Here is the liberal Washington Post columnist: Vote for Cheney. Now there is a sentence I never expected to write. Yes, I hope that every Democrat and every moderate and progressive-minded unaffiliated voter in Wyoming crosses into the Republican primary on Aug....
E.J. Dionne
Where are the Rusty Bowers Republicans?
Watch Rusty Bowers testifying yesterday before the House Select Committee on January 6th: Here is E.J. Dionne at The Washington Post: Note to every politician in the GOP: You have to decide. You can be a Rusty Bowers Republican. Or you can...
“While the Right has been busy taking the White House, the Left has been marching on the English department.” E.J. Dionne and Michael Kazin remember Todd Gitlin.
Here is a taste of Dionne’s column on the hero of the New Left who died this past weekend at the age of 79: …Gitlin was president of SDS from 1963 to 1964 and wrote the best account of the...
E.J. Dionne on Political Idolatry
This morning I was on a local radio show in the Boston area. When the host asked me what I thought about Christians getting involved in politics, I said, as I have before, that Christians who want to enter political...
Is David Brooks the Last American Whig?
No newspaper, magazine, or website is credible these days until it publishes a “David Brooks spiritual pilgrimage” article. 🙂 Most of these pieces are reviews of his latest book The Second Mountain. Check out examples of this genre at The...
E.J. Dionne on Ben Sasse’s Failure to Oppose Donald Trump’s “National Emergency”
Ben Sasse, the senator from Nebraska, has been a vocal critic of Donald Trump. Yet rarely does his opposition to Trump move beyond words. For example, when twelve GOP senators broke with their party to oppose Donald Trump’s “national emergency”...
Intellectualism and Anti-Intellectualism in the Age of Trump
Here is a taste of Adam Water‘s and E.J. Dionne‘s recent piece at Dissent: “Is Anti-Intellectualism Ever Good for Democracy?” Intellectuals are not entitled to special privileges, and “intellectualism” should not be seen as a superior way of life. But the...
Tweet of the Day
“True religion…begins in doubt and continues in spiritual exploration. Debased religion begins in fear and terminates in certainty.” Neal Gabler quoted in @JohnFea1‘s new book, “Believe Me: The Evangelical Road to Donald #Trump.” (My #) Fea coined the term “Court...
Original Sin Liberalism
Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne writes about it in relation to gun control at Commonweal: Here is a taste: An Original Sin Liberal might go on to challenge conservatives who claim to be very conscious of human fallibility and our capacity for selfishness....
“Faith and the Faithful in U.S. Politics”
This was the title of a symposium held recently at Holy Trinity Parish in Washington. The event was sponsored by the Georgetown University Institute of Politics and Public Service and the Georgetown’s Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life. ...
Populism and American Religion
This looks like a great symposium....
The Reading Habits of Journalists and Public Intellectuals
Check out Danny Funt‘s piece at Columbia Journalism Review titled “What does it mean for a journalist today to be a Serious Reader? In the course of the essay he discusses the reading habits of Adam Gopnik, David Brooks, Ta-Nehisi Coates,...
The Diplomacy of Narcissism
This is what E.J. Dionne calls Donald Trump’s foreign policy of “America First.” Here is a taste of his recent column at The Washington Post (via Real Clear Politics). The problem with “America First” is that it describes an attitude, not a...
E.J. Dionne Weighs In on the Obama Prayer Breakfast Speech
Thanks for all of your comments on my post about Obama’s speech at the National Prayer Breakfast. I know that not all of the readers of The Way of Improvement Leads Home agree with my take on the speech, but...
Culture Wars: Old and New
In his regular Washington Post column, E.J. Dionne reflects on how the so-called “culture wars” have changed. Here is a taste:This is the new culture war. It is about national identity rather than religion and “transcendent authority.” It focuses on which […]
E.J. Dionne on Pope Francis
Dionne weighs in on Evangelii Gaudium. Here is a taste: But American liberals and conservatives alike might be discomfited by the pope’s criticism of “the individualism of our postmodern and globalized era,” since each side defends its own favorite forms...
Is it Possible to Be a “Progressive Catholic?”
Patrick Deneen does not think so. The Georgetown University politics professor (soon to be a Notre Dame politics professor) believes that the phrase “progressive Catholic” does not make sense. He makes this argument in a very insightful piece that critiques...