqi nun in to testify…