The Irish Parliament House, now the Bank of Ireland, on College Green in Dublin, is one of my favourite buildings in the world. You can go there and visit the House of Lords chamber. Unfortunately, the House of Commons chamber burned down shortly after the Irish Parliament was merged into the British one in 1800. It is supposedly the first purpose-built parliament building in the world, though no longer in use.

Via Mere Comments.

The other evening whilst out on the town with Will Moller (Groton ’02, Kenyon ’06), I was pleased to learn that Groton still graduates its male student in straw boaters.

I think straw boaters are about due for a revival. And not those horrific plastic numbers that proliferate around convention and campaign time. The real deal. The trouble is the best place to start a straw boater revival is St Andrews, and we’re only all in St Andrews when straw boaters aren’t really “in season” as the sartorialists would say.

The Scotsman has given in to the current Fleet Street mania and become a tabloid. The newspaper had experimented with the tabloid size for its Saturday edition and then just a few days ago converted the weekday editions as well.

For my fellow Americans in the audience, a little explanation. Going tab is all the rage amongst respectable newspapers in Britain over the past year. The ancient Times of London comes in both broadsheet and tabloid format. The Independent was the first broadsheet to publish both a broadsheet and tabloid edition, and then decided to become a permanent tabloid. The Guardian, to my knowledge, has kept out of the tabloid fray, and the venerable Daily Telegraph remains commited to broadsheetism.

The benefits of publishing in tabloid size are that the newspaper is easier to handle and read. Financially, however, it means page size, and thus potential advertising space, is reduced by half.

I am not a fan of this tabloid revolution. I fantasize periodically about the Mitre being published in broadsheet format instead of A4. Perhaps my anti-tabloidism is culturally ingrained. After all, we Anglophones are used to the formula of broadsheet = trustworthy. This formula is not true, for example, in France, where the two main respectable newspapers, le Figaro and le Monde, are printed in a format slightly smaller than the standard US/UK tabloid.

Nonetheless, one of the aspects of broadsheets that I enjoy is that they aren’t easy to read on subways and whatnot. It’s best to sit down in a comfortable chair in a well-lit location and peruse the goings-on and thoughts of New York, the nation, and the world in the New York Sun than to get tiny bits of news in a “convenient” format.

“Chuck Schumer has a problem with people who have deeply held religious views, so he’s repeatedly blocked traditional Catholics from serving as federal judges.”

Just watched this television advert for Dr. O’Grady, and it hits the spot!

“As this new nation grew from weakness to strength to world power, the hand of Divine providence was always humbly sought and thankfully acknowledged. But today, we meekly watch as cultural revolutionaries try to destroy the purest of our traditions… It’s time to tame the liberal elite.”
Dr. Marilyn O’Grady, Conservative Party candidate for the United States Senate

This November, New York will face its first serious three-way U.S. Senate race in (my) living memory. Liberal incumbent Chuck Schumer is being challenged by fellow liberal Howard Mills as well as by a conservative, Dr. Marilyn O’Grady.

The politicos among the audience will remember that a similar situation in the 1970’s resulted in the Conservative Party candidate Jim Buckley defeating both the liberal Democrat and liberal Republican candidates to capture one of the Empire State’s two Senate seats.

I think the chances of this happening again are somewhat smaller today. Unfortunately, this time around the two-liberals-and-a-conservative model will likely split the block of voters who normally vote Republican rather than split voters that are doctrinally liberal. Shame on the NYGOP for having so many willy-nillies among its ranks!

A number of commentators have weighed in on the printed page about the “end of the electoral alliance” between the Republican and Conservative Parties. It hasn’t really ended, per se. The Conservative Party is just refusing to endorse Republican candidates that aren’t conservative, which is one of its founding purposes, and something it should have done in the recent gubernatorial election.

Check out Marilyn’s website here, and the Conservative Party’s rather lacklustre site here. (Both links are also on the sidebar at left).

Bon Voyage has to be one of the best films I’ve seen ever. A true classic. Cinema at its most magnificent and magnetic. Bon Voyage is entertaining, thrilling, amusing, beautiful, and full of intrigue. Hollywood hasn’t made a film that could even approach its quality in years.

Alright, alright, I’ll admit its a film that appeals especially to me. It is, after all, French, and depicts a period of French history of which I am particularly interested in: the advent of the Vichy regime. But this is no history film. It is certainly not a “romantic comedy” as described on the back of the DVD box. It was a pleasure in every way. Certainly not the usual claptrap you get from Los Angeles designed to appeal to the lowest common denominator. This is a film where all the contributing factors (beautiful women, gunfire, and intrigue) are in proportion.

Well I could go on for ages. Just see it! Rent it, buy it, confiscate it, see it!

The official Bon Voyage website from Sony Pictures Classic.

Well folks, another entry is long overdue, and it will surprise you not that my computer is still out. As such, the unanswered emails are piling high, but I promise they will be taken care of.

Reading.

I’ve finished Buckley’s Miles Gone By and I have to say I found it immensely enjoyable. It is a collection of biographical musings from across the years, akin to his previous Nearer, My God. The former, I’m glad to report, avoids the slight haphazardness of the latter, perhaps because it is much longer and the selections included are well grouped. One of the tales which I particularly enjoyed was of WFB and Brent Bozell (whose brother is in Solesmes) at Yale. WFB and some cronies had piled there money together to purchase an aircraft, which Buckley and Bozell one day landed on the great lawn of the Ethel Walker School, where Buckley’s younger sister was studying. Upon disembarking the aircraft, they were promptly invited to tea with the headmistress. The audio CD which accompanies the book is a mere fancy.

Of Paradise and Power was particularly enlightening. Though Mr. Kagan’s general supposition about the difference in American and European worldviews (as well as Europe achieving a Kantian perpetual peace only by existing under the wing of the United States, a Hobbesian leviathan) seems quite well thought out, I did find myself disagreeing with one or two of his conclusions. Plus it irritated me when he referred to Britons as Europeans. Such silliness.

Speaking of silliness, I’ve started reading Wodehouse. Bought Young Men in Spats, a collection of tales from the Drones Club, and a volume of three of the Jeeves-and-Wooster novels. So far, both are thoroughly enjoyable.

et cetera…

I was very pleased to catch up with Mr. Nicholas Merrick last night, via whom I also ran into Mssrs. Simon Tuchman and Steven Lagotte. Good old Nicholas, I’m very pleased to say, is not a Buddhist as was previously thought for some unknown reason, and Deo gratias Simon is no longer of the Marxian persuasion in terms of economic thought and whatnot. Floreat Thorntona!

Michael Ulsterman (as he is known to me), our favourite Oirishman, was in town recently and I was very pleased enough to take him out for a bite at Café Lalo, one of Manhattan’s finest eateries (as well as the locale where I inadvertently stood up Brearley girl Buffy Breed on accounts of my not knowing what day of the week it was). Michael, though a liberal, is a Unionist through-and-through, and has a very sharp, sardonic wit that I hope will soon grace the pages of the Mitre. I think the first time I went to Lalo’s was with Jessy Lewis, Jessie Smyth, and Peter Scott (and was the other Peter there as well?). Jessy is now at Brown, which I’m informed she is enjoying much more than her premier year at Barnard; I just spoke to young lady Smyth (Univ. of Penn.) a week or so ago; and last I heard of Peter Scott he was on the May Ball committee at King’s College Cambridge. Not bad, not bad at all.

Particularly enjoyed the recent Kens Club correspondence.

Got to chat with Nicholas Vincent on his birthday (Aug 1) whilst he was minding Japanese children in Oxford with the indefatigable D. P. Atheist Mr. Vincent threatened to don shorts to evensong at Christ Church Cathedral, but Mr. Prior threatened a walloping and Nicholas was brought into line. (I know! Shorts at evensong! What will they think of next?)

Lastly, and mournfully…

Our prayers go out to Lindsay Mucka, whose father died only a few days ago. Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May he rest in peace. Amen.

Instagram: @andcusack

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