We should not have needed the likes of Robert Conquest to describe and awaken us to the horrors of the Soviet Union. We should not have needed him to tell us that Joseph Stalin was a monster. We should not have needed him to tell us that the monstrousness of Stalin was the direct and …
This Is What Integrity Looks Like
Wouldn't it have been nice if someone like Johnnie Walters were in charge of the Internal Revenue Service these past several years? Johnnie M. Walters, a commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service under President Richard M. Nixon who left office after refusing to prosecute people on Nixon’s notorious “enemies list,” died on Tuesday at his home in Greenville, S.C. He …
Quote of the Day
His contributions represent a particular sort of genius: insight which not only seems obvious in hindsight, but which so substantially transforms the discipline that its effect is hard to appreciate all these years later. Is it really possible that family choices were not seen as appropriate material for economic analysis back in the day? [. …
In Memoriam: Gary S. Becker
Milton Friedman called Gary Becker "the greatest social scientist who has lived and worked in the last half century." The praise was well-deserved, and if it wasn't, that might have been because the only other contender for the title was Friedman himself. Becker was masterful at formulating interesting questions to think about, and he was …
In Memoriam: Ted Cohen
I never had the pleasure of taking any one of Ted Cohen's classes, but I was fortunate enough to get plenty of exposure to him via the Latke-Hamantash debates at the University of Chicago, which Cohen so famously moderated. He was always funny, witty, and the life of just about every single event. I am sure …
More on Pete Seeger
Presumably, we are meant to think well of someone who left behind this legacy: Along with countless other sensible people, I have often bristled at the mindless deification of Pete Seeger, the nonagenarian folk singer who died yesterday at age 94. I have no doubt that Seeger was a lovely man (a mutual friend, who became …
In Memoriam: Pete Seeger
His legacy was summed up nicely nearly seven years ago by Ronald Radosh: Today, Jim Brown's new documentary, "Pete Seeger: The Power of Song," opens the annual American Film Institute/Discovery Channel Silverdocs Festival near Washington, D.C. Two years ago, Mr. Brown asked to interview me for the film. I was a former student and friend …
Let Me Fix a Headline for the New York Times
This piece should have been entitled "Amiri Baraka, Embracer of Lunatic Conspiracy Theories and Noted Anti-Semite, Dies at 79." And here is why: [Baraka] came to renewed, unfavorable attention in 2002, when a poem he wrote about the Sept. 11 attacks, which contained lines widely seen as anti-Semitic, touched off a firestorm that resulted in the …
Continue reading "Let Me Fix a Headline for the New York Times"
In Memoriam: Ariel Sharon
A comprehensive obituary is here. See also this profile; it is a critical one, but interesting in its way. For a favorable remembrance, see this profile. I imagine that if Sharon had not lapsed into a coma, we might have seen greater movement towards a comprehensive peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians; as a …
In Memoriam: Amiri Baraka
A remembrance is found here. He was the writer of terrible poetry that received praise from people who don't know much about poetry . . . or anything else, for that matter. I am sure that Baraka's passing makes some people sad, and I imagine that he did have some virtues, so I am happy to …
