Jeffrey Rosen is President and CEO of the National Constitution Center and professor of law at the George Washington University. His new book is titled The Pursuits of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders […]
Archives for February 2024
REVIEW: Food Has a Story
If anything deserves a love letter, it’s the history of food
Is Biden really behind? A response to Dan Williams
Three caveats in response to Dan Williams’s analysis earlier this week.
Evangelical roundup for February 8, 2024
What is happening in Evangelical land? Part of me will always be grateful for James Dobson. I totally agree with Bonnie Kristian: Evangelicals should consider a “journalism tithe.” Rick Warren on certainty: Christian music and Nashville. Willow Creek is closing […]
Embracing Nostalgia
The good old days weren’t always good. But sometimes they were.
Do young “breakthrough scholars” in US history still exist?
Rumors of the death of US history have been greatly exaggerated.
Akhil Reed Amar: “Let the states decide whether Trump should be on their ballots”
Yale law professor and author Akhil Reed Amar, one of my go-to commentators on all things constitutional, wrote an amicus brief for the Section 3, 14th Amendment Supreme Court case Trump v. Anderson. Here is a taste of his piece […]
My piece today at The Atlantic
It is titled “Part of Me Will Always Be Grateful for James Dobson.” The subtitle is “Americans deserve a fuller accounting of evangelicalism’s role in our country’s life.” Regular readers of Current will recognize some of these ideas. Here is […]
The Prophetic Voice You May Not Have Heard
Letha Dawson Scanzoni’s legacy lives on
The Art of Living: Robert Falcon Scott’s Terra Nova expedition
The Art of Living is an occasional series about people who seemed to know something about living.
A quick primer on the Senate border bill
On Sunday, Senate negotiators released the text of a $118 billion bipartisan bill to reform the country’s immigration policies. The negotiators were Jim Lankford (R-Oklahoma), Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut), and Krysten Sinema (I-Arizona). Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House of […]
Just how progressive is Pennsylvania senator John Fetterman?
Can a politician still be a “progressive” in today’s Democratic Party if he supports Israel and wants restrictions at the southern border? Adam Gabbatt of The Guardian tackles this question in a piece on Fetterman. Here is a taste: There […]
Celebrating the launch of Colin Elliott’s Pox Romana: The Plague That Shook the Roman World
What was it like “to write a book on the first pandemic in human history while experiencing the most recent pandemic”? An interview with Dr. Colin Elliott about his new book, Pox Romana.
A case for 1950s nostalgia
Today’s socialists are not longing for the days of Jim Crow. But, as Dustin Guastella of Teamsters Local 623 in Philadelphia argues, neither should they throw out the idea that the 1950s was a great time for the American worker. […]
“Trump should be thrown off the ballot.” Historians convince E.J. Dionne
When the Colorado–14th Amendment ballot case broke, Washington Post columnist and public intellectual E.J. Dionne was skeptical. He was among those who thought that Trump should stay on the ballot in Colorado and let the people decide whether he should […]
Evangelical roundup for February 5, 2024
What is happening in Evangelical land Stop equating evangelical Christianity with whiteness More on the Quaker evangelicals serving migrants in Denver. Joel Belz, RIP. John Inazu interviews Michael Wear on spiritual formation and politics. The National Association of Evangelicals is […]
2024 and The Politics of Class
An educational class divide could return Trump to the White House
The making of Joel Belz
Joel Belz’s life story displays the strengths of American evangelicalism at its height.
Sunday night odds and ends
A few things online that caught my attention this week: Abraham Lincoln’s 1838 speech to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield, IL. Yellowstone National Park’s winterkeeper. Darryl Hart and Menckeniana Do we need more Hubert Humphrey liberalism? Lost photos of […]
Movie clip of the day
RIP: