“That states should attempt to dispense with theological supports is one of the many crucial experiments that bewilder our brains and unsettle our ways today. Laws which were once presented as the decrees of a god-given king are now frankly the confused commands of fallible men. Education, which was the sacred province of god-inspired priests, becomes the task of men and women shorn of theological robes and awe, and relying on reason and persuasion to civilize young rebels who fear only the policeman and may never learn to reason at all. “
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“History does repeat itself, but the soundtrack is different, and the sequel is usually disappointing”. – HO
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“We must remind ourselves again that history as usually written (peccavimus) is quite different from history as usually lived: the historian records the exceptional because it is interesting—because it is exceptional. “
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From Victor Davis Hanson
“we need to take a deep breath and concede that sometimes past mellifluous appeasement is more dangerous than present flamboyant deterrence — just as the sober and discreet can be more adroit in warping the Constitution through distortions and corruptions of the Justice Department, the IRS, the FBI, and the FISA courts than are the profane and rambunctious.”
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by Henry Oliner The first Progressive Era from Teddy Roosevelt through Woodrow Wilson established the regulatory and administrative state and changed the nature of our government. It was tainted by an elitist view of race that used the science of
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From Ben Shapiro at National Review, We Can’t Erase History — Or Simplify It History is important only if we recognize that it isn’t some sort of Punch-and-Judy drama to be acted out with puppets in black hats and white. Most
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The concluding paragraphs of Deirdre McCloskey’s Bourgeois Dignity- Why Economics Can’t Explain The Modern World: Yet innovation, even in a proper system of the virtues, has continued to be scorned by many of our opinion makers now for a century
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From a book review of Conserving America? by Patrick Deneen- review by Micah Medowcroft- Trump Didn’t Kill Conservatism in The Wall Street Journal: In our republic, argues Mr. Deneen, a conception of men “not as parts of wholes, but as wholes apart” has
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From a book review of Conserving America? by Patrick Deneen- review by Micah Medowcroft- Trump Didn’t Kill Conservatism in The Wall Street Journal: The two dominant alternatives to this fixation on the present are progressivism’s focus on the future and what
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“Unfortunately for Britain- and fortunately for America the generation that emerged to lead the colonies into independence was one of the most remarkable group of men in history-sensible, broad-minded, courageous, usually well educated, gifted in a variety of ways, and
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I am reading an excellent biography of Alan Greenspan by Sebastian Mallaby titled The Man Who Knew. I recommend it as much for its illumination of the economy, the Fed’s role, and political decisions as for its portrayal of Mr.
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The Electoral College was carefully designed to fulfill a similar purpose of the constitution, to apply a break on majoritarian tyranny. The framers understood that democracy and demagogue had the same root. To the greatly disappointed Democrats who lament the
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Ike’s Gamble by Michael Doran is an account of the 1956 Suez Crisis with a perspective different from many previous ones which were directed from narratives from CIA players at the time. The United States under Eisenhower supported the rise
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I attended a Hillsdale College Free Market Forum in Atlanta last week. I was able to meet Don Boudreaux from Café Hayek, one of my daily go to blogs, and Ronald Pestritto, a history professor at Hillsdale. Ron authored three
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George Will wrote an excellent piece in National Affairs, The Limits of Majority Rule. My very brief summary and a few comments: The Progressive pivot of about 1890- but reached in full bore under FDR is when democracy superseded liberty
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from Roger Kimball at The Wall Street Journal. Since Men Aren’t Angels: Madison, Hamilton and other supporters of the Constitution worried about the potential incursions of federal power just as much as did the anti-Federalists, who opposed adopting the Constitution
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From National Affairs George Will writes The Limits of Majority Rule. It is an excellent summary of the history of the court as it has moved from judicial review to activism. The success of Progressivism has hinged on the court shifting from
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From National Affairs George Will writes The Limits of Majority Rule. I strongly recommend you read the entire essay. an excerpt: So, we must ask: How aberrant, or how frequent, are abusive majorities? A related but different question is: When legislatures, which
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From National Affairs George Will writes The Limits of Majority Rule. : an excerpt: If the sole, or overriding, goal of the Constitution can be reduced to establishing democracy, and if the distilled essence of democracy is that majorities shall rule in
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From National Affairs George Will writes The Limits of Majority Rule. I strongly recommend you read the entire essay. an excerpt: Another reason many conservatives favor judicial deference and restraint is what can be called the conservative populist temptation. Conservatives are hardly
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