October 1, 2018
- The Decline of Dinesh — Alice B. Lloyd
- Astroturfing on Capitol Hill — Tony Mecia & Haley Byrd
- The Battle of the Bobs — Ethan Epstein
This issue examined how entitlements have consumed an ever-larger share of the federal budget, with Yuval Levin and James C. Capretta analyzing the fiscal crisis facing Washington. Alice B. Lloyd profiled the political evolution of Dinesh D'Souza, tracing his trajectory from provocative antics at the Dartmouth Review in the 1980s to his prominent role in contemporary conservative politics. The magazine also investigated astroturfing campaigns on Capitol Hill, where lobbyists orchestrate constituent calls to lawmakers, and covered a competitive Senate race in New Jersey between two candidates named Bob.
Articles in the Archive — 21
Not With a Bang, but a Tote Bag
I seem to recall an essay by Ralph Waldo Emerson in which he predicts that the world will be subsumed not by fire or flood, but by an overwhelming mound of common pins. It hasn’t happened so far, but that may be because we have shifted the cultural weight, as it were, to a far more voluminous…
The Entitlement Crisis Is Looming
Washington fiddles while the entitlement problem metastasizes
Dinesh Unchained
The right-wing populist got his start with puerile antics at the ‘Dartmouth Review.’ American politics has finally caught up.
Nothing More Than Feelings
Rarely have we witnessed so many people pretend a controversy was about one thing when it was so obviously about another. Since September 16, when the name of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s accuser became known—Christine Blasey Ford, a California psychologist, alleges that he sexually…
Run, Mike, Run
Bloomberg’s running again. And why not?
Who Gives Merkel More Headaches: Foreigners or Xenophobes?
Germany cannot decide whether migrants or xenophobes are a bigger threat.
Time’s Journey on the Road to Obsolescence
On a bookcase in my office here at The Weekly Standard may be found a well-thumbed copy of a volume entitled Time Inc.: The Intimate History of a Publishing Enterprise, 1923-1941 (1968) by Robert T. Elson.
Trump Tries Something Surprising: Self-Control
Eyebrows were raised in Washington when President Trump responded to an allegation of sexual assault against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh. The president didn’t mention the accuser. He said the Senate Judiciary Committee would go through “a process and hear everybody out [and] I’d like…
The Pros and Cons of Mandatory Reporting
The pros and cons of ‘mandated reporting.’
How St. John’s College is Cutting Tuition by One-Third
St. John’s College lowers tuition, a lot.
The New Jersey Senate Race Is a Battle of the Bobs
A surprisingly competitive Senate race in New Jersey.
Off the Hook: How Organizations Are Using Telemarketing to Reach Congress
A lot of those spontaneous calls from constituents are the work of lobbyists.
Why Do We Love Advice Columns?
Caitrin Keiper on America’s love affair with amateur advice.
Fear Factor
John Wilson reviews ‘The Monarchy of Fear’: Are our lives and our politics really dominated by fear?
The Retropedestrian
Thomas Vinciguerra on the odd tale of the Texan who tried to walk around the world backward.
Emmy Noether’s Beautiful Theorem
One hundred years ago, she united symmetry and conservation in physics.
A Simple Favor: Momma Drama
The comedy-thriller is memorable despite its forgettable name.
The Post vs. the Post
The Trump administration is accusing hundreds, and possibly thousands, of Hispanics along the border of using fraudulent birth certificates since they were babies, and it is undertaking a widespread crackdown.” So thundered a Washington Post report on August 29. There’s just one problem: It isn’t…
Beto Male
Robert Francis O’Rourke is running against Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. You may know the challenger better by the name Beto O’Rourke. The Scrapbook is generally reluctant to bring up the names and nicknames of public figures (after what Idaho senator Mike Crapo must have endured in middle school, he’ll…
Jackpots and Crackpots
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, aka the richest guy alive, recently announced plans to donate $2 billion to create a network of preschools. “The child will be the customer,” says Bezos. Maybe we’re old-fashioned, but the idea of pupils as “customers” doesn’t lead us to believe that Bezos has a firm…
Category 5 Irrationality
On Tuesday, September 11, as Hurricane Florence lumbered through the Atlantic toward the Carolinas, we received a text from a Weekly Standard colleague asking how long it would take for the hurricane to become political. Somebody would blame Trump or the GOP for something—it was just a matter of…