liberalism 91

Devon, PA.  Last month, I alerted FPR readers to the appearance of the first part of my essay, "Art and Beauty against the Politicized Aesthetic," in First Principles.  The primary…

In the late 1970s, my grandfather’s older brother, already in his nineties, was pressing his almost deaf ears to a little portable radio still hoping to hear that “the Americans…

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…

“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…

[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…

Seattle, WA Robert Nisbet's 1953 book The Quest for Community has rightfully achieved that rare and estimable status of "classic."     What Nisbet saw more clearly than most of his contemporaries …

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…

Devon, PA.  Last week, Caleb Stegall's reprinting of his article on Community from the Conservative Encyclopedia excited a small objection that the genealogy of conservatism said article offered was untenable…

Devon, PA.  When given the opportunity, I have made no secret of my great admiration for James Kalb's The Tyranny of Liberalism.  Readers of FPR may, from time to time,…

Devon, PA.  Upon reading an essay of Patrick Deneen's, a close and dear relative recently wrote me, protesting the uselessness of the terms "liberal" and "conservative."  They are simplifying terms, and inadequate…

Last week's motley collection of protests against taxation, centralization and the Government are now old news, but their spirit remains perennially relevant. Invoked in the name of the original "Boston…

Mt. Airy, Philadelphia. Before it became a science of supply and demand and the circulation of commodities, economics was originally understood as the wisdom of household management. The Greek word…

Alexandria, VA. For many years now, "environmentalists" have sought to thwart the extension of forms of commerce and economic development that prove destructive of "eco-systems" or threaten the delicate balance…

Via John Schwenkler, I see that Norman Borlaug has just celebrated his 95th birthday. Borlaug, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, is one of the primary architects of modern…

Russell wrote:  This is, perhaps, why Caleb Stegall and those like him are, to me anyway, the most important-if not necessarily the most persuasive-of all the localists and agrarians out…

MT. AIRY, PHILADELPHIA. Before I say something rather abstract about concrete things, a few personal words about what (and who) lies behind these thoughts may be in order. The photo…

Alexandria, VA A few nights ago in Washington D.C., Wendell Berry was among the speakers at what turned out to be a pep rally for opponents of global warming.  They…

SOUTH BEND, IN. Edmund Burke's reputation has suffered much among conservatives during the past few years. Russell Kirk, of course, held him up as an exemplary genius of the conservative…

BURNED-OVER DISTRICT, NY. It’s town meeting day in the once and future republic of Vermont.  Herewith, from the American Conservative, my profile of Frank Bryan, the University of Vermont professor…