How to govern well
What do Singapore, the United States, Canada, Denmark, and England all have in common? At first glance, not much. One is an oligarchic city state, two are parliamentary democracies, another is a Scandinavian social...
Author: Will
Christine O’Donnell on “The Women of Middle Earth”
Via Politico, here’s O’Donnell’s old Catholic Exchange article on Tolkien and gender.
Saul Alinsky, conservative?
There’s a lot of good stuff in Jesse Walker’s review of Radical: A Portrait of Saul Alinsky, but here’s my favorite bit: In the early ’60s, the book reveals, Barry Goldwater contacted Alinsky and...
Forget viability. What about competence?
A quick question about the O’Donnell win in Delaware: At what point does a candidate’s personal problems or demonstrable lack of competence become a reason not to vote for them? O’Donnell really does seem...
Five Books on American Conservatism
Looking for a Fall reading list? You could do worse than a few of the titles from the Five Books symposium on conservatism.
The Costs of Empire
One interesting footnote from our recent debate over war and material self-interest is the question of the British Empire. Namely, did the Brits actually benefit from conquering all those foreign territories?
J-E-T-S!
It’s official – every male who’s ever tossed a football is guilty of sexual harrasment: It was also claimed that players were deliberately overthrowing passes to allow them to retrieve the ball from near...
Quote of the Day
Via commenter Gilbert, who manages to tweak two League contributors in one fell swoop: The materialist theory of history, that all politics and ethics are the expression of economics, is a very simple fallacy...
How to get rich quick in Medieval Europe
Note: I hope I’m not boring everyone with these digressions into the history of the Crusades, but I’ll stick with this example because Erik brought it up originally and because it aptly demonstrates that...
Melville and American Foreign Policy
I’d highly recommend Walter Russell Meade on Melville’s Benito Cereno, a novella I remember slogging through in English class. Who knew high school reading lists could prove so useful?
What White People Really Like
Striking, hilarious results from OkCupid (an online dating site) reveal what different ethnic groups are really into.
Wars of plunder?
In an uncharacteristically silly post, Erik asserts that all wars are either defensive or driven by “plunder.” He also suggests that the United States’ invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were somehow motivated by a...
“This, then, is the essence of being a hipster. Pretending you aren’t one.”
Psychology Today takes on the sad science of hipsterism.
Magic Bus
Public Service Announcement: The League of Ordinary Gentlemen officially endorses letting your kid walk to school. Also: I hope there’s a special circle of hell reserved for busy-body elementary school administrators.
The Organized Labor-Neoconservative Nexus
There’s a lot of interesting stuff in this Nation article on the Progressive split over China policy, but Labor’s belligerent tone is pretty striking: AAM’s Paul expressed grave concern about China’s efforts to enhance...
Intervention and Moral Hazards
Michael Brendan Dougherty highlights an article suggesting that humanitarian interventions actually increase the likelihood of genocide and ethnic cleansing:
Lomborg Recants
Well, this is interesting (via Grist): The world’s most high-profile climate change sceptic is to declare that global warming is “undoubtedly one of the chief concerns facing the world today” and “a challenge humanity...
