Rachel Getting Married
A movie about self-satisfaction that is itself way too self-satisfied to have anything very interesting to say
Entry from November 17, 2008
Who, do you suppose, is being described in the following passage? You recognize it as soon as she walks into the room: a woman, late 40s, thin, stylish, her un-plasticized face aglow. Having long since passed proving herself, she radiates a secret kind of joy, propelled by a benevolent second wind. This is what a…
Let the Right One In
A Swedish vampire movie comes close to injecting a magical new life into a tired conceit but doesn’t quite succeed
Entry from November 13, 2008
In scolding the United Nations Security Council for not sending more “peace keeping” troops to the Congo to deal with a Rwandan invasion and civil war in the eastern part of the country, The New York Times editorializes as follows: “The international community failed to stop Rwanda’s genocide and promised not to let it happen again….
Entry from November 10, 2008
Not for the first time in recent weeks have I been moved to wonder how so intelligent a person can be so spectacularly wrong; not for the first time, either, have I answered myself with what I fear is destined to become the two-word motto of glorious Age of Obama now a-dawning: wishful thinking. The…
Entry from November 5, 2008
President-elect Obama has been magnanimous in victory. Senator McCain has been gracious in defeat. Do you find it surprising that neither magnanimity nor grace appears to have any place at The New York Times? I thought not. Of course, the Times has made no secret of its advocacy on behalf of Senator Obama on its…
Entry from November 4, 2008
Well, which is it? David Broder of the Washington Post says that it was “the best campaign I”ve ever covered” — better, even, than his first, which was 1960. That election, you may remember, issued in the presidency of John F. Kennedy, a fact which may not be unconnected with Mr Broder’s fond recall of…
Entry from October 31, 2008
During the election campaign of 1972, the first in which I was able to vote, the coming Nixon landslide was pretty obvious to most people, as I remember, except for those in the media, who were almost as pro-McGovern then as they are pro-Obama today — if a little more reticent about showing it. I…
The Choice of Sarah Palin
Where does she get the nerve, anyway? — From The New Criterion of October, 2008
Saying Something Stupid
Brains, or at least the reputation for them, may be enough to earn the approval of the popular culture, but are they enough to govern the country? — From The American Spectator of October, 2008