Doubt & Certainty continued
“The whole problem with the world is that fools & fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.” ~ Bertrand Russell, via commenter TKOEd’s comments in the first...
Tagged: conservatism
On Certainty & Doubt
“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with...
Against Intellectual Provincialism
Epistemic Closure Revisited Eons ago in blog-years, Julian Sanchez provoked some indignant responses by suggesting that conservatives are too dependent on a closed, self-referential media ecosystem. Sanchez’s original post elicited a sharp reply from...
Speaking of the World’s Most Infamous Creed Apologist
(UPDATED BELOW THE FOLD) Joe Carter, with whom Barrett will be brawling beginning tomorrow, makes a highly unique argument with regards to the Tea Party, at least to the extent that he is making...
Fair & Balanced
Mike Farmer objects to my criticism of Fox News as a network which appeals to the doing brain rather than the thinking brain: E.D. Kain tries to write a fair and balanced post on...
Once a Man, Like the Sea I Raged…
I see that it’s time once again for conservatives to worry that the American male is insufficiently masculine. Someone should tell them that the very first sign of insufficient masculinity is worrying about insufficient...
Narrative Over Principle: The Perils of Believing Your Own Propaganda
I’ve not got a whole heck of a lot to add to this very good paragraph from Glenn Greenwald on the whole hubbub over the propriety of the Obama Administration’s entirely speculative suggestions (with...
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 New Culture War
Over at the Washington Examiner, I have a three–part–series on the new culture wars. In Part One I talk about the breakdown of the modern conservative movement and the Three-Legged Stool. Now, thirty years...
On conservatism and such
There have been a number of reactions lately to my decision to no longer consider myself a ‘conservative’. Few have been exactly favorable. Perhaps that is because I have not been clear enough or...
Toward a positive conservatism
“How much time he gains who does not look to see what his neighbor says or does or thinks, but only at what he does himself, to make it just and holy.” – Marcus...
Toward an organic society
I have been a bit of a curmudgeon lately. Cranky and disillusioned by the fact that the tribe with whom I most often agree on policy and economic issues seems determined to shoot themselves...
Perception vs. Reality
Via E.D.’s True/slant blog, I agree that Conor Friedersdorf did yeoman’s work on this piece demonstrating the wide difference between what movement conservatives think the ACLU does and what the ACLU actually does. I...
The conservative disposition
Jason has just given you the liberal-libertarian disposition, so I thought I’d try my hand at explaining why I’m sometimes drawn to the conservative alternative. My knowledge of political philosophy is almost nil, so...
Once More into the Liber-al-tarian Breach
Erik’s post today gives me a good excuse to better define and clarify what I’m talking about when I talk about liber-al-tarianism and the notion that the intermediate-term future of libertarianism lies more with the...
Kagan and the Conservatives
I haven’t had enough time to dig into soon-to-be-Justice Kagan’s record in nearly the depth that I would like, and I’m not expecting to have all that much time to provide a fitting analysis. ...
Red families & blue families
My wife and I lived together for two years prior to tying the knot, though we were both still in college when we finally made our vows. We’d known each other and dated for...
All the American Tories
Daniel McCarthy has perhaps the best take on Red Toryism and its incompatibility with the realities of American politics I have seen yet. One important factor behind the success of traditional, pre-liberal Toryism in...
What Tyranny Looks and Sounds Like
This video, and in particular the audio, needs to be distributed far and wide. It should be on every evening news broadcast tonight. It depicts what real, actual tyranny looks like, and how it...
“There Is No Arizona”*
I’m a committed believer in open borders and, failing that, of a robust guest worker program and something in the neighborhood of absolute amnesty for illegal immigrants. Moreover, I’ve got no real affinity for...
