Tag: Demographics

War’s Paradoxes II: From the Peloponnesian War to ‘Leading From Behind’

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

1. Why Did Athens Lose the Peloponnesian War?

It really did not in a way: Athens no more lost the war than Hitler did the Second World War between September 1939 and May 1941. Instead it was defeated in a series of wars (only later seen as elements of one long “Peloponnesian War”) against a litany of enemies — none in isolation necessarily fatal, all in succession and ultimately together lethal. Continue reading “War’s Paradoxes II: From the Peloponnesian War to ‘Leading From Behind’” →

2013: Welcome to Very, Very Scary Times

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

On the One Hand…

These should not be foreboding years. The US is in the midst of a veritable energy revolution. There is a godsend of new gas and oil discoveries that will help to curtail our fiscal and foreign policy vulnerabilities — an energy bonanza despite, not because of[1], the present administration. Continue reading “2013: Welcome to Very, Very Scary Times” →

The Rise of Faux Diversity

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by Bruce Thornton

Defining Ideas

In Fisher vs. University of Texas, the Supreme Court heard legal challenges to the University of Texas’s admissions policies, which allow consideration of an applicant’s race in order to promote “diversity” among the school’s students. Such racial preferences are widespread in university admissions. In 80 percent of elite schools, they amount to the equivalent of a 100-point boost in SAT scores, according to research by UCLA law professor Richard Sander and journalist Stuart Taylor. Continue reading “The Rise of Faux Diversity” →

Are We Becoming Medieval?

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by Victor Davis Hanson

National Review Online

A tourist mecca like Venice now boasts that it dreams of breaking away from an insolvent Italy. Similarly Barcelona, and perhaps the Basques and the Catalonians in general, claim they want no part of a bankrupt Spain. Scotland fantasizes about becoming separate from Great Britain. The Greek Right dreams of a 19th-century Greece without Asian and African immigrants who do not look Greek. Continue reading “Are We Becoming Medieval?” →

The New Reactionaries

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by Victor Davis Hanson

National Review Online

Starting in the 1930s and continuing after the war, the Democrats offered a liberal critique of, or perhaps enhancement to, the Republican vision of rugged individualism. A modern American state now had the capital and the moral ambition to smooth the rougher edges of capitalism by insisting on unemployment and disability insurance, a 40-hour week, overtime pay, and what we now associate with the social safety net. Such entitlements, along with a rapidly growing economy, redefined poverty — so much so that whereas in 1930 malnourishment was endemic among the poor, by 2000 obesity was far more injurious to the nation’s collective health. Continue reading “The New Reactionaries” →

‘Exceptional’ America

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by Victor Davis Hanson

Defining Ideas

Accepting inevitable national decline is the new pastime of both the media and government elite. Some of the pessimism revolves around current federal financial insolvency. Continue reading “‘Exceptional’ America” →

The Moral Dimensions of Illegal Immigration

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

The New Old Debate Over Illegal Immigration

The debate over illegal immigration is mostly fossilized. We know the predictable contours. Continue reading “The Moral Dimensions of Illegal Immigration” →

The Philosophies of Illegal Immigration

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

Dinosaur Thinking

Even to talk of illegal immigration earns slurs. Continue reading “The Philosophies of Illegal Immigration” →

California Abandons History for Melodrama

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by Bruce S. Thornton

Advancing a Free Society

Just when you think California can’t get any wackier, the state legislature steps up and proves you wrong. Continue reading “California Abandons History for Melodrama” →

The Destiny of Cities

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by Victor Davis Hanson

City Journal (Autumn 2010)

As the world steadily grows more urbanized, with 50 percent of its population no longer rural, it is more important than ever to ask how cities either perish or manage to survive. Continue reading “The Destiny of Cities” →