The heroes of every age are often not seen as heroes during their lives, or if so viewed in their own age they are not so viewed in later ages. And doubtless perceptions of heroes change as one future passes into another. But for us, today, Churchill and Orwell are heroes to many, and whatever| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
In their eternal quest to remake reality, a perennial target of the Left is the family: man, woman, and children, the bedrock of all human societies. The family, by its existence and by what it brings forth, mocks the Left project, and so the Left has tried to destroy it for 250 years. But only| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
A friend of mine has been pushing me to look into Jordan Peterson for the past six months. I thought, since my friend is conservative, that Peterson offered right-wing politics, and it is true that he has recently been in the news for his thoughts on certain charged topics. However, Peterson does not, in fact,| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
America was, for much of its existence, defined as a nation of laws, not men, in the famous phrase of John Adams. No more. Now men, but only some men, rule. They rule as they please, in arbitrary, selective, self-benefitting fashion. Thus, what we live under is a tyranny, a system without rule of law.| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
American Genesis is a cultural history of the grand century of American technology, from 1870 to 1970. Thomas Hughes published his book in 1989, when Americans believed that the grandeur of American technological achievement had matured into something less flashy, yet more durable and equally pregnant with accomplishment. Hughes linked a valedictory history of early| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
Of late, I have repeatedly claimed that the Left’s core goal is to achieve a utopia where all people have complete equality combined with wholly unfettered liberty. This has occasioned numerous queries (especially when one book review was linked on Reddit), asking, in effect, whether this is not internally contradictory. That is, if liberty is| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
This book was once famous, but was mostly forgotten when Communism died and so-called liberal democracy seemed ascendant. It is increasingly famous again, and relevant, in these days of a new creeping totalitarianism, this time in the West itself. Such timelessness is the signature of a classic work, so my goal today is to explicate| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages (Anne Mendelson)| theworthyhouse.com
A few weeks ago, I watched Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and Quentin Tarantino’s movie delivered to me what I have been seeking. Namely, the exact point America careened off the path to flourishing, abandoning our long, mostly successful search for ever-increasing excellence and achievement. It was 1969. As the shadows lengthen and the| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
Among the many gaping holes in American historical knowledge is any grasp of the French Revolution (and that includes my own knowledge). As an abstract matter, this is unfortunate, but nothing notable, given that the historical knowledge of modern Americans is essentially one large gap. As a concrete matter, though, it is a real problem,| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
When I am dictator, which hopefully will be any day now, I am going to bring back what was once a crucial distinction. Namely, the sharp separation between the deserving and the undeserving poor. Theodore Dalrymple’s book shows both why that distinction is necessary, indeed absolutely essential, and why it has fallen from favor among| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
It is common knowledge that the vast majority of sociology is completely worthless, or worse than worthless, and that “social science” is an oxymoron. Still, the study of the societies of man can be a worthwhile discipline, as a branch of humanities, not the sciences. To be sure, the number of modern authors writing in| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
Never in history has targeted violence by individuals or small groups, killings and bombings, what the Russians once called “propaganda of the deed,” ever led to the replacement of a governing system, or even triggered significant societal change. Yet for the Left such acts have proved irresistible since the mid-nineteenth century. In keeping with this| The Worthy House • Towards A Politics of Future Past -
Daniel Miller and Charles Haywood debate winning the Culture War| IM—1776