Johann Neem — Revenge of the Poorly Educated

This post is an essay by one of my favorite historians, Johann Neem.  It's a review of a new book, After the Ivory Tower Falls, written by Will Branch.  In this review, Neem examines the way that the divide between those who attended college and those who didn't has defined and defiled American politics in …

Eric Levitz — The Diploma Divide

This post is a recent essay by Eric Levitz, which was published in New York Magazine in October.  Here's a link to the original. He explores an issue that has been a major concern of mine in recent years, the role that higher education has had in exacerbating political divisions in the US and elsewhere in …

William Galston — When Character Reigned

This post is a lovely essay by William Galston about the importance of character in political life, which was published recently in American Prospect.  Here's a link to the original.   His case in point is George Washington, whose own character was the key to American independence and the formative influence on establishing the American presidency.   …

Francis Fukuyama — Liberalism and Its Discontents

This post is a reflection on Francis Fukuyama's new book, Liberalism and Its Discontents.   The book provides the best and clearest discussion I've seen about the power and appeal of liberalism and the nature of the negative reactions it has been generating, especially in recent years.  Attacked from both left and right, threatened by populist …

Max Weber’s “Politics as a Vocation” and the Role of Professor

This post is a reflection on Max Weber's "Politics as a Vocation," which he gave in 1919 at Munich University.  "Science as a Vocation" is the other famous speech he gave at Munich in 1917, which I posted here three years ago.   Compared to the science lecture, it's very long -- 23,000 words -- so …

William Deresiewicz — On the Smug Dysfunction of the US Meritocracy

This post is a lovely essay by William Deresiewicz about what he calls "blue state culture."  It's published in the current issue of Salmagundi, and it's available without paywall at this link .  This issue of the magazine presents a series of responses to a powerful piece by David Brooks last fall in Atlantic, “How …

Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address

My post today is a classic document from American political history, Abraham Lincoln's second inaugural address.  He delivered it on March 4, 1865, only 41 days before his assassination.  At only 702 words, it's one of the shortest political speeches of all time, but it's amazing to watch how Lincoln deploys these words.  The last …

Michael Lind — America’s Asymmetric Civil War

This post is an essay by Michael Lind that was published in Tablet in early January.  Here's a link to the original. Lind is an astute scholar of the growing divisions in American cultural and political life, and in this essay he unpacks the nature of this divide in a manner I find both original …

David Frum: Democracies Fail in the Absence of Strong Conservative Parties

This post is a piece by David Frum that was published in 2017 by Atlantic. Here's a link to the original. There has been a lot of talk lately about the threats to democracy, brought on by the disaster of the Trump administration and other shifts toward populist autocracy around the world.  In this essay, …

Online Gaming Is Teaching Us that We Live in a World Without Constraints

This post is a piece by Francis Fukuyama published February 8 in American Purpose.  Here's a link to the original. What I particularly like about this brief analysis is the way he uses his own experience trying to work with an engineering design and manufacturing software to throw light on the recent invasion of the …