Hillary Clinton and her running mate, Tim Kaine, use the same word to describe Donald Trump‘s praise of Russian President Vladimir Putin: “unpatriotic.” Satisfying as it may be for Democrats to deploy that adjective against the nominee of a party known for its flag-waving jingoism, it is neither accurate nor adequate in describing what’s truly […]
The 15th anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 was an important moment for our nation. But Abraham Lincoln said everything said on September 11, 2016 more poignantly in 1838. In his famous “The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions” speech in Springfield, Illinois, Lincoln brilliantly captured the challenge of remembering and reapplying our founding […]
“I realized that America doesn’t need more ‘all-talk, no-action’ politicians running things. It needs smart businesspeople who understand how to manage. We don’t need more political rhetoric — we need more common sense. ‘If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ — but if it is broke, let’s stop talking about it and fix it. I […]
Before the Battle of Chaeronea (338 BC), where Philip II of Macedon prevailed over a common Greek alliance, the city-states had been weakened by years of social and economic turmoil. To read the classical speeches in the Athenian assembly is to learn of the democracy’s constant struggles with declining revenues, insolvency, and expanding entitlements. Rome […]
Critiquing Donald Trump’s policy pronouncements for being implausible feels a bit like belittling bathroom graffiti for its weak use of metaphor and inappropriate deployment of the conditional rather than the subjunctive. Sure, you may be technically correct, but you’ve failed to grapple with the essentials of the form. And neither the author nor his audience […]