IN THE December 31, 2014, ISSUE
To Carry the Fire
What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from.
– “Little Gidding,” Four Quartets, T. S. ...
Also In This Issue
Articles
Follies of the Fifth Republic
The critic Malcolm Cowley once noted that “the chief advantage of two years in France is to give you a taste for America.” In that spirit, those who are despondent ...
The Red-Light District
On December 5, Newark, N.J., mayor Ras Baraka hosted a press conference to talk about red-light cameras — devices that snap photos of drivers who violate traffic laws, allowing authorities ...
Before You Say No . . .
March 7
Dear Mrs. Heath:
I wish to ask you a great favor. My brother David goes to Cranwell and he says they go easier on brothers, so I might have a ...
Against Secret Police
The December 7, 2014, New York Police Department CompStat report found that the number of shooting incidents in the city was up 4.5 percent year over year, while the total ...
Where You Are and What You Say
There are fans of Senator Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican and libertarian. And there are critics. But they all tend to give him credit for one thing: speaking in venues ...
Features
To Carry the Fire
What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from.
– “Little Gidding,” Four Quartets, T. S. ...
On a LARC
Usually one makes the case for a policy before enacting it. Not so with the Left’s new push to promote long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs), such as intrauterine devices (IUDs) and ...
Advice on ‘Advice and Consent’
Despite the Democratic party’s losses in November’s elections, President Obama has audaciously begun ignoring constitutional restraints in order to impose his policy views. This is true not only on domestic ...
Justice of the People, by the People, for the People
One day, police came to Christos and Markela Sourovelis’s North Philadelphia home with a search warrant. After threatening to shoot the family dog, they forced their way in and went ...
Books, Arts & Manners
Getting to Brussels
Since the emergence 25 years ago of his groundbreaking essay “The End of History,” Francis Fukuyama has become one of America’s foremost public intellectuals. Political Order and Political Decay is ...
Roots of a Tyrant
One brief paragraph terrorized Joseph Stalin. It was the postscript to the document known as Lenin’s Testament. That document has never been authenticated, yet it weighed on Stalin because, even ...
Writing the Coattails
About halfway through Britain’s long Blair nightmare, I went to two dinners where Boris Johnson was billed as the guest speaker. Each time he was eagerly awaited: a man on ...
The Great Calvinist American Novel
Were he alive today, John Calvin wouldn’t be the first person I would invite to most book clubs. It’s hard to imagine he’d approve of the characteristic goings-on: the overemphasis ...
Hope for America
There is no small irony in the fact that the song “Thanks for the Memory” is so closely linked to the remarkable career of Bob Hope. That is what the ...
The Lady Prevails
It’s a truism of the movie business that female stars are treated unkindly, and often cruelly, at an age when male careers are often just taking off. And it’s easy ...
Sections
From the Twitter feed of Kim Jung-un, @youthcaptain.
Seriously? Guys, just heard the wildest rumor about a movie Sony is making about yours truly! So excited! Getting deets ASAP from military intelligence! #gonnabeastar #gonnashinesobright #itsshowtime
Hey! @kimkardashian! I can ...
Alienation
Showman scientist and charismatic universe-explainer Neil deGrasse Tyson had some tweets the other day on the subject “When I was your age.” They were lessons about technological progress, aimed at ...
Poetry
PURSUIT
She was a child possessed with fears
Whose dreams revealed another place
Where shadowed shapes that lived in mirrors
Pursued her at a furious pace.
She ran all night and every night
And finally slept ...
The Poetic-Truth Beat
For a number of years I worked as a metro columnist at a bustling city newspaper. For a time, my cubicle was located next to the investigation desk of the ...
Letters
Fellow Heroes
I read with great pleasure your piece in “The Week” (December 8) regarding the long-overdue awarding of the Medal of Honor to Lieutenant Alonzo Cushing. However, I feel called ...
The Week
‐ Think about it from Jeb’s perspective: Would you want to be the only Bush who doesn’t get to be president?
‐ An armed Islamic radical took hostages in a café ...