Even the most sagacious among us can be snookered by manipulative con men. This essay originally appeared in Law & Liberty on April 27, 2022 (here). Thanks to Instapundit (here), Power Line, Real Clear Policy (here), the Leighton Smith Podcast (here), and Real Clear Books (here)! I’m ho…
History & Culture
Redneck Poet: Working Man’s Robert Frost?
Merle Haggard, a country music icon, was emblematic of a tumultuous era in America. He deserves to be remembered. This essay originally appeared in Law & Liberty, on March 4, 2022 (here). Thanks to Power Line, Real Clear Books (here), Scott Johnson’s Sunday Morning Coming Down (here, he…
Holiday Reading Suggestions
This is likely my last post for the year. Merry Christmas! Thanks to Power Line, and Real Clear Books (here)! My editors at Law & Liberty invited some contributors to make suggestions for holiday reading. Enjoy!
Is History for Sale?
He who pays the piper, calls the tune. The same is apparently true for benefactors of historical sites. Radical leftists such as Robin DiAngelo risibly contend that “American wealth was built on the labor of kidnapped and enslaved Africans and their descendants.” They likewise contend…
An Elegy for the Boy Scouts
Lord Baden-Powell, who founded the venerable organization, would not recognize what it has become. An edited version of this essay first appeared in Law & Liberty on July 27, 2021 (here). Thanks to Power Line, Instapundit (here), Real Clear Policy (here), SE Texas Record (here), The Leader Ma…
No-Fault Divorce and Its Discontents
“Back to the Future” is not the solution to America’s marriage crisis. This essay began as a letter to the editor of the magazine Chronicles (a section they call “Polemics & Exchanges”). The editors styled the exchanges between Stephen Baskerville and me “Matrimony Mon…
The Importance of Curiosity
Why Eden’s fatal sin is a necessary virtue in this mortal coil. This essay first appeared in Law & Liberty, on April 26, 2021 (here). Thanks to Real Clear Policy and Real Clear Books! Curiosity was once thought to be, in the words of English historian G.M. Trevelyan, “the life blood of re…
Is Nullification an Option?
Opponents of the Leviathan will find no succor in the imagined panacea of nullification. A slightly edited version of this essay first appeared in Law & Liberty on April 2, 2021 (here). Thanks to Instapundit (here), and The Tennessee Star (here)! The Tenth Amendment Center gets confused about…
The Perilously Impermanent Past
Roy Rogers is not the only American icon facing the end of the trail in the 21st century. In order to achieve primacy, the leftist mythology requires that the pantheon of American heroes be dethroned. This essay originally appeared in Law & Liberty on February 18, 2021 (here). Thanks to Power…
How Political Ideology is Pushing Religion Out of Religious Studies
The new revivalists preach a secular gospel of identity politics and social justice, with college classrooms as their pulpit This essay was originally published by the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal on April 29, 2020 (here). Thanks to the John Locke Foundation’s Locker Room Blo…