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MICHAEL GERSON
Modern conservatism comes in two distinct architectural styles. The first seeks to build from scratch, using accurate ideological levels and plumb lines, so every wall is straight and every corner squared. The goal of politics is to apply abstract principles in their purest form.
MICHAEL GERSON
Suppose that the Environmental Protection Agency were to admit offhandedly that the fluoridation of water had only modest communist mind-control effects. Or the United Nations were to concede it has been running fleets of black helicopters over American cities, but only in the course of conducting extensive goodwill tours.
MICHAEL GERSON
In some cases, the fog of war is initially thick, then dissipates. Following the Sept. 11, 2012, Benghazi attacks that killed four Americans including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, the facts were initially clear. The fog was a later addition.
MICHAEL GERSON
The Rev. Jim Wallis is a man of the left — perhaps the defining figure of the evangelical left. So it is not surprising that I should find some of the policy views expressed in his new book, “On God’s Side,” badly mistaken. But this does not prevent Wallis from being resoundingly right in his central premise: that American politics would be elevated by a renewed commitment to the common good.
MICHAEL GERSON
On Syria, President Barack Obama has sometimes seemed isolated within his own administration. As the atrocities have escalated — from the shelling of neighborhoods, to airstrikes on bread lines, to the use of Scud missiles against civilians, to the likely incremental introduction of chemical weapons — the Assad regime’s strategy has become alarmingly clear.
MICHAEL GERSON
Since Franklin Roosevelt busted the curve, presidents have generally tried to avoid the 100-day measure of their effectiveness. But as President Barack Obama’s second term reaches this milestone, his legislative yield is particularly paltry.
MICHAEL GERSON
DALLAS – Thursday’s dedication of the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum here has been an occasion for both friends and critics of the former president to press their case. According to the polls, the number of critics has fallen over time. They make up for it with enthusiasm.
MICHAEL GERSON
The sense of helplessness that follows a tragedy is too much for us. So we fill the silence after the sirens with explanations. This is very human — until it becomes inhuman.
MICHAEL GERSON
Since the Eisenhower administration, the United States generally has done food aid in a certain way: grow and pack it in America, ship it across the world on American-flagged ships, then deliver it through American charities, which sell a portion of the food to fund their other programs. Not coincidentally, the system has been popular with American agribusinesses, shipping companies and maritime unions.
MICHAEL GERSON
Post-World War II Great Britain was the full, fearless application of modern liberalism — what Margaret Thatcher called “those banal and bureaucratic instruments of coercion, confiscatory taxation, nationaliza-tion and oppressive regulation.” The result was dysfunc-tion, decay, drabness and demoralization. Distinguished men of the left had seized their moment of promise, and the promise had lost. “Wherever )Chancellor of the Exchequer) Sir Stafford Cripps has tried to increase wealth and happiness,” said journalist Colm Brogan, “grass never grows again.”
MICHAEL GERSON
Over the years, Americans have come to discount statements on Israel and Zionism by Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Repetition has rendered them unremarkable.
MICHAEL GERSON
At the Normandy American Cemetery on the cliff above Omaha Beach, there are rows and rows of crosses and Stars of David. Certainly, many buried there were not religious. But the overwhelming majority of Americans in the mid-20th century identified themselves culturally as Protestants, Catholics or Jews, no matter their personal beliefs.
MICHAEL GERSON
There is a close relationship between culture and cult – between the shared attitudes and values of a people and their religious views and practices. American culture is increasingly shaped by men and women who would rather sleep in or play golf on a Sunday morning.
MICHAEL GERSON
Recent brutal attacks on the GOP have claimed that minorities often think that “Republicans do not like them or want them in the country.” That younger voters are “rolling their eyes at what the party represents.” That former Republicans view the party as “scary,” “narrow-minded,” “out of touch” and populated by “stuffy old men.”
MICHAEL GERSON
It would be a mistake to confuse a budget proposal for a proposed budget, though they bear a superficial resemblance. A budget proposal – of the type that Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., have recently announced – represents the internal agreement reached by a party caucus and the starting point of a high-stakes political negotiation.
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