Archive

American Politics

31 October 2011

“Who are they and what are their demands?” everyone immediately demanded to know. The puzzlement showed how the movement that began on September 17 as Occupy Wall Street differs from the great social movements of the past fifty years. It’s another thing entirely to redefine the American populace at large as an excluded group, cast out from the democracy and prosperity that supposedly form the national birthright. More…

Book Reviews

26 February 2010

The expectation in the American West, when looking at a map of public and private lands, is one of apparent socialism: the closest this country gets, at least on paper, to the appropriation of property by the people. The numbers are well known: 85 percent of Nevada is owned by the federal government, 57 percent of Utah, 50 percent of Idaho, even 45 percent of California. More…

You don’t have to be Christian to appreciate Robinson—her work, while close to theology, comes down on the side of poetry, aspiring only to assent, not ultimate truth—but a knowledge of the faith’s dying words and urgent messages may well be required to get her meaning. More…