Big G.K.

In The Everlasting Man, G. K. Chesterton begins his essay on "The End of the World" by noting his introduction to a new religion.

I was once sitting on a summer day in a meadow in Kent under the shadow of a little village church, with a rather curious companion with whom I had just been walking through the woods. He was one of a group of eccentrics I had come across in my wanderings who had a new religion called Higher Thought; in which I had been so far initiated as to realise a general atmosphere of loftiness or height, and was hoping at some later or more esoteric stage to discover the beginning of thought.

A Fred Siegel Shelf

 

He was a frequent contributor to City Journal. As the Mamdani term approaches, his commentary will be especially missed.

A Technocracy Instead of a Democracy

Jonathan Turley on Justice Brown Jackson's view that the chief executive (a.k.a the President) should not be able to fire experts in the executive branch.

I'll add some relevant quotes:

"This army of [college-educated] scribes is clamoring for a society in which planning, regulation, and supervision are paramount and the prerogative of the educated."

- Eric Hoffer

"Rather than opening minds, social media seems to be creating a generation largely unable to communicate in person."

- Joel Kotkin

Niall Ferguson on Trump's National Security Strategy (NSS)

"The truth always hurts. But there is another reason the NSS has outraged the papers of record. Since the early 20th century, the foreign policy establishment has held this truth to be self-evident, that all regions are not created equal, and Europe is the most important region of them all. The NSS rejects this. It firmly puts Europe in second place, after the Western Hemisphere."

Read all of Niall Ferguson's Free Press essay here.

[Photo by Thomas Fields at Unsplash]

In My Stack

 

No Civilization Was Built by Hermits.

 Playing it safe can be very risky.

[Photo by Aaron Burden at Unsplash]

Must Reading

The New Criterion: Andrew Roberts on "Will China Bury Us?"

[Photo by Jerry Wang at Unsplash]

And Let Us Never Forget

[Photo by Winston Chen at Unsplash]

Find Something Beautiful Today

 

[Photo by Matthew Stephenson at Unsplash]

It's Saturday: Crank It Up!