George Bush Jr and George Bush Sr.

Who Killed the New Majority?

The Republican National Committee has produced an “autopsy” on what went wrong in 2012, when the party failed to win the White House and lost seats in Congress. Yet, the crisis of the Grand Old Party goes back much further. First, some history. The Frank Lloyd Wright of the New ...

Was Iraq Worth It?

Ten years ago today, U.S. air, sea and land forces attacked Iraq. And the great goals of Operation Iraqi Freedom? Destroy the chemical and biological weapons Saddam Hussein had amassed to use on us or transfer to al-Qaida for use against the U.S. homeland. Exact retribution for Saddam’s ...

Pope Francis—Against the West?

“The Faith is Europe. And Europe is the Faith,” wrote Hilaire Belloc after that bloodbath we call World War I. “Either Europe will return to the Faith or she will perish.” By 1938, Belloc concluded Christian Europe was done: “The bad work begun at the Reformation is ...

John McCain

Who Speaks Now for the GOP?

Last Wednesday, Sen. Rand Paul rose on the Senate floor to declare a filibuster and pledge he would not sit down until either he could speak no longer or got an answer to his question about Barack Obama’s war powers. Does the president, Paul demanded to know, in the absence of an imminent ...

Bibi

Infantile Conservatism

Regularly now, The Washington Post, as always concerned with fairness and balance, runs a blog called “Right Turn: Jennifer Rubin’s Take From a Conservative Perspective.” The blog tells us what the Post regards as conservatism. On Monday, Rubin declared that America’s ...

Who Killed the Middle Class?

“It is our generation’s task, then, to reignite the true engine of America’s economic growth—a rising, thriving middle class.” So said Barack Obama in his State of the Union. And for one of his ideas to reignite that engine, Republicans applauded. “And ...

Pope Benedict XVI

A Godly Man in an Ungodly Age

“To govern the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me.” With ...

Senator Chuck Hagel

The Republican Obsession

If last week’s hearing for Chuck Hagel raised questions about his capacity to be secretary of defense, the show trial conducted by his inquisitors on the tribunal raised questions about the GOP. Is the Republican Party, as currently constituted, even capable of conducting a foreign policy ...

America’s Role in a Darkening Age

When, in the 1950s, Nikita Khrushchev said, “We will bury you,” and, “Your children will live under communism,” Eisenhower’s America scoffed. By 1980, however, the tide did indeed seem to be with the East. America had suffered a decade of defeats. Southeast Asia had ...

The Old Republic and Obama’s America

“Second Term Begins With a Sweeping Agenda for Equality,” ran the eight-column banner in which The Washington Post captured the essence of Obama’s second inaugural. There he declared: “What binds this nation together ... what makes us exceptional—what makes us ...