n 1793, Captain Horatio Nelson took command of HMS Agamemnon, a 64-gun ship of the line in the British Navy, at the start of one of England’s perennial wars with France. The two nations had been fighting for almost half of the more than 700 years that had elapsed since William of Normandy conquered the […]
RRAYED, pp. Drawn up and given an orderly disposition, as a rioter hanged to a lamp-post. That’s a quotation from The Devil’s Dictionary, by Ambrose Bierce. It popped into my head just now for some reason, but before exploring that reason and the inferences that might be drawn from it, let’s spend some more time […]
If you’ve ever been to Canada, you’ve found yourself quite at home, eh? True, the money looks different, and the speed limits are posted in kilometers per hour, and people say “aboat” when they mean “about,” and cafes offer orange marmalade instead of “mixed fruit jelly,” and red maple leaves wave where you’re used to […]
At National Review, the erstwhile flagship of American conservatism, Jim Geraghty puts out a bulletin called “The Morning Jolt.” On the morning after Tuesday’s off-year elections, the “Jolt” was mostly negative for conservatives. Geraghty noted a few successes: winning the Mississippi governor’s race, improving the Republican Party’s position in the New Jersey legislature, narrowly rejecting […]
The recent uproar over whether the Democrats’ machinations against President Donald Trump are comparable to a lynching has died down, as uproars surrounding our 45th president always do. But further exploration of the question may yield something useful, not only to Trump but to the nation. People have called what’s happening to Trump a witch […]
In 1841, Texas vigilantes tied up “Buckskin Bill” McFadden and led him to a tree. As they threw a rope over one of its limbs, McFadden cursed his killers. “You’ve stolen my life and you’ll wade through blood for it. You fellows that are grinning now will bleed and die to pay for this murder.” […]
No one speaks of a century’s first decade as “the aughts.” Few of us speak of the second decade as “the teens.” But by the time the third decade comes around, we seem to have gotten used to the charming fact that we’re in a new chapter of history. Our shouts of “It’s the 21st […]
The Drudge Report on Thursday featured an arresting headline: “D.C. Tourist Savagely Beaten, Stomped, Spit on by Gang of Youths.” Who could resist clicking on that? The link went a Gateway Pundit story, which supplies the additional information that the attack took place outside the Washington Hilton Hotel, where President Ronald Reagan and three others […]
When I was a boy, everyone said the epitome of Shakespeare is Hamlet’s soliloquy. The soliloquy, the one from Act III, the one that poses the question: “To be, or not to be.” Those words, like the first four notes of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, are instantly recognizable, a pocket summary of an entire cultural tradition. […]
The crook is in a parking lot trying to break into a car when he sees a lady with shopping bags approaching her vehicle. Pretending to be a friendly stranger, he insists on helping her load the bags into her trunk. She tells him that since she didn’t ask for his help, he won’t be […]
At the end of his documentary series “The Civil War,” Ken Burns bids farewell to many of the figures who drove that story. They departed this earth in touching, even inspiring ways. There’s General Ulysses S. Grant, stricken with cancer, racing the Reaper to produce an autobiography and thereby provide for his family, and finishing […]
background_repeat=”no-repeat” hover_type=”none” border_position=”all” animation_type=”” animation_direction=”left” animation_speed=”0.3″ [fusion_text columns=”” column_min_width=”” column_ rule_style=”default” rule_size=”” rule_color=”” class=”” id=””] In the spring of 1519, the Aztec god-king Montezuma II received word that strange, marvelous creatures had appeared on his empire’s eastern shore. Fearing either to receive or destroy them, he sent envoys with orders to greet them, offer them […]
Former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, now governor of California, heard a still, small voice the other night. The voice said, “Gavin, the intentional killing of another person is wrong.” So His Excellency stepped forth the next day and announced he was taking steps to close every military installation in the state. Sorry, my mistake. […]
Did you hear that Phil Robertson has a new book out? Yes, the “Duck Dynasty” patriarch, author of Happy Happy Happy, UnPHILtered, and (in a previous life) War and Peace, has just written The Theft of America’s Soul: Blowing the Lid Off the Lies That Are Destroying Our Country. You can tell by the title […]
Mean People Suck.” I first saw that bumper-sticker slogan almost 20 years ago, pinned to the office bulletin board at the newspaper where I worked. It struck me as a little strange, much like what Jon Stewart called a “moment of zen.” Isn’t it mean to tell people they suck? Yet my progressive media colleagues […]
President Trump is down but not out,” says the headline in the New York Post. Beneath it, columnist Michael Goodwin writes that Trump is “battered, bruised and beaten,” his polls cratering, his presidency “at low tide,” and his enemies “riding high.” Worse than that, Trump’s failure to extract from those enemies any funding for a […]
Sister Souljah had a point. Younger readers may have some trouble figuring out who Sister Souljah was, or what her point might have been. We’ll get to that. For now, let’s just say that if Donald Trump were to gather a group of black leaders around him and say, “Sister Souljah had a point,” heads […]
Americans these days are nothing if not angry, but are we angry at the right people? Consider the recent set-to between President Donald Trump and CNN’s designated Trump tormentor, Jim Acosta. The irrepressible Acosta was declaiming to the president that the caravan of Central Americans making its way through Mexico to the U.S. border could […]