More or less, the musings of a graduate of a Scottish university, born in New York, formerly resident in South Africa, and now living in London.
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ALL TEXT © ANDREW CUSACK 2004-PRESENT UNLESS OTHERWISE STATED
10:50 pm
The magazine that stands athwart history yelling “go faster!”
10:54 pm
Andrew, just before seeing your “National Revolution: Try and Stop Us” cover, I drove home tonight behind a Hummer bearing a bumper that read “USA: We Run the World.”
11:03 pm
Oh National Review! I had actually forgotten it existed since I expunged it (and the evil more vile NRO) from my reading two or three years ago. Come to think of it I’m not sure I know any young conservatives who read it anymore.
11:13 pm
Ha! I think you had a Freudian slip there Tuck, when you wrote “evil more vile” instead of (presumably) “even more vile”.
KD, a new bumper sticker has been doing the rounds lately: “BE NICE TO AMERICA” in big letters, followed by “or we’ll bring democracy to your country”.
11:18 pm
Tucker, you have no idea how right you are. Remember when they made that big deal about National Review being handed over to a board, and they had Austin Bramwell, the one young guy, appointed to “ensure the future” or something like that? Apparently he was urged off the board a short while later (for the usual crime of being a conservative).
That’s the future (or lack thereof) of National Review for you!
2:33 am
Apparently consistency with your views is not something you seek in your favorite NR writers?
Derbyshire here deprecates the Bourbons, the Hapsburgs, and Franco. I’m sure I’ve seen at least the last two defended here.
He also writes here that he has lost even his moderate Anglicanism, believes religion is not a positive thing for individuals, and that to ask whether it benefits society is a malformed question, rather we should say that there are religious people and it’s better if society accommodates those impulses.
Oh, and he also describes himself as mildly anti-catholic and though he attributes it partly to prejudice then proceeds to provide reasons.
8:07 am
I know this marks me out as the old-timer amongst the youthful band of Hayward, Harrington, and Cusack, but I remember when National Review was a great magazine (and I remember Kuehnelt-Leddihn writing for it). I’ll go even further; I remember when the New Yorker was a great magazine! My subscriptions to both lapsed years ago.
11:30 am
One can disagree with someone, even frequently, and still find him worth reading.
2:44 pm
Would it terribly impolite to mention Brad Delong’s instructive examination of NR archives?
12:12 pm
Incidentally, the Ludwig von Mises Institute has some major works of Erik Maria Ritter von Kuehnelt-Leddihn available for purchase.
Both LIBERTY OR EQUALITY and THE MENACE OF THE HERD are listed as out of print at Kuehnelt-Leddihn’s grandson’s website, but you can purchase either of them through the Mises Institute site.
THE MENACE OF THE HERD has a particularly chilling cover.
[click here]
As to Derbyshire, I agree with Mr. Cusack completely. I don’t always agree with him, but he’s one of the more interesting writers around. And certainly the most interesting of the current crop at National Review.
4:09 pm
At least National Review isn’t as dire as the Weekly “Low” Standard, which really is an absolutely appalling read, rather like a very poor man’s City Journal.
For the record, I generally disagree with both John Derbyshire and Andrew Cusack, but I enjoy their writings.
6:56 am
As yet another who imbibed much of his early political thinking from the early NR, may I add my voice to those who lament its present abject state? Derbyshire is good, not because he is always right, but because he thinks as a conservative. The rest (all of them) are neo-cons at best, shills for Israel at worst.
Kuehnelt-Leddihn was always stimulating, but the best mind who wrote for NR was Thomas Molnar, one of the unsung geniuses of his time.
7:23 pm
I hadn’t known Austin had been hired by NR (even for a short period of time). We were co-bloggers on the Harvard Federalist Society Blog, and met briefly at a Notre Dame Law School function. I understand he is married to a former NR column writer (whom I managed to greatly irritate once, but that’s another story).
As to NR’s content, I can’t say I pay too much attention to its political writing; I’m usually perusing the blog on the federal judiciary.
10:51 am
Per Derbyshire from Joseph Bottom, Editor of First Things:
“Scooter Libby was sentenced on Tuesday to thirty months in jail and a $250,000 fine. And I can’t much stand the bloodsports of American politics anymore.
“At the time of his conviction, I wrote a small essay about my friendship with Scooter—others knew him better, but we had a genuine literary friendship, free from the politics that infects too much conversation in America these days. And I, along with many others, wrote a letter to the sentencing judge pleading for mercy. Bill Kristol has perhaps the strongest reaction to this week’s imposition of an enormous sentence. And Kristol’s furious indictment of President Bush for his failure to act seems exactly right.
“But, then, why should the president act, when even much of the conservative press seems willing to forget the man who is Scooter Libby. Here, for instance, is the reaction on the webpages of National Review [penned by John Derbyshire] : “Libby? Heck, he’ll be all right, and a taste of low life might educate him some.” Rich? Ramesh? Jonah? Jay? Kathryn? Kate? Are any of you reading what your writers are saying? This is vile.
“I was so angry and hurt that I thought I would write that I would never read National Review again. But it isn’t true. The world is too small not to continue to know the magazine, to read it, and to interact with it.
“Still, this much is true: From the moment Scooter Libby was indicted, all the way down to this moment of his sentencing, I have judged the character of many acquaintances in the worlds of writers, public intellectuals, and conservative politicians—their courage and their trustworthiness—by a simple measure: whether or not they stood up for Scooter Libby.
“The person [John Derbyshire] who could write that line for National Review—“Libby? Heck, he’ll be all right, and a taste of low life might educate him some”—may be an interesting writer, and we might find that he’s a fun person to spend a little time with. But we also know now that he is not trustworthy when trust really matters, and we know that he is not brave.”