Random stuff I find interesting and you may not.
Pope Pius IX recognized the moral and spiritual deception at the heart of communism. On November 9, 1846, Pope Pius IX issued an encyclical titled Qui Pluribus, a Latin phrase that translates as “to the many.” Pius was writing during a period of great political and social upheaval. Across the continent, food shortages, unemployment, and … Read more
“Here I am, then. I have come home.” So said Pope John Paul II after landing in Warsaw in 1983, bending to kiss the soil of his native country. The mood was patriotic and defiant. “Poland for the Poles!” came the shouts from the crowd—union men, priests, fathers and their sons. “We are the real … Read more
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own … Read more
If there is the thinnest bit of a silver lining to be found in the untimely demise of Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition leader who reportedly died this week in prison, perhaps it is this: It is a well-timed reminder of how much Russia sucks. Most Americans probably don’t need the reminder. After all, Russia … Read more
“We cannot save the world by playing by the rules,” thunders Greta Thunberg, voicing the sentiment of practically every violent radical, terrorist, and concentration-camp builder throughout modern history. Here is a 21st-century question: Is the 20-year-old environmental campaigner old enough to know better? There was a time, not that long ago, when this would have … Read more
Only two blocks from the White House, a small museum in an elegant Beaux Arts mansion draws our attention to one of the deadliest ideologies of all time: communism. The Victims of Communism Museum opened only last year after decades of thoughtful planning, and the care that went into the project shows. Visiting the museum … Read more
There is in psychiatry something called the “Goldwater rule,” which holds that it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a psychiatric evaluation of a person he has not examined and received authorization to speak publicly about. I am not a psychiatrist, but, in the spirit of the rule: I am happy—proud, even—that Joe Biden … Read more
Fascism’s vitality in the 21st century marks it as the most successful fighting faith from the 20th century. So, it is well to understand fascism’s founder, who 100 years ago this October orchestrated the March on Rome (he arrived there by railroad sleeper car) that propelled him into power at 39, the youngest ruler in … Read more
At the height of the Stalinist purges, Soviet internal affairs minister Lavrentiy Beria famously boasted: “Show me the man and I’ll find you the crime.” U.S. Border Patrol agents may be wondering if the Beria standard is back in vogue with the Biden administration. The reason: Fox News has reported that the Department of Homeland … Read more
The hideous legacy of modernity can be seen in the ghastliness of the guillotine, the gulag and the gas chamber. The stormtroopers of modernity have trampled much underfoot on their monstrous march across the historical landscape. Having abandoned the lessons of the past in the reckless pursuit of an imaginary future, these slaves of the … Read more
The Biden administration revealed on Tuesday that guys who can’t get laid may be terrorist threats due to “involuntary celibate–violent extremism.” That revelation is part of a new crackdown that identifies legions of potential “domestic terrorists” that the feds can castigate and investigate. But there is no reason to expect Biden administration anti-terrorism and anti-extremism … Read more
The hard reality about social justice activism in America and in my opinion, its greatest setback, is that it is undeniably inspired by Maoism. The Guardian explains that in short, “Maoism is a set of contradictory ideas that has distinguished itself from Soviet guises of Marxism in several important ways. Giving centre stage to a … Read more
A special court has been convened in Colombia to try eight leaders of the Marxist-Leninist terrorist outfit known as FARC — Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia — on war crimes and crimes against humanity charges. Perhaps justice will be done upon these eight — will it ever be done for their enablers in the United … Read more
Peter Zeihan writes, eight years of Obamaesque inaction, four years of Trumpian irregularity, and a never-ending parade of preening, feckless wankers in Congress has prompted American businesses to take a far more active role in topics we all until recently thought of as the exclusive province of government. Civic planning. The environment. Immigration. Education. Income … Read more
Perhaps I should mention why I call it “the Batflu.” At least one correspondent thinks it is because I am racist, and “have a problem” with bats. But he fails to discriminate between bats and viruses, between the Chinese generally, and the Communist devils who rule them. He thinks I mean one, if he thinks … Read more
November 7th [2020] marks the 103rd anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution, where Communist revolutionaries overthrew the czarist government of Russia, eventually leading to the establishment of the Soviet Union. From there, Communism would spread throughout the world with the promise of liberating the working class and establishing a worker’s utopia. Countries like China, Vietnam, Cuba, … Read more
Our national reckoning on race has brought to the fore a loose but committed assemblage of people given to the idea that social justice must be pursued via attempts to banish from the public sphere, as much as possible, all opinions that they interpret as insufficiently opposed to power differentials. Valid intellectual and artistic endeavor … Read more
“Marxism, as National Review has reported elsewhere, is making a little bit of a comeback among American progressives who have put out of their minds the 100 million corpses produced by socialism in the 20th century, along with the corpses socialism continues to produce in the 21st century — in Cuba, in Venezuela, in North … Read more
My friend Tom Palmer says that whenever he sees somebody sporting a Che Guevara t-shirt, he likes to ask the wearer, “That’s a great t-shirt; do you have the entire collection?” The wearer usually responds either with a blank stare or by asking Tom what does he mean, to which Tom then responds: “You know, … Read more
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s three-volume opus, The Gulag Archipelago, which some have called the most important masterpiece of the twentieth century, is subtitled: “An Experiment in Literary Investigation.” Consider how odd that is. No Westerner would call such a work “literary,” lest someone discount its documentary value. Literature is one thing, truth another, isn’t that correct? But … Read more
Soviet’s Crimes Against Humanity In 1921, the Lenin-led Soviet Union faced one of the worst famines in history. A new book details its horrors and the American effort to combat cannibalism. The stories began to appear in the Soviet press in the autumn of 1921, each one more gruesome than the last. There … Read more