How We Became a Braid

What is it about November and anniversaries? As it happens, this one marks the 80th anniversary of the creation of the magazine I edit, Commentary, as well as the 70th anniversary of National Review. So we’re older. But then, NR was famously “right” from the beginning, while Commentary only really began to move to the right in the late 1960s. In that sense, Commentary is kind of the kid brother of National Review, at least when it comes to the crucial intellectual labor of making arguments for traditionalism, ordered liberty, and the responsibilities of the West and of the United States as the world’s leading power and force for good.

The journey of Commentary, under the stewardship of my father, Norman Podhoretz, concomitant with the rise of the crew of thinkers and writers who came to be known as the “neoconservatives,” provided the occasion for a 1971 editorial in National Review titled “Come On In, the Water’s Fine.”

About the Author

John Podhoretz

John Podhoretz is the editor of Commentary.

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William F. Buckley Jr.

Philosophy

Conservatives

Western Civilization

What is it about November and anniversaries? As it happens, this one marks the 80th anniversary of the creation of the magazine I edit, Commentary, as well as the 70th anniversary of National Review. So we’re older. But then, NR was famously “right” from the beginning, while Commentary only really began to move to the right in the late 1960s. In that sense, Commentary is kind of the kid brother of National Review, at least when it comes to the crucial intellectual labor of making arguments for traditionalism, ordered liberty, and the responsibilities of the West and of the United States as the world’s leading power and force for good.

The journey of Commentary, under the stewardship of my father, Norman Podhoretz, concomitant with the rise of the crew of thinkers and writers who came to be known as the “neoconservatives,” provided the occasion for a 1971 editorial in National Review titled “Come On In, the Water’s Fine.”