Thelonious Sphere Monk probably did not drink as much bourbon as William Faulkner. He probably did not shoot as much heroin as William Burroughs, or smoke as much marijuana as Norman Mailer, or get as many “vitamin shots” from feel-good Manhattan doctors as John F. Kennedy. But he had his share. He had his measure….
Search Results for: george will
The “Struggle” for the “Soul” of the Republican Party: When Vapid Met Vaporous
Unless you actually have a life, you may be aware of a “struggle” going on now for the “soul”, loosely speaking, of the Republican Party. In one corner you have Brink “Mr. Nice Guy” Lindsey, arguing in National Affairs for “Republicanism for Republicans” and in the other Tucker “Bow Tie/Blue Collar” Carlson, who moans that…
Go Donald! Go Donald! (Some of the time)
Yes, it has come to this: the American “Establishment” is so blind, benighted, and beggared that it takes the installation of a complete mountebank1 in the White House to save that Establishment, and the United States as well, from that Establishment’s ever-compounding follies. I refer, of course, to Donald Trump’s precipitous withdrawal of a relative…
The demise of the Weekly Standard: Only evil deeds go unpunished
Yes, the word is that Bill Kristol’s bawling, brawling neocon baby, the Weekly Standard is no more, mourned in predictably fatuous fashion by co-founder John Podhoretz, “The Murder of the Weekly Standard* and long-time contributor David Brooks, among others, for heroically refusing to swallow the Trumpian swill that is now de rigueur on the Right,1…
Donald Trump, president of peace?
Amusing, not to mention welcome, if true. My bête noire di tutti bêtes noires has set the Acela world on its collective ear if not its collective rear by his sudden decision to pull all American troops out of Syria, where they never should have been in the first place. You don’t get it, Donald!…
The Devil is in the Footnotes
Evelyn Douek is an S.J.D. candidate at Harvard Law School, studying international and transnational regulation of online speech. Before coming to Harvard to complete a Master of Laws, Evelyn clerked for the Chief Justice of the High Court of Australia, the Hon. Justice Susan Kiefel, and worked as a corporate litigator. She received her LL.B….
H.W.–the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
De mortuis nihil nisi bonum? Speak nothing but good of the dead? Well, I leave that to the fancy outfits. If you want to read about what a wonderful guy Il Giorgio, aka “Aitch Dubya,” was, well, read the Post or the Times, or whomever. Here at Literature R Us, we mix the good with…
A Star Is Born: You know who I feel sorry for? I feel sorry for the guy who had to pretend he could be punched out by Lady Gaga
Yeah, at 5’1” and (apparently) 108 pounds, I doubt if the Gaga Girl packs much of a punch, but if you believe the latest reiteration of A Star Is Born, she can send a normal size guy reeling with just one blow.1 This is just one of the many questions raised by ASIB, including “Who…
Elliott Abrams, Easily Appeased
The recent murder and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi has upset the Washington establishment in a manner that the deaths of tens of thousands citizens of Yemen have not, presumably because those poor souls had the misfortune not to live in Washington. In any event, everyone who is anyone in Washington now has a conscience about…
John McCain, Paul Ryan, and the Myth of the Virtuous Republican
John McCain is one of those guys who, when he dies, people say “he was the last of a dying breed.” No one will ever say that about Paul Ryan. John McCain was a genuine war hero, a man who preferred to face hardship, torture, and even death rather than abandon his comrades. Paul Ryan…