IN THE November 25, 2013, ISSUE
Fifty Years after Dallas
Whatever bargain Joe Kennedy struck with the devil, the expiation of it was cruel. The poor man was forced to watch his three gifted boys precede him to the grave, ...
Magazine
Also In This Issue
Articles
The E-Word
When we were schoolkids, we were taught that the longest word was “antidisestablishmentarianism.” Lately, I’ve been thinking that the most common word is “establishment” — as in “establishment Republican.” I ...
Eric the Red
The history of Western fashion in the 20th century will be very much impoverished if those who come to write it fail to emphasize the seminal importance of something I ...
Fifty Years after Dallas
Whatever bargain Joe Kennedy struck with the devil, the expiation of it was cruel. The poor man was forced to watch his three gifted boys precede him to the grave, ...
The Christie Challenge
Chris Christie’s victory has predictably ignited talk of his seeking the presidency. Before his backers start reserving the moving van, though, it’s worth stepping back and calmly surveying what he’s ...
The $5 Problem
An examination of Americans’ household balance sheets uncovers something to discourage everyone: For those with preferences for minimalistic government and a maximally free economy, the disastrous state of our private ...
Features
Schadenfreudarama
To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, you’d have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at the unraveling of Obamacare.
First, the obligatory caveats. It is no laughing matter that millions ...
A New Agenda
What do we do next, not only in the fight to stop Obamacare but, more generally, to advance a larger, positive vision of America and craft a practical plan to ...
Pro-Life, Pro-Animal
In 20 or so years of political speechwriting, the only condition I have ever set down in advance of being hired is that I would never, under any circumstances, assist ...
Books, Arts & Manners
Camelot Revisited
On Sunday, November 22, 1964, some 40,000 Americans — a crowd greater than the capacity at Boston’s Fenway Park — visited Arlington National Cemetery to pay their respects on the ...
The Right JFK
After President Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, his supporters portrayed him as a liberal hero and a martyr for liberal causes. Kennedy loyalists Theodore Sorensen and Arthur Schlesinger Jr. soon published ...
The Road to Roe
Roe v. Wade was a “reasoned statement, elaborated with great care.” So the Supreme Court claimed in 1992, when it reaffirmed its 1973 ruling that all states had to allow ...
Essential Ellington
In a passage quoted by Terry Teachout in this new book, T. S. Eliot writes: “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets ...
Into the Inferno
Twelve Years a Slave, the first non-Tarantino major motion picture in years to offer a slave’s-eye view of the antebellum South, would probably have been guaranteed admiring reviews and a ...
Sections
Letters
Health-Care Hell
I am writing to you regarding the November 11 cover of National Review. The allusion to Canto Three of Dante Alighieri’s Inferno of the Divine Comedy featured on the ...
The Week
‐ We can’t keep insurance policies we like, and we have to keep a president we don’t. Can’t win.
‐ New Jersey is the country’s bluest state with a Republican governor, ...
Bethesda Mental-Health Clinic
Doctor’s Notes
Tuesday: Spent a full session with Client BHO. Spent most of the session hearing how well the rollout has gone for one of his signature pieces of legislation — ...
Killer Elite
Double Down, an insider view of the 2012 campaign, reportedly quotes President Obama saying he’s “really good at killing people” when it comes to picking targets for drone strikes. So ...
Poetry
BOCA RATON
In the rat’s mouth
of wealth
one learns to accept
opulence
as a perk of life
dazed by the depth
and breadth of it
spread on the hyaline
sea sparkle & sky
cluttered with yachts
cutting cream swaths
in a ...
Those Who Can’t, Govern
For much of last year, a standard trope of President Obama’s speechwriters was that there were certain things only government could do. “That’s how we built this country — together,” ...