Where you come from

A colleague remembers Tim Russert.

Orphaned

Staggering statistics on children without fathers.

Elite ideology

A nice essay on the way in which feminism has ended up helping economic expansion rather that human development.

Old vs. new

Peggy Noonan's list is interesting.

Freedom to offend

When people are certain about their identity, they are not easily offended, nor are they willing to give the state the power to "protect" them, since a healthy society has many ways to "tar and feather" outrageus doctrines. Unfortunately we are witnessing a double trend in which, while the cultural fabric of society weakens, the power of the state becomes more absolute.
David Warren has a good column on the subject.

Rapture for nerds

Some supposedly intelligent people are putting their faith in the singularity.

Philantropy

Is aid bad for Africa?

Pilgrimage to the mall

Apparently, modern pilgrims are very brand conscious.

"Believe me, ladies, we’re not worth it"

A classic Antony Lane review. There is a perverse irony in the way feminism, by ideologically affirming women as "independendent" beings, seems to have really made them much less free...

Wait and see...

Is the XXth century faith in the state really dying?
Or is it British society that is dying and is no longer able to sustain freedom?

Green Leninism

Charles Krauthammer on what environmentalism" represents for a certain type of people.

Changing the destiny of mankind

Amir Taheri's discussion of Iranian foreign policy really sheds light on the mentality of Western "liberals", who cannot conceive that somebody could be driven by a totalizing ideal. Theirs, on the contrary, is the ideology of the bourgeois: a confortable life for all is the fulfillment of every conceivable human desire.

Networking

John Allen interviews Cardinal Scola

Daughter of a theory

Like all ideologies, feminism tends to embrace abstractions better than real people.

Uniform

It is not easy to be original.