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Musical taste, and taste in general, is a funny thing. We live in an age where the reigning cultural paradigm is an enervating relativism, where all views are allegedly equal, when of course we know they’re not. I could give way too many examples of the judgmental non-judgmental and the intolerant tolerant, or the illiberalism of modern liberals. For what seems like eons, the West’s cultural elite have embraced the subjective as superior to the objective, if that even exists. Forget the law of non-contradiction,…
When I found out about the new film 'Parker,' I became very interested. Someone was finally allowed to use Parker’s name? What sort of sorcery was this? And then I found out the movie had been due to be released in October before being pushed back to January, which always a bad sign. So, what is this movie? A gem to be embraced, or a crappy flick that’s being flushed out with the rest of the trash at a time of year when fewer people…
"A friend’s daughter recently started at a highly regarded boarding school. When her mother asked how she was enjoying the mixed-sex environment, the girl said quietly: 'You have to give the boys oral sex or they get cross.' Reeling with shock, the mum protested that her darling daughter did not have to do anything of the sort. 'Oh yes you do,' replied the girl. 'And you have to shave down there or the boys don’t like it.' The girl in question is not some brazen,…
I’ve often wondered these several decades of my political awareness why the term “Uncle Tom” is used by modern liberals as an epithet. As is easy to do in our Internet age, a quick read of the Wikipedia entry on “Uncle Tom” gives the basic outline, but given I seem to be immersed in antebellum America lately, having read “What Hath God Wrought” and having just watched the PBS series “The Abolitionists” I figured it would be a good time to finally read “Uncle Tom’s…
Phil Mickelson, the affable “aw shucks” fan-favorite on the PGA Tour and one of the game’s greatest golfers, really stepped in it this week. He ticked off liberals by hitting it Dead Solid Perfect in a few off-hand comments about his dissatisfaction with current income tax policy. Poor Phil. He was too naïve to know that such talk is to be left only to the real pros — the tax-hiking, redistributive masters of our modern economy. He didn’t realize that his job in today’s American Culture is…
"... the miracle of Fátima and my Cuban experiences inspired 'The Tragedy of Fidel Castro'."
"After the second ring, God answered the phone and heard a woman's anxious voice. 'Master, it’s me. The war's about to begin'."
I’ll never forget an interview I heard with the current Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. Here in the mean streets of Chicago several years ago there was a horrific murder of a young black man on the Southside. What made this more terrible than the other hundreds of murders that happen in the city each year is that it wasn’t with a gun, and it was caught on video:
Manti Te'o is in for a world of embarrassment, to be sure, in light of the revelation that his "late" girlfriend was a fiction. But there's more to the story, as Notre Dame's actions in this and other incidents throughout the past year bring its integrity into question and another major American institution shows clay feet. Corruption among a nation's authorities can undermine public confidence rapidly.
See, I’d seen that look before. That wrinkled nose, that laughing sparkle in the eyes. In the movies, evil guys laugh out loud. Bwa-ha-ha. Or they chuckle suavely, swirling their drinks in their glasses. But this is the real deal, the real look most monsters have. A sort of cute, dainty, delicate recoil from speaking the thing out loud. The forbidden joke of it. Are we being naughty now? I know you’re used to seeing me review Andrew Klavan’s books, and I know you’ve come…
Creeping back from the abyss, Netflix appears to be taking the smart road after its highly publicized missteps of the past couple of years: innovation and risk-taking. With several high-profile programming moves, Netflix appears to be staking out territory as the Internet alternative to cable TV subscription channels such as HBO and Showtime. Netflix has an impressive slate of original programming from some of the industry's most successful creative people—but opportunities remain for Netflix or another savvy company to profit from a huge market segment…
The moral high ground of environmentalism seemingly was ceded by free-market proponents a long, long time ago. There exist multiple reasons why this appears to be so, but perhaps the most often argued — if not the most persuasive — case employed against the free-marketers is the intrinsic “evil” ascribed to the profit motive of businesses and individuals alike. Nothing could be further from the truth, but urban mythology abounds with bad actors passing out carcinogens like Halloween candy while polluting groundwater, rivers, lakes and…
"As these cases often do, 'The Bughouse Affair' begins as a relatively simple matter. Sabina Carpenter is hired to catch a ruthless lady pickpocket. Meanwhile, John Quincannon is hired to tackle a house burglar who seems to be working his way down an insurance company’s list. These cases have no apparent connection to each other, but after some investigation, the detectives realize that there is a connection between the two crimes. But almost on cue, a bizarre locked-room murder takes place, and the detectives are…
"For mature/self-actualizing/sentient beings, there are only two substantially identical states of instant awareness; according to a G?D orientation and according to a Nature?Life orientation. Traditionally, upon awakening, at the first instant when meta-consciousness (The Neshama) kicks in, even before eyes open and the body begins the turn from horizontal to vertical, the mind acknowledges that life has been restored for another day and therewith that G?D seems to have great faith in this individual. . . ."
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