I have written for National Review since the third bleak day after September 11, 2001, and have not missed a column since. I live and work on the West Coast, but the editors and writers at NR in New York over the years have seemed like a family, with long traditions back to, and reverence for, William F. Buckley’s original vision of a conservative voice in the wilderness of growing liberal chaos.
In the 21st century there are now all sorts of conservative media in a way undreamed of when Buckley created National Review. But few have such deep roots as NR and welcome such diverse views. In over 13 years, I have never had a column spiked, though often on issues such as war, peace, immigration, or the particular Republican nominees vying for the presidency my views were not necessarily those of either the editorial staff or fellow conservative writers. In other words, a wide conservative spectrum — paleo-conservatives, neo-conservatives, tea-party enthusiasts, the deeply religious and the agnostic, both libertarians and social conservatives, free-marketeers and the more protectionist — characterizes National Review. The common requisite is that they present their views as a critique of prevailing liberal orthodoxy but do so analytically and with decency and respect.
I support National Review because it is a professional and humane organization that tirelessly makes the case that what is called liberalism is not liberal and that what we are told is progressivism progresses nowhere but to serfdom. And that collective and state-run empathy for the poor and dispossessed is not a Great Society, which depresses individual initiative and makes us all collectively poorer, but rather is best expressed as allowing the citizen of a free society to prosper on his own initiative, and thereby enrich the entire commonwealth.
In the 21st century, National Review has opened new pathways of reaching younger professionals and students, with an Institute, symposia, and lecture series. Its cruises are unique — natural meeting places for some of the greatest Americans one can find, from all walks of life, who share a common worry that wherever liberal engineers think they are driving America, all sorts of people simply do not wish to go — and won’t! Intellectual populism is a National Review cruise and get-together.
Let us all support National Review, each according to his or her station, as the country reawakens from its six-year slumber. And as it rediscovers what has been lost, National Review will be there each day to help us rebuild.
Donated $50 earlier today. NRO is indispensable during these trying times.
Thank you Dr. Hanson, Mona Charen, Charles Krauthammer Heather MacDonald and Rich Lowry for all the good work that you do.
Anything to stop “Progserfdom,” thank you Professor Hanson for recommending National Review.
Natural Law tells us no one has a right to unjustly aggress upon our body, finances, spirits, souls or minds.
Isn’t “Progserfdom” Worldview K-12 Education an evil aggression upon minds that could otherwise be free?
It was actually this same call to giving that Hanson posted a year ago that got me into NRO and I have loved most every minute of time I’ve spent reading columns there. I will probably be giving in the near future.
I do support National Review, but I wish they had reviewed my book, The Great Liberal Death Wish (2012) which predicted the reelection of Obama, Putin’s aggressions, immigration disaster, overreaching courts and more (it was dedicated to Bill Buckley, who encouraged the writing of it!).
Damage control…due to the Jason Lee Steorts commentary?
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/418515/equal-chance-love-why-we-should-recognize-same-sex-marriage-jason-lee-steorts
What you are professing is laudable, but in today’s egocentric society, unlikely to come about in reality.
I’m glad that you mentioned it.
The new NRO website is horrible. I used to read articles there every day but since the new look never.
Adds and bloated streaming etc. etc. I go directly to VDH for articles now but it breaks my heart that
the NRO site is worthless. I haven’t even been able to find contact info to voice my displeasure it’s so hard to navigate.
I wonder if the number of visitors has tapered off or if I’m just a lone wolf. (could very well be me).
Pass it along if it seems relevant.
BTW I try to read every thing that you write. I come from a Santa Clara prune farming family so your writings in that regard (raisin farming, Cal ag etc. ) really strike home.
Hi Roy,
Try not to get too frustrated with NRO’s new look. It took me a little while to get used to it, but now I love it. And remember, only the look has changed, not the content. I hope you’ll support NRO any way you can, as they need our help to keep the lights on. Could you imagine not being able to easily access VDH, Mona Charen, or Rich Lowry’s erudite commentaries?
I’ll support the National Review the day that John Derbyshire returns.
I read the National Review in college libraries since 1959 until I had the money to subscribe in 1968 and kept my subscription until the firing of John Derbyshire a few years ago. I let my subscription lapse with a heavy heart but Derbyshire’s firing was too much for me especially after the way the NR treated Joe Sobran years before.
Dan Kurt
The NRO can pound sand. I once was a big supporter and reader of NRO. No more.
The NRO advocates for homosexual “marriage.”
The NRO disassociated from John Derbyshire (talk to me about race after you’ve lived in Chicago for 18 years).
Mark Steyn – the best conservative commentator ever – left the NRO.
The NRO is now the “Jeb Bush” of conservatism. Bye, bye, NRO. I won’t give you a penny.