First Principles – American Greatness

Symbolic Opposition vs. Effective Political Action

Christopher Roach — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 06:00:40 +0000

Republicans are famous for performing symbolic opposition. They harried Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton with Benghazi hearings and endless oaths to overturn Obamacare. […]

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Dissecting the Ramaswamy/Haley Debate on the Ukraine War

Fred Fleitz — Fri, 01 Sep 2023 10:00:05 +0000

Last week’s heated exchange at the first GOP presidential primary debate on the Ukraine War between businessman Vivek Ramaswamy and former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley […]

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Trump’s Second Term: The First 24 Hours

Sebastian Gorka — Tue, 01 Aug 2023 10:00:27 +0000

Say we do it. Say we prevent Mark Zuckerberg – or any other America-hating billionaire – from pumping hundreds of millions into the privatization of […]

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South Carolina is Ground Zero for the MAGA Movement

Keith Blandford — Fri, 07 Jul 2023 14:00:35 +0000

President Donald Trump launched the MAGA movement back in 2015 when he announced his first successful presidential campaign for the White House. The message resonated […]

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The Future We Deserve

Vincent McCaffrey — Sat, 24 Jun 2023 03:02:41 +0000

This is not a difficult equation, even for those who are as math challenged as I am. Perhaps you are an anarchist, and this might […]

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Can You Define Leftism?

Dennis Prager — Wed, 21 Jun 2023 03:02:41 +0000

After a speech in Romania last week, I was asked a question by a young member of the audience that, remarkably, I don’t remember ever […]

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Do We Still ‘Hold These Truths’?

Mackubin Owens — Mon, 19 Jun 2023 03:00:58 +0000

In about three weeks, we will once again be celebrating the Fourth of July, America’s Independence Day. But what are we really celebrating? For all […]

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Our Town

Vincent McCaffrey — Sun, 18 Jun 2023 03:00:29 +0000

At this juncture, we are most concerned with the corruption of our government because that has the most immediate bearing on our welfare and the […]

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Still Swimming Upstream But Getting Tired

Vincent McCaffrey — Wed, 14 Jun 2023 03:01:51 +0000

You are not as stupid as “they” say you are. How smart you are is another matter. After 75 years of nonstop miseducation, mass media […]

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Sorcery or Nihilism, Part IV

Jay Whig — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 03:02:07 +0000

I concluded the third essay of this four-part series by noting the Right needs new magic words. (See here for parts one and two.) Let […]

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I Feel Better in Europe

Dennis Prager — Wed, 07 Jun 2023 03:02:04 +0000

This is one of the saddest of the more than 1,000 columns I have written. I am writing in Budapest after spending four days in […]

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Sorcery or Nihilism, Part III

Jay Whig — Wed, 31 May 2023 03:03:36 +0000

I concluded my second essay (see here for part one) in this four-essay series noting conservative sorcery doesn’t work. But what of the sorcery of […]

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Sorcery or Nihilism, Part II

Jay Whig — Mon, 29 May 2023 03:03:58 +0000

In part one of this series of four essays, I asked whether we are compelled by our times to understand sorcery—their sorcery, and our own. […]

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This Pride Stuff Isn’t Healthy

Dennis Prager — Tue, 23 May 2023 03:01:29 +0000

I have never understood ethnic, race, gender, or sex pride. Even as a kid. For my bar mitzvah, someone gave me a book titled Great […]

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Sorcery or Nihilism? Part I

Jay Whig — Mon, 22 May 2023 03:03:59 +0000

There is perhaps no more flummoxing question for the intellectual Right than the cause of the evident and dramatic decline of the political and private […]

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The GOP Must Practice What It Preaches on Free Speech

Thaddeus G. McCotter — Sun, 21 May 2023 03:02:46 +0000

Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has commenced his tenure by evincing that he may well exceed the expectations of many wary Republicans. While […]

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While We Were Sleeping

Vincent McCaffrey — Fri, 19 May 2023 03:03:14 +0000

Unless you were in a coma, you are aware that there has been a lot of stuff going on in the world. Difficult to keep […]

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A Biblical Law That Would Change American Life

Dennis Prager — Tue, 16 May 2023 03:01:35 +0000

One of the most remarkable laws in the Bible is in the Book of Deuteronomy: “Do not hate an Egyptian.” It is remarkable because it […]

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How the Courts Fostered a Family Crisis

Kimberly Lowe — Mon, 15 May 2023 03:02:16 +0000

The average American family is struggling under the current economy and policies that erode our autonomy and strength. Economic policies designed to force Americans to […]

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More Evidence Showing Why the Science™ Is Never Settled

Jack Kerwick — Fri, 12 May 2023 03:02:20 +0000

Contrary to what political opportunists and activists of various sorts would have us think, The Science™, as they say, is never “settled.” In fact, science […]

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How to Bring People to God and Religion

Dennis Prager — Wed, 10 May 2023 03:01:59 +0000

There are four primary reasons fewer and fewer people in America and the West take God, the Bible, or religion seriously. 1) The belief that […]

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An American’s View of the Coronation

Roger Kimball — Sun, 07 May 2023 03:00:30 +0000

The coronation of King Charles III was a stirring spectacle. I watched only a few of the more elaborate bits—some climactic moments in Westminster Abbey, […]

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What’s Needed Now Is Not False ‘Compassion’ But Real Courage

Laura Hollis — Fri, 05 May 2023 03:01:43 +0000

An obsession with a distorted sense of “compassion” is strangling our national debate on the most important issues of our time and contributing to the […]

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Men of the West, On the Cusp

Vincent McCaffrey — Thu, 04 May 2023 03:00:28 +0000

So here we be, again. On the cusp, I would say. Four thousand years of Western Civilization at risk. On the verge. The eve of […]

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Thoughts on the Death of My Dog

Dennis Prager — Wed, 03 May 2023 03:01:32 +0000

Last week, Otto, my beloved English bulldog, died. He died as he lived—peacefully. His presence in our home for 12 years was an unmitigated joy. […]

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The Conservative Case for Getting Sued Into Oblivion

Scott Greer — Tue, 02 May 2023 03:03:12 +0000

Fox News last month agreed to fork over nearly $800 million in its settlement of a defamation lawsuit with Dominion Voting Systems. Dominion claimed Fox […]

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Why A.I. Can Never Become God

Adam Mill — Fri, 28 Apr 2023 03:03:28 +0000

Artificial intelligence will not spontaneously erupt into a superintelligence. Not soon, not ever. To understand the absurdity of A.I. becoming a “god,” we need only […]

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The Science™ Is Never Settled

Jack Kerwick — Sun, 23 Apr 2023 03:02:05 +0000

Science, or at least the language of “science,” was long ago conscripted in the service of politics of one kind or another. Of this, few […]

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Branding the ‘Mark of Kaine’ On Catholics

Thaddeus G. McCotter — Sun, 23 Apr 2023 03:00:49 +0000

Following Henry VIII’s establishment of the Church of England, his successors Elizabeth I and James I continued his war upon the island nation’s Catholic subjects. […]

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Perhaps We Should All Go Back to Church

Jim Nelles — Sat, 22 Apr 2023 03:01:43 +0000

I went to church on Sunday. I used to go all the time. I am not sure why I stopped. Maybe it was because Sundays […]

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Woke Liberalism?

Paul Gottfried — Fri, 21 Apr 2023 03:01:24 +0000

Earlier this month, an article I had just published in Chronicles, “Marx Was Not Woke,” received unexpected publicity. This happened after my essay elicited a […]

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The Worst Conspiracy of All

Vincent McCaffrey — Wed, 19 Apr 2023 03:00:47 +0000

The worst, most diabolical and very baddest conspiracy theory of all is the one that says, “even if it’s real, it doesn’t matter.” Everyone—that is, […]

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The Eternal Hope of God’s Paschal Promise

Thaddeus G. McCotter — Sat, 15 Apr 2023 03:01:18 +0000

I recently finished the third season of a detective drama that, sadly, has been losing my interest as the seasons wore on. But I was […]

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How Qualified Immunity Leads To Weaponized Government

Keith Gross — Thu, 13 Apr 2023 03:02:20 +0000

A bedrock American principle is that our government is not only for but also by the people. Our founders created a system in which citizens […]

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Standing Back to See More Clearly

Mike Kerrigan — Sun, 09 Apr 2023 03:03:13 +0000

I had occasion recently to reflect on the nature of suffering while consoling a friend grieving the loss of his beautiful young daughter. Like gazing […]

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Our Politics of Everything and Nothing

Anthony Esolen — Fri, 07 Apr 2023 03:03:19 +0000

Aristotle famously said that political science isn’t for the young, because youth lack the broad human experience needed to make prudential judgments for the common […]

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Our Constitutional Doom Loop

Emina Melonic — Thu, 06 Apr 2023 03:03:55 +0000

In the Bosnia of my youth, there was a wonderfully absurd expression describing a particular kind of chaos—a type of chaos so screwed up it […]

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No Going Back

Vincent McCaffrey — Thu, 30 Mar 2023 03:02:03 +0000

Like most polls, Gallup polls are usually paid advertisements for whomever commissions them and therefore deserving of as little attention. However, the indefatigable Sharyl Attkisson […]

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Do Conservatives Oppose Change?

Dennis Prager — Wed, 29 Mar 2023 03:00:46 +0000

If you Google “what is conservatism?” this is the definition you will receive: “Commitment to traditional values and ideas with opposition to change or innovation.” […]

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Who Says That Chance Rules in the Affairs of Men?

Roger Kimball — Mon, 27 Mar 2023 03:00:31 +0000

Some years ago, while driving into Boston to attend a conference on “Changing and Unchanging Values in the World of the Future,” I noticed a […]

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America’s Pope at the Heritage Foundation

Ken Masugi — Sun, 26 Mar 2023 03:05:25 +0000

The man I regard as America’s Pope spoke at the Heritage Foundation the other day. (Fortunately, I lack the authority to choose a pope, which […]

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Canada’s Assisted-Suicide Policy Body Surfing Toward America

Thaddeus G. McCotter — Sun, 26 Mar 2023 03:00:24 +0000

Invariably, no matter the issue, whenever the Left aims to implement a policy proposal it deems innocuous, a triggered Right declares it part of a […]

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Recalling Santayana’s Genteel Tradition

Roger Kimball — Mon, 13 Mar 2023 03:00:24 +0000

A few years ago, I had occasion to supply an essay for Yale’s new edition of Santayana’s Character and Opinion in the United States and […]

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The Price of Eliminating Consequences

Victor Davis Hanson — Fri, 10 Mar 2023 04:01:50 +0000

Recently there were some remarkable online videos of a Portland, Oregon good Samaritan confronting shoplifters and forcing them to dump loads of their pilfered goods. […]

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The Scots and the Founders

Robert Curry — Sat, 04 Mar 2023 04:01:10 +0000

In Common Sense Nation: Unlocking the Forgotten Power of the American Idea, my goal was to tell the story of the Scottish Enlightenment’s impact on […]

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‘Bring Me Some New Clichés’

Glenn Ellmers — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 04:04:12 +0000

Recently I’ve been interested in understanding postmodernism, specifically the work of the prolific author and social critic Michel Foucault, who died in 1984. Reading his […]

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The Libertarian-Socialist Axis

Edward Ring — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 04:00:33 +0000

On the surface, it might seem ridiculous to suggest libertarians and socialists work to further the same political agenda. Their ideologies are diametrically opposed. The […]

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What Are Judeo-Christian Values?

Dennis Prager — Wed, 15 Feb 2023 04:00:03 +0000

The term “Judeo-Christian values” is frequently used. I am one who uses it. I do so for the same reason the late great British prime […]

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What’s Wrong With Nationalism?

Anthony Esolen — Tue, 14 Feb 2023 04:03:40 +0000

Pope Francis, along with many other commentators on current affairs, has condemned nationalism. I might join these commentators, if I knew just what they were […]

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Ordered Disobedience

Chris Bray — Sat, 11 Feb 2023 04:02:31 +0000

In October 1944, U.S. troops landing on Leyte Island in the Philippines were menaced from the sea by an enormous Japanese naval fleet that was […]

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