By happy coincidence, on the very day that ex-FBI director James Comey published his self-serving memoir, my wife and I happened to be rummaging around in the George C. Marshall research library on the campus of Marshall’s alma mater, Virginia Military Institute, in Lexington. It was entirely…
Writers and editors at the Denver Post recently did what more than a few journalists have only dreamed of doing: They denounced their proprietor in the pages of the Denver Post. So audacious was their action that the gesture made the front page of the New York Times, which reported approvingly that…
A touch of old Washington passed away March 30 with the death of 94-year-old Anna Chennault.
There was a snowstorm in Washington, D.C., a few days before the arrival of spring, and while it deposited a handful of inches on the ground and closed area schools for the day, the evidence was gone nearly as soon as it had arrived—and largely forgotten. Not, however, by a 33-year-old first-term…
I confess to a weakness for the attorney general, Jeff Sessions. I say this despite the fact that I disagree with him on various issues—civil-asset forfeiture, for example, and the opioid crisis. But as is often the case in politics, certain whimsical reasons recommend him. To my mind, his very…
Like most American cities, Washington has been grappling lately with the issue of historic monuments and statuary, public and private, and whether they ought to be displaced and discarded. The good news this past week is that, in a departure from recent custom, a new statue—eight feet high, encased…
Judge Frederic Block, meet Judge H. Lee Sarokin.
I was struck by the convergence of two stories in a recent edition of the New York Times.
Say what you will about Donald Trump’s intellectual acumen, but he does have a certain flair for drawing attention in directions he desires—or better yet, prompting his detractors to say things he wants them to say. This may not be “genius” in the usual sense of a much-abused term, but it’s a…
If you should find yourself in Pyongyang, the capital of North Korea, you might be surprised to discover a U.S. naval vessel moored on the Pothong River near the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum. It is the USS Pueblo, a modest craft launched in World War II, recommissioned by the Navy in…
When J. Edgar Hoover died suddenly in May 1972, there had been one director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation during the previous 48 years. In the nearly 46 years since that day, there have been 15 of them.
I've never stuffed a note in a bottle, and tossed it into the ocean. But I seem to have done the bibliographical equivalent, and the evidence has washed up on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean.
In the winter of 1949, the first secretary of defense, James V. Forrestal, announced his impending retirement from office.
I was surprised last week to learn that plans for the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago have run into local opposition.
In 1898, when the 42-year-old George Bernard Shaw stepped down as drama critic of London’s Saturday Review, he introduced his successor, Max Beerbohm, 26, with these words: “The younger generation is knocking at the door, and as I open it there steps sprightly in the incomparable Max.”
Journalists like anniversaries, or at least this one does, and 2018 is an ideal vantage point from which to survey the past. It’s been a half-century now since the annus horribilis of 1968, for example, and a century-and-a-half since my favorite president (James Buchanan) died. But more to the…
Everyone had a good laugh last week at the expense of Matthew Petersen, chairman or commissioner at the Federal Election Commission since 2008, who had been nominated by President Trump to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. In a televised hearing before the Senate…
Frank Bruni had an interesting column the other day in the New York Times. Naturally, it was about Donald Trump, and naturally, it registered disapproval. But the point was more psychiatric than political: Entitled “Donald Trump Could Really Use a Friend,” it assembled a host of testimonials to…
On inauguration eve 1991, in Rhode Island, the departing governor, Edward DiPrete, had a morsel of news for the incoming governor, Bruce Sundlun.
This is a day of mourning for Americans who believe that our politics are broken, who yearn to reach across the aisle, stop the partisan bickering, and eradicate the influence of money, Big Business, the military, corporate media, parochial interests, anti-tax activists, the NRA, the AMA, the CIA,…
The death of 83-year-old Charles Manson reminds us of two things, among others: It is usually a fallacy to believe that life in America in the recent past was somehow better than it is at present. And second, punishment for the crime of murder is not always the same as justice.
Despite everything we know, or think we know, about the private life and opinions of Judge Roy Moore, I have no doubt that he will win the Alabama special election on December 12, and succeed to Attorney General Jefferson Sessions's old Senate seat.
I'm delighted, of course, by the news that Prince Harry, the Prince of Wales's personable younger son, is now engaged to Meghan Markle, described by Wikipedia as an "American actress, model, and humanitarian." I wish them both health and happiness.
If Americans think our nation is painfully divided, two statistics from across the Atlantic might put their minds at ease. The first is the percentage of British voters who chose, in a binding referendum last year, to abandon the European Union: just slightly under 52 percent. The other is the…
It's becoming increasingly unlikely that Roy Moore will be elected to the Senate—or, perhaps, endure as the Republican nominee for the seat once held by Attorney General Jefferson Sessions. But in the event that Judge Moore wins his election, it is interesting to note that more than a few…
I was in New England for a few days last week and found myself at breakfast one morning with a group of Armenian academics, born in Lebanon but now settled permanently in and around Boston. By any measure, they were a distinguished group—historians, physicians, political scientists—and for them, of…
Amanda Hess, a David Carr Fellow at the New York Times, who “writes about Internet culture for the [Times] Arts section,” recently took to its pages to tell us what she thinks of politicians who podcast. Executive summary: She doesn’t approve of them (“Politicians Are Bad at Podcasting,” Oct. 27).
Last week's release of surviving documents on the assassination of John F. Kennedy was not the first time the federal government has made a clean breast of things on the subject, or attempted to do so. There were plenty of leaks when the Warren Commission was deliberating, back in the Bronze Age…
At this juncture, we can stipulate that President Trump would probably have been well advised to follow Gen. John Kelly’s reported advice and write a letter of condolence to the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson instead of calling her on the telephone. No doubt Trump had reasoned that words of regret,…
My guess is that up until two weeks ago, the name of Harvey Weinstein meant little if anything to most people, including readers of this magazine.
When I first learned the big news this week about Jeff Glor, my mind wandered back three decades, and more, to the mid-1980s. But who is Jeff Glor, you ask? The 42-year-old Glor is lead anchor on the CBS network's 24-hour streaming news service, called CBSN, and he has just been named by the…
My guess is that up until two weeks ago, the name of Harvey Weinstein meant little if anything to most people, including readers of this magazine.
By the time you read this, it is entirely possible that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will have resigned his office in despair and frustration. He finds himself, after all, at “the breaking point” (New Yorker) in relations with his mercurial boss, President Donald Trump. Meanwhile, over at PBS…
Before Jack Henry Abbott, there was Edgar Smith.
Before Jack Henry Abbott, there was Edgar Smith.
Reactions to the death of 91-year-old Hugh Hefner this past week seem to waver between tributes to his pioneering role in the postwar Sexual Revolution–and horror at the consequences of his pioneering role in the Sexual Revolution. My own view of the aforementioned Revolution is that it would have…
One day, when he was running for the Democratic nomination for president in 1976, Jimmy Carter was asked what he thought about Hubert Humphrey. In fairness to Carter, it should be remembered that Humphrey—the former vice president and 1968 Democratic candidate—was lurking in the background that…
For those of us who wish (or hope) that Donald Trump may ultimately settle into something resembling a conventional president, his ex-chief strategist Stephen Bannon offered a glimmer of encouragement last week.
For those of us who wish (or hope) that Donald Trump may ultimately settle into something resembling a conventional president, his ex-chief strategist Stephen Bannon offered a glimmer of encouragement last week.
We Americans are a resilient people, but like resilient people everywhere, we need the occasional interlude of rest and relaxation. Which is why after two weeks of something like a national nervous breakdown over equestrian statues of Robert E. Lee, we welcomed the approach of Labor Day, the…
Readers will recall that just before memories of the Confederacy became an existential threat to national unity, Americans were worried about another—and surely more plausible—menace to the United States. In early August, Kim Jong-un, the North Korean dictator who has been successfully testing…
On the evening of Oct. 14, 1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered one of his famous Fireside Chats to a national radio audience. What used to be called Community Chest drives—local campaigns to raise money for social-welfare charities—were about to be launched, and FDR wished to pay…
Like many, perhaps most, Americans, I had never heard of the professional football quarterback Colin Kaepernick until he became better known for kneeling before games than for throwing passes during games.
During the 2016 presidential primary campaign, Jeb Bush took to calling Donald Trump the “chaos candidate.” It didn’t seem to have much effect at the time, but Bush was prescient: The chaos candidacy is now the chaos presidency. And yet, as Henry Adams once wrote, while order is the dream of man,…
Family connections used to take me occasionally to northeast Mississippi, and when my wife and I were feeling adventurous, we would drive the 35 miles or so north to Tupelo to visit the birthplace of Elvis Presley.
On August 2, the White House press room was the scene of one of those dialogues of the deaf that so infuriate people outside Washington. Stephen Miller, one of President Trump’s senior policy advisers, stepped to the podium to endorse an immigration reform bill sponsored by two Republican senators,…
In the past half-century, there have been two presidential elections that Democrats should have won by a landslide but did not.
In the past half-century, there have been two presidential elections that Democrats should have won by a landslide but did not.
Opinions may vary about Donald Trump Jr., but nearly all can agree that his meeting with the mysterious Natalia Veselnitskaya—and two or four or seven other people in Trump Tower last summer—has done his father no good. I plead agnosticism on this particular case, tending to conclude that it…
Opinions may vary about Donald Trump Jr., but nearly all can agree that his meeting with the mysterious Natalia Veselnitskaya—and two or four or seven other people in Trump Tower last summer—has done his father no good. I plead agnosticism on this particular case, tending to conclude that it…
The name of William Woodward (Hootie) Johnson, who died last week at 86, is not likely to be widely familiar. He was the scion of a South Carolina banking dynasty, and something of a civil-rights pioneer in his home state: Recruiter of African-Americans in the family firms and local politics;…
Jim Acosta, senior White House correspondent for CNN, has acquired a certain renown lately for his habitual, and carefully staged, verbal confrontations in the White House press room with President Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer. You could make the argument that both Spicer and Acosta, in…
Jim Acosta, senior White House correspondent for CNN, has acquired a certain renown lately for his habitual, and carefully staged, verbal confrontations in the White House press room with President Trump’s press secretary, Sean Spicer. You could make the argument that both Spicer and Acosta, in…
Hobby Lobby, the Oklahoma City-based arts-and-crafts chain, was recently fined $3 million by the Department of Justice for purchasing and shipping artifacts–Assyrian and Babylonian cuneiform tablets, among other things, mostly from Iraq–to its headquarters by way of an antiquities dealer in the…
I've been reading the post-mortems on last week's G20 summit in Hamburg, and depending on the source, it was either the dawn of a new Era of Good Feelings in global affairs, or another catastrophe in the history of the 6-month-old Trump presidency. The truth, I suspect, lies somewhere in-between.…
Now that the 2017 commencement season is past, I'm emboldened to express my shock that the University of Pennsylvania didn't honor its most famous—and arguably, most distinguished—graduate, Donald J. Trump (Class of 1968) with an honorary degree. Shock, I would say, but not necessarily surprise:…
One evening in 1984, working late in the offices of the Los Angeles Times, I was interrupted by a reporter giving a local woman a tour of the premises. The woman’s name was Judy Johnson, the reporter informed me, and she was the principal source for a story that had just broken—and had hypnotized…
London
When the Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke at the Brookings Institution in Washington in March 2016, a handful of Armenian-American pickets appeared on the sidewalk beside Massachusetts Avenue, holding signs aloft and chanting about Erdogan's burgeoning Islamist dictatorship and the…
You know about the Oscar curse: The notion that winning the Academy Award for Best Actress is great, but often followed by professional oblivion. Is there a New York Times curse as well?
In the summer of 1972, two days after the Watergate break-in, Simon & Schuster published Sen. Edward Kennedy's second book, a scathing condemnation of American medicine entitled In Critical Condition: The Crisis in America's Health Care. Composed largely of excerpts from recent testimony before…
George Osborne, Britain's longtime Chancellor of the Exchequer until the fall of the Cameron government, seems to have raised some eyebrows recently with his announcement that, beginning in May, he will become editor of the [London] Evening Standard. And keep his seat in the House of Commons.
If there's a president of the United States who likes the press, he has not yet been elected. Of course, in modern times, there have been presidents who charmed certain columnists and correspondents (John F. Kennedy) or liked to banter with the White House press corps (Franklin D. Roosevelt). But…
If there’s a president of the United States who likes the press, he has not yet been elected. Of course, in modern times, there have been presidents who charmed certain columnists and correspondents (John F. Kennedy) or liked to banter with the White House press corps (Franklin D. Roosevelt). But…
Readers of the Washington Post op-ed page might be forgiven for believing that they're under assault—from adjectives, lots of adjectives. Consider, for example, these opening sentences from the three separate pieces spread across the top of the page this past Monday.
An elementary lesson of life is that systems are often invented by geniuses but usually administrated by less gifted individuals. This explains a lot about zero-tolerance policies in schools, prosecutorial discretion, and other topics of recurring interest. The best-known example, in popular…
You never can tell about Senate confirmation.
"[The British monarchy's] mystery is its life. We must not let in daylight upon magic." —Walter Bagehot To a certain degree, Bagehot's law was adopted as well by American presidents, whose status was upheld by a tradition of decorum and whose prestige was accentuated by a certain—well, mystery.…
"[The British monarchy's] mystery is its life. We must not let in daylight upon magic." —Walter Bagehot To a certain degree, Bagehot's law was adopted as well by American presidents, whose status was upheld by a tradition of decorum and whose prestige was accentuated by a certain—well, mystery.…
Having run twice, and unsuccessfully, for the presidency, Hillary Rodham Clinton is now an official object lesson in how not to run for political office. No doubt, Clinton was a subpar candidate—especially when compared with her husband—but one strike against her is manifestly unfair: that she had…
Having run twice, and unsuccessfully, for the presidency, Hillary Rodham Clinton is now an official object lesson in how not to run for political office. No doubt, Clinton was a subpar candidate—especially when compared with her husband—but one strike against her is manifestly unfair: that she had…
Suppose, for a moment, that Donald Trump is elected president Tuesday evening. It seems unlikely, but is not impossible; and we've faced the apocalypse a couple of times in recent memory.
It may well be, as Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter suggests, that Donald Trump represents "the final stage of a dumbed-down America"—a process that seems to have begun, by Carter's reckoning, with George W. Bush. Trump, writes the novelist Richard Ford in the Times Literary Supplement, is "a…
It may well be, as Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter suggests, that Donald Trump represents “the final stage of a dumbed-down America"—a process that seems to have begun, by Carter's reckoning, with George W. Bush. Trump, writes the novelist Richard Ford in the Times Literary Supplement, is "a…
The news that Hillary Clinton's campaign maintained lists of journalists for friendly leaks and helpful advice—Maggie Haberman and John Harwood of the New York Times, Dana Milbank of the Washington Post, etc.—is not news, exactly. Some would argue that the more interesting story would be a list of…
If you ever worry about the quality of news on the Internet, consider a recent story at BuzzFeed from reporter Adrian Carrasquillo. The writer notes indignantly that Donald Trump's infamous campaign comments about Mexican immigrants were not unprecedented: Speaking on a radio talk show, in 2011,…
I've lately had the pleasure of being interviewed on John Batchelor’s cerebral radio program, which originates in New York but is heard all over the country. Since I am in Washington, and not New York, I speak to Mr. Batchelor by telephone—which means that his millions of listeners hear but do not…
In the increasingly unlikely event that Donald Trump is elected president, it should be conceded that he could prove to be a transformative chief executive in unexpected ways—indeed, in ways that good progressives would, ordinarily, welcome. Case in point: The federal civil service.
One hundred and fifteen years ago this week, President William McKinley was shot while attending a reception at the Pan American Exposition in Buffalo. His assailant, an anarchist son of Polish immigrants named Leon Czolgosz, had stood in a receiving line to shake McKinley's hand and, concealing a…
"Trump just failed his first foreign policy test," tweeted Hillary Clinton after Donald Trump returned from his meeting with the Mexican president, Enrique Peña Nieto. Actually, the opposite is true: Trump was smart to accept Peña Nieto's invitation to Mexico City, and smarter still to comport…
At this late hour, there is a chance—admittedly a very slim one—that Donald Trump might wish to avoid a catastrophic loss to Hillary Clinton, or that Republican leaders might petition him to step aside as their nominee. There is time enough yet for such a thing to happen, and there is a remote—a…
No doubt, the "computer glitch" that caused Delta Air Lines to shut down for six hours on Monday morning, canceling some 300 scheduled flights, was a great inconvenience to many summer travelers: People make plans based on estimated times of arrival; connecting flights require a combination of luck…
For obvious reasons, I've lately been pondering examples from recent history where political nominees have proved too toxic for their own parties. There are more than a few examples—Tom Hayden, David Duke etc.—but only one with anything like contemporary resonance: The 1966 gubernatorial election…
On the very day that Donald Trump announced that, as president, he would wage war on pornography, a press release arrived on my desk from the Hugh M. Hefner Foundation. The foundation, it announced, is inviting nominations for the 2016 Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Awards, which "honor individuals…
On this date 50 years ago, Charles Whitman, a 25-year-old ex-Marine and engineering student, climbed to the observation deck of the Tower at the University of Texas in Austin and shot 49 people, killing 14. Earlier in the day he had stabbed his wife and mother to death; Whitman himself was shot and…
Whether Donald Trump emerges from the Republican convention as the GOP presidential nominee is an open question at the moment. I happen to believe that he will; but it is theoretically possible that he will not—and we might well see a brokered convention, or a fractured convention, in Cleveland…
A book about a statesman by a politician prompts two questions: Do we learn anything new about the statesman, and do we learn anything useful about the politician? In this case, the answer to both questions is yes.
The Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen took Speaker Paul Ryan to task this week for Ryan's tepid endorsement of Donald Trump—"What I know about Ryan is that he could not be proud of endorsing Trump"—and compared him at length, and distinctly unfavorably, with a Republican from an earlier era,…
Americans of the last generation may associate Cliveden with the Profumo affair of the 1960s, which began when Britain's secretary of state for war spotted a London party girl emerging nude from its swimming pool and began a liaison that would later bring down the government. So wrote Liesl…
I don't know how important Jerry Brown's endorsement of Hillary Clinton will prove to be, but in the closing hours of the California Democratic primary campaign, and the closing days of the primary season itself, it cannot hurt. Brown is a four-term governor of California, three-time presidential…
Let us stipulate, first, that it is not a crime against morality for zoological parks to exist, especially now that zoos tend to reflect our understanding of animal cognition. Wild animals are no doubt happier in the wild; but a zoo may be seen as refuge as well as a place of confinement,…
I had not realized, until very recently, that the business of depicting famous people on American currency is a zero-sum game. Alexander Hamilton is, at the moment, the hero of a blockbuster Broadway musical, and so there was never any chance that he might be supplanted on the $10 bill. (More about…
Queen Elizabeth II has achieved two royal milestones during the past year. Last September, she became the longest-serving British monarch in history, beating the record previously held by her great-great grandmother, Queen Victoria. For nearly a decade now, she’s been the oldest British…
Is tiny, pro-Western, landlocked, democratic, free-market, Christian Armenia (pop. 2.9 million) a threat to its neighbor, Turkey (pop. 75 million)? According to the government of Turkey, and its autocratic Islamist president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Armenia's "alliance" with Russia is lethal to…
This past Monday's business was briefly interrupted by the specter of BREAKING NEWS on the office television, featuring a photograph of Justice Clarence Thomas. For a fearful moment I wondered what the BREAKING NEWS might be – and was quickly reassured when I saw, from the crawl at the bottom of…
Rummaging around the other evening in a box of magazines and newspaper clippings with my byline, I stumbled upon the November 1975 issue of a journal called the Alternative: An American Spectator. Mindful, as always, of capricious mortality, I have lately been subtracting from the volume of paper…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the November 16, 2015 issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the November 9, 2015 issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the November 2, 2015 issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the October 26, 2015 issue.
By the time you read this, it is possible that Vice President Joe Biden will have announced his candidacy for the presidency. Or not.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the October 12, 2015 issue.
It occurred to me not long ago that, given my age and station in life, I should probably not purchase any more suits. Gazing at the contents of my clothes closet, there can be little doubt that I have more than enough to see me through the balance of my working life, and beyond—if, lest we forget,…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his casual essay "Hangers On."
Banned Books Week, the American Library Association’s annual self-advertisement, has now ended for this year. Bookstores will disassemble their earnest displays of “banned books,”and the semblance of normality will return to public libraries. And we will be left with the sobering thought that, in…
Did you see the CNN debate on Wednesday night? Neither did I. Oh, I watched a few highlights that seemed to be agitating social media—Carly Fiorina cutting Donald Trump down to size, for example—but like the Super Bowl, I contented myself with reading about it the next morning.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the September 14, 2015 issue.
President Obama’s unilateral renaming of Mount McKinley in Alaska has agitated the Ohio congressional delegation, and more than a few observers across party lines, largely because it was done without constitutional authority. To be sure, such niceties have not stopped this president in the past.…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the August 24-31, 2015 double issue.
Now that President Obama has returned from his two-week summer vacation on Martha's Vineyard—that is to say, now that life in political Washington is back to normal—we may put this annual media ritual in some perspective. Or put another way: If you're an admirer of Obama, you will regard this brief…
A little over 30 years ago, three generations of the McMartin family, who had run a nursery school in Los Angeles for decades, were arrested, jailed, and put on trial, charged with hundreds of sensational counts of child sexual abuse. Six years later, when no convictions had been obtained, all…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the August 17, 2015 issue.
Proof positive that it’s the latter half of August—when just about everyone is on vacation, or ought to be—arrived this week with the news that the latest social media sensation in Great Britain is a clandestine video of Prime Minister David Cameron.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the August 10, 2015 issue.
Well, one minor mystery of the American presidency was clarified this week.
Many decades ago, on my first day as the designated conservative on the editorial page staff of the Los Angeles Times, I attended the morning editorial meeting presided over by our courtly editor, Anthony Day.
The Weekly Standard is hiring an assistant to the literary editor. This is an entry-level clerical/administrative post with editorial duties and the opportunity to assist in the composition of the Books & Arts section. The ideal applicant will be interested in promotion and social media. Knowledge…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the August 3, 2015 issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his casual essay "Marriage à la Modesto."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the July 20, 2015 issue.
As a lifelong student of the manners and habitat of the American upper-middle, and upper, classes, I am of course a weekly reader of the Vows (weddings) pages in the Sunday New York Times. The tone of these notices has evolved with the years—the weekly essays on one featured couple tend to…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the July 20, 2015 issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the Summer Reading Issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the June 29th issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the June 8th issue.
Jon Stewart’s shrewdness as a crowd pleaser has never been more evident than in his treatment of Caitlyn Jenner. Earlier this week, when Bruce Jenner’s sexual transformation made the cover of Vanity Fair, Stewart strung together a series of television commentaries about Jenner’s appearance. Most,…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the May 25th issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the May 18th issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the May 11th issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the May 4th issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his casual essay "Their Money or Your Life."
We're living in a transgender moment in America -- which is a little odd, when you think about it. For transgender people are not exactly new to the news: The British travel writer James Morris became Jan Morris as long ago as 1972, and the ophthalmologist Richard Raskind became tennis pro Renee…
During Christmas vacation 1968-69 I ran into a high school friend much wiser in the ways of the world than I. He had stumbled onto a curious job for the next few weeks— collecting the proceeds from a chain of bowling alleys in the Washington area, counting the loot, and delivering it to corporate…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section from the March 23rd issue.
I walked into my local Starbucks yesterday morning with a certain foreboding. As everyone must know, the chief executive officer of Starbucks, one Howard Schultz, had commanded that Starbucks employees ("baristas," in corporate parlance) write this phrase -- #RaceTogether -- on the coffee cups they…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts sections from the March 2nd, March 9th, and March 16th issues.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the February 23rd issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD's Books & Arts section.
Anyone who has toured a house for sale in the past few decades knows that walking into a child’s bedroom is a little like entering a trophy shop. The trophies might be neatly arranged on shelves and tabletops, or strewn haphazardly across the floor; and they might be measured in feet, rather than…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian his casual essay "Trophy Summer."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the February 2nd issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD's Books & Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the January 26th issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD's Books & Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the January 19th issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the December 29th issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the December 22nd issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
Having twice visited Castro's Cuba -- once during the 1970s, when Cuban troops were fighting in Angola and Mozambique, and again a dozen years ago, long after the Soviet subsidies had disappeared -- I can attest that the place is a horror.
With nearly every passing day, yet another detail in last month’s sensational Rolling Stone article alleging gang rape at a University of Virginia fraternity house collapses under the weight of scrutiny. Its author, Sabrina Rubin Erdely, has retreated into strategic silence; her editor, Will Dana,…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the December 15th issue of THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the December 8th Holiday Reading issue.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian his casual essay "Voice of Experience."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the December 1st issue's Book & Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with literary editor Philip Terzian on the November 17 issue's Book & Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the November 10th issue's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the November 3rd issue's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the October 27th Issue's Books and Arts section.
I went to my favorite pen shop in downtown Washington the other day to buy some ink, and on reflecting that the act of riding the subway to buy a bottle of ink had a certain antediluvian quality, I was seized with a very antediluvian idea. I decided that I wanted to buy a pack of cigarettes as…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his personal essay, "I'd Walk a Mile."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the October 13th Issue's Books and Arts section.
The brief military career of 44-year-old Hunter Biden, Vice President Joseph Biden's younger son, seems to have ended after one month in the naval reserve. Biden is reported to have tested positive for cocaine use, and was immediately discharged. It was "the honor of my life to serve in the U.S.…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the October 13th Issue's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the September 1st Issue's Books and Arts section.
One summer morning almost exactly 20 years ago, I drove out to Leesburg, Virginia, to meet a courtly businessman named B. Powell Harrison and discuss the fate of Dodona Manor. Dodona Manor, a plain, early-19th-century Federal-style residence, had been the home of General George C. Marshall: His…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the August 18-25 Summer Reading Issue's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his casual essay "Guided Torture."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the August 4 issue's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the July 28, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the July 14, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his casual essay "The Snake in the Garden."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the June 30 / July 7, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
Arriving home the other afternoon by car, I noticed an elongated object straddling the lawn and driveway in front of our house. “Is that a snake?” I asked my alluring wife, whose fondness for such creatures is approximately the same as my own. But before she could answer, or even focus on the…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the June 16, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the June 9, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the June 2, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
Who was Herschel Grynszpan? He was a 17-year-old Polish Jew, born and raised in Germany, who in November 1938 walked into the German embassy in Paris, where he had been living for two years, and shot a 29-year-old diplomat named Ernst vom Rath, who died two days later. Vom Rath’s assassination was…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the May 19, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
The first magazine to which I subscribed was neither Boys’ Life nor Sports Illustrated; it was Mad, whose longtime editor (1956-85) Albert Feldstein died last month at the age of 88. I was gratified to see that his death, at any rate, was duly noted with lavish tributes and extended obituaries. He…
It's hardly news that conservatives are not especially welcome on college and university campuses. Speech codes are designed to restrict discourse and punish the exercise of fundamental rights. Faculties are disproportionately left-wing in their politics. Administrators are sometimes intimidated…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the May 19, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the May 5, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the April 28, 2014 edition of the Books and Arts section.
I once lived for a year in a small town in Alabama. Like many small towns in the mid-20th century, Anniston was worried about its long-term prospects, and kept thinking of ways to keep the town, especially the downtown, vital. If this had been New England, the town fathers would have closed off one…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Casual Podcast, with Philip Terzian reading his essay, "The Elevator Blues."
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the April 14, 2014 edition of the Weekly Standard's Books and Arts section.
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the March 24, 2014 issue of the magazine's B&A section. Joining him is executive editor Terry Eastland, to discuss his recent review, Ordeal by Congress, which was a memoir by Judge Leslie Southwick on his road to confirmation to the…
THE WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast with Philip Terzian, on the March 17, 2014 issue of the magazine's B&A section.
In an essay on Winston Churchill, the late British psychoanalyst Anthony Storr mentions that Churchill, at age 11, expressed a desire to play the cello, but that the interest “was not encouraged, and soon died out.” What might have been, in Churchill’s case, is intriguing to Storr: “It is possible…
The WEEKLY STANDARD podcast, with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section of our February 24, 2014 issue.
The WEEKLY STANDARD podcast, with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section of our February 4, 2014 issue. He is joined by James Bowman, who authored the review "Casualties of War" in this issue.
The WEEKLY STANDARD podcast, with literary editor Philip Terzian on the Books & Arts section of our January 13, 2014 issue.
The new WEEKLY STANDARD Books & Arts Podcast, with literary editor Philip Terzian and his guest, senior editor Andrew Ferguson. This week they discuss Ferguson's recent cover story on Ambrose Bierce.
Everyone of a certain age, it is said, remembers the moment when they heard that John F. Kennedy had been shot. Yet even though I was 13 years old at the time, and recall quite a lot from 1963, I do not remember this, though for a technical reason.
The death of Manfred Rommel last week, at 84, ended a life that might be taken as a metaphor for contemporary Germany.
Like the Eiffel Tower, the Capital Beltway is an industrial monstrosity that, inadvertently, has come to represent its hometown to the outside world.
According to the polls, a little more than a majority of Americans oppose intervention in Syria, although it is difficult to say exactly what this means since the subject is decidedly ambiguous. Does intervention mean the sort of limited air campaign that President Obama seems to have in mind, or…
I found myself thinking not long ago about Helen Keller, specifically the famous scene in her autobiography where she describes cold water being pumped from a well onto one hand while Annie Sullivan spells out w-a-t-e-r in Helen’s other palm.
No doubt, the bankruptcy of Detroit will have unintended consequences. But one possibility, currently under discussion, is especially distressing: sale of the paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts, which, unlike most municipal collections, is owned by the city, not a nonprofit trust.
Liz Cheney's decision to challenge a three-term incumbent Republican senator has caused a certain amount of soul-searching within the GOP. The Republican dilemma—support for a dynamic candidate versus loyalty to a good soldier—is a real one.
Rooting around in a bookstore not long ago, I stumbled upon a second edition of Functions of a Complex Variable (1917) by the Scottish mathematician Thomas MacRobert. Immediately I felt a chill, a sense of doom and foreboding, I had not experienced since youth. This was a dread mathematics text…
The latest round of Pulitzer Prizes is set to be announced this afternoon, and two things can be said about the eventual winners: Some recipents will be more deserving than others, and there will be an excess of self-congratulation. So this is as good a time as any to point you toward WEEKLY…
The American position on the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic should be obvious.
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