During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England, the English Parliament put forth measures designed to reform the theological doctrines and rituals of the Church of England. This church was founded during the reign of Henry VIII in 1534 after separating papal authority from England to annul his marriage to his first wife and
MoreOn April 29, 1962, President John F. Kennedy held a dinner honoring Nobel Prize winners of the Western Hemisphere, considered the brightest minds at the time. To the winners, President Kennedy remarked: “I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House,
MoreA recent headline at Politico begins, “Don’t Blame Mental Illness for Mass Shootings; Blame Men.” To be fair to the author, Laura Kiesel, she probably didn’t choose that title. And to be doubly fair, she doesn’t blame men in general for mass shooting. She does — correctly — point out that the overwhelming majority of people who
MoreWriting for the Wall Street Journal in 2005, federal judge and former U.S. deputy attorney general Laurence Silberman recalled how he was “shocked” to discover the extent the FBI abused its power to spy on Americans. Speaking of the first time he reviewed the files of J. Edgar Hoover, Silberman writes how Hoover tasked “his agents with reporting privately to
MoreSeeing as historical racism and historical guilt/corruption of blood are apparently all the rage of discussion nowadays, I feel it is time once again to discuss the complexities of historical racism and reveal that things were never quite as simple as they’re assumed to be. A smug talking point that Europeans will never cease to
MoreLatin American revolutionary Simón Bolívar is commonly referred to as the George Washington of Latin America by numerous scholars and political figures. Bolívar’s military prowess was unquestioned, as he led a vigorous liberation campaign that freed present-day Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela from the grasp of the Spanish Empire. Bolívar’s exploits have become legend in Latin American political history,
MoreThe exploits of John Brown have long fascinated historians. His actions, for better or worse, certainly had a significant effect on the country prior to Southern secession, but the fascination with Brown is largely driven by the enigma the man himself has proven to be. In trying to explain his actions and motives, historians have
MoreChanges to the presidency in recent memory have often meant a shift in ideology. Former President Bill Clinton was a liberal Democrat, but George W. Bush was a neoconservative. The most recent member of the ex-presidents’ club, Barack Obama, began as a progressive Democrat before finding his way to the establishment. While initially staying quiet,
MoreBefore the US Constitution of 1787 was ratified, its proponents had claimed a centralized and powerful American state was necessary for the purposes of military defense. But, as the Anti-Federalists of the time pointed out, the older constitution (known as the Articles of Confederation) had already been sufficient enough to allow the colonies to defeat what was
MoreHere are the portraits of famous figures from the Civil War: The first is a Democrat. Politically, he was the polar opposite of Abraham Lincoln and the new Republican Party. He was ardently pro-slavery. He supported the Lecompton Constitution that sought to make Kansas a slave state, and favored the Dred Scott decision that threw out
MoreWhy was James Madison so critical of democracies? Moreover, why was he so concerned about them when, according to the definition he provided, “democracies” basically don’t exist anywhere, either in his time or in our own. Today, many conservatives like to claim that “the Founding Fathers” opposed democracy and supported less majoritarian republics. However, as
MoreOn November 21, after 37 years in power, Zimbabwe’s dictator, Robert Mugabe, resigned in infamy. By contrast, the late South African leader, Nelson Mandela, was revered in the West. His successor, Thabo Mbeki, was well-respected. Yet over the decades, both Mandela and Mbeki lent their unqualified support to Mugabe. When the baton was passed from
MoreBeing “pro-life” means a person opposes abortion. But while the pro-life movement seeks to change hearts and minds about abortion, the ultimate goal of the movement is to make abortion illegal. Abortion doctors murder babies, and they should be prosecuted for the crime. How can the pro-life movement bring about the legal prohibition of abortion?
MoreAmong the Grassy Knoll Left, the CIA has always been the prime suspect in the JFK assassination. In their scenario, the Agency had good reason to kill the president as his supposed attempts to end the Cold War threatened the justification for their existence and the source of their sinister power. With the president who
MoreWhen female biographers examine subjects of the same gender via traditionalist institutions (marriage, motherhood), feminists are quick to blast them for affirming the male stereotype of women writers as being unable to write about anything unconnected to a man. But such a view is a-historical when one is dealing with a subject that did not
MoreA retired CIA agent was once asked what he would say to Kim Philby, an MI5 agent who spied for Joseph Stalin, if he encountered the defector in Moscow. Rather than angrily confront Philby, the American stated he would ask with considerable satisfaction, “How do you like Moscow now, Kim?” If for once Philby was
MoreThere’s an old saying that has a kernel of truth to it: “That it takes a maniac to defeat a maniac.” There are exceptions to this rule as in the case of the calm and empirical Joseph Welch destroying the fanatical Joseph McCarthy with one phrase (“Have you no sense of decency?”). But more often
MoreUber-liberal Orson Welles once offered as a reason for his friendship with the equally conservative John Wayne was that the latter had “better manners” than the director’s liberal friends. There is certainly a kernel of truth in this when viewed from our vantage point. There are of course some instances where conservatives go into the
MoreCharlie Elphicke is the Conservative Member of Parliament for Dover and Deal. This makes him my Member of Parliament. On Friday the 3rd November 2017, he discovered – via the media, he says, not from any official notification – that he was suspended from the Conservative Party, and that the Police had been asked to
MoreDo you know who Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were? Do you know what they did? Do you know what happened to them? I’ll save you a trip to Wikipedia: They sold us out to the Rooskies and when we caught them, we sent them to the chair. Those were the days. Professional bullsh-t artists like
MoreHistory is always changing over time. As perspectives shift and fresh minds assess old information, events are judged from varying points of view. Sometimes history is even lucky enough to benefit from new information and these nuggets can fill in the blanks. But sometimes, we get remarkable insight and a treasure trove of information. This
MoreAmericans today consider the Supreme Court to be the final arbiter of the Constitution. Politicians and voters alike will fight tooth and nail over legal questions facing the judicial system, even criticizing Supreme Court rulings when initially handed down. But give a Supreme Court decision enough time and Americans eventually acquiesce. The question becomes “settled.”
MoreSpeculation has been mounting with less than a week remaining before the deadline for the final Warren Commission pages to be released. The public has been eagerly awaiting and there has been bipartisan support for the declassification. But the President had yet to offer any public indication as to whether he would allow the documents
MoreWhile the official story has largely remained in tact for decades, questions and theories have still loomed regarding JFK’s assassination. The Warren Commission report concluded a long investigation, but countless pages remain classified. Under a 1992 law, the deadline to release the remaining documents is this month. The only person who can stop this release
MoreIn honor of last week’s Trump/Tillerson IQ Test kerfuffle, I decided to do a very politically relevant anthropology article. Well, even more politically relevant than the other times I talk anthropology, a topic that is literally the most important thing that nobody is talking about. So a few days ago, the president got into a bit
MoreOn July 1, 1991, President George H.W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court to replace Thurgood Marshall, America’s first black justice. For compensation, President Bush decided to nominate a second black justice, but this time one with conservative views, which turned out to be extraordinarily controversial. Thomas’ nomination was already fairly controversial even before
MoreFor decades, the assassination of former President John Fitzgerald Kennedy has been subject to numerous conspiracy theories. While the official story states one man, Lee Harvey Oswald, acted alone, many offer different explanations for what really happened continue to persist. The theories range from foreign actors and communist plots to more sinister ideas such as
MoreWell, it’s Christopher Columbus Day again. And this, of course, means that it is but another occasion for leftists everywhere to repudiate their own civilization. For a few decades now, the 15th century European explorer’s face has been held up as that of Western civilization, i.e. the face of all that is evil in the
MoreIn the final outcome, we must temper the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients with the rule of law. It was Obama who unconstitutionally allowed them to stay, an illegal action that President Trump is trying to bring back to the rule of law that this country is based upon. The children involved in
MoreOn May 22, 1856, South Carolina Representatives Preston Brooks and Laurence Keitt, along with Virginia Representative Henry Edmundson, made a visit to the Senate chamber. When they arrived, the balcony above the chamber still contained some straggling observers, mostly wives of senators. Since Brooks and Keitt were southern gentlemen, they respectfully waited for the ladies
MoreEdward Gibbon (1737-94) was born into an old and moderately wealthy family that had its origins in Kent. Sickly as a child, he was educated at home, and sent while still a boy to Oxford. There, an illegal conversion to Roman Catholicism ruined his prospects of a career in the professions or the City. His
MoreThe assassination of former President John F. Kennedy is known as one of the most tragic moments in United States history. A popular, young President was riding along in a motorcade in Dallas when he was shot dead sitting next to his wife, Jackie. The assassin would later be caught and then killed before he
MoreWhen a member of the House of Commons rises to speak on a subject in which he has a pecuniary interest, both the rules of the House and plain decency require him to declare that interest. It is a just requirement, and I propose to follow it here. My agreed title for this morning is
More“Two things are infinite: the Universe and human stupidity; and I’m not sure about the Universe.” Albert Einstein In the political struggle for man’s superiority over the state (the Right), and supporters of the state’s superiority over man (the Left), we naturally arrive at a final crisis. Why final? Because the Left seems to have
More“Anybody who would trash Lee and laud Lincoln is either stupid as a post or just plain evil…” This applies in spades to anyone who would laud the Radical Republicans of 1865, as one TV GOP blonde has recently, and asininely, done. The Radical Republicans, if you can believe it, considered Abraham Lincoln a moderate
MoreHitler was a very good student. Those who read Mein Kampf will find therein many good words about America. More precisely, not about the whole of America, but about the numerous attempts of the American socialists to change the foundations of the American way of life. The ideas of forced sterilization and forced abortion were
MoreLast week we delved into Coming of Age in Samoa, and now we’ll deal with its repercussions. As a casual glance around would inform you, much of the discussion of masculinity that goes on in this day and age is roughly “why don’t we just…change it? After all, there’s nothing inherent about it, it’s all just
More“Some crazy person just compared President Abraham Lincoln to Hitler. Yes, this just happened on CNN and Brooke Baldwin’s reaction was perfect.” So scribbled one Ricky Davila on social media. Indeed, an elderly Southern gentleman had ventured that President Lincoln, not General Lee, murdered civilians, a point even a Court historian and a Lincoln idolater
MoreThere’s an old saying that “he who distinguishes well teaches well.” In other words, if one’s going to talk about an important subject, one should be able to define his terms and tell the difference between two things that are not the same. This wisdom, unfortunately, is rarely embraced by modern pundits arguing about the
MoreIn 1852, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech in Springfield, Illinois in which he talked about the attempts at required militia training. He described how much of a joke the citizens made of any attempt at mandatory militia training. “No man,” Lincoln said, citing the rules, “is to wear more than five pounds of cod-fish for
MoreI’m not going to bother going over the gory details of the national disgrace that unfolded in Charlottesville, VA on Saturday. It’s been hashed out over and over again, and there’s nothing to be gained by putting it under a microscope here. But I do have some observations that I’d like to share. First, there
MoreFrom its beginnings, academics abroad, and for a time within Germany, attacked the Nazi regime’s appeal to the uneducated, ignorant, and mindless as a reflection of those who peopled Hitler’s dictatorship in general and his inner circle in particular. This had a basis in reality, for among Heinrich Himmler, Martin Bormann, Herman Goering, it was
MoreOn the eve of the federal convention, and following its adjournment in September of 1787, the Anti-Federalists made the case that the Constitution makers in Philadelphia had exceeded the mandate they were given to amend the Articles of Confederation, and nothing more. The Federal Constitution augured ill for freedom, argued the Anti-Federalists. These unsung heroes
MoreTime has not been kind to the Spanish Civil War, which, among the Left at least, ranks up there with World War II as “the good war.” Russian declassified documents show that Stalin was trying to import his horrific Purge Trials into Loyalist Spain by attempting to execute en masse his Spanish opposition in the
MoreBiographers of literary critic Edmund Wilson have asserted that the writer who bears the closest resemblance to Wilson, who reigned as America’s premier man of letters from the 1920s—1960s, is George Orwell. Writing of his subject, Lewis Dabney sought to validate this trans-Atlantic connection by stating that, like Wilson, Orwell was “a social critic who’d
MoreAs Hillary Clinton continues her “excuse” tour regarding her decisive loss to Trump, ranging from the now well-worn Russian collusion thesis to weak support from Obama during the campaign to an ineffective and shattered DNC, many Democrats have sought to acquaint her with the painful reality that she was simply a bad candidate. Such frankness,
MoreIt is said, cold-bloodedly, that JFK died in the most romantic and, based on what was to come for the remainder of the 1960s, fortunate way possible. For his death bathed his image in golden lights that did not cling to him while he lived, and allowed him to miss the consequences of many of
MoreAs we are well into the first year of the Trump administration, and leftists are still walking around in a dim haze of incredulity, I’d like to reflect a little on why the man was elected. As some of you have probably inferred from the title, I am (on paper) a “coastal elitist.” I was
MoreOne of the more transparently manipulative and hypocritical slogans used by Western Communist Parties in the mid 1930s to recruit allies for Stalin was specifically designed for Catholics: “You can still take Communion and love the Soviet Union.” Graham Greene, novelist, pundit, and above all, Catholic, embodied this slogan. Indeed, Greene’s attempts to link Catholicism
MoreConservatives today locate the origins of the “mainstream media” in the Watergate and Vietnam era; when every reporter since has wanted to have the presidency-toppling effect of a Woodward and Bernstein. But from Watergate on, the presidencies that reporters have wanted toppled have been exclusively Republican ones. Much of this partisanship had to do with
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