“Modern Age is pleased to offer some relief that nonetheless has a measure of relevance. We asked some twenty of our friends and contributors to weigh in on the best choice for president—but not the best choice on the ballot this November. Instead, we asked them to choose the best character from all of creative literature for the role.” An interesting exercise. The answers they got were a nice range of amusing to head-scratching, but that is part of the fun. George Bailey from It’s A … [Read more...] about Jeeves for President
Modern Society
Why the Praise for Mediocre Books?
Reading book reviews is an exercise of learning to read between the lines. There are good book reviewers out there and they write interesting and thoughtful reviews. But, the majority of reviews are the equivalent of the publisher’s blurbs on the back of books. The first rule of book reviewing tends to be Praise the Book as path-breaking and timely and wonderful. The exception is books written by people the reviewer doesn’t like, the hit review, in which the book is eviscerated as violating … [Read more...] about Why the Praise for Mediocre Books?
Be Like Batgirl
Is it fun to be a Superhero? Having Superpowers is obviously fun; if you could run faster than sound or climb walls or fly, that would be great. But, would it be fun to put on your costume and go out at night and fight villains? Most Superheroes get some satisfaction about their crime fighting ways. But, one of them seems to really enjoy everything about it. Batgirl. In the early pages of Batgirl: A Celebration of 50 Years, the stories are pure fun. Here we have Barbara Gordon with a Can-Do … [Read more...] about Be Like Batgirl
Capitalism, Christianity, and the Great Books
For those of you who like podcasts, I recently joined the moderators of The Open Door to talk about a recent article I wrote for Public Discourse. You can listen to the podcast here And, the article which was the basis for the discussion is here … [Read more...] about Capitalism, Christianity, and the Great Books
Collapsing Communities
There is you and there is the city, state, and country in which you live. We could discuss either one of those levels of aggregation. If we talk about you, the individual, we could discuss your ideas or personality or hopes and dreams. If we talk about the city or state or country, we inevitably end up talking about politics. But what about the space in between you and the city, state, country? What about your community? What does your community look like? Who is in your … [Read more...] about Collapsing Communities
Shop Local
One of the curiosities of any Age is the things that people assume are New. A generation arises and discovers phenomena that surely nobody before had ever seen. Those with a bit of knowledge of history know that there really is nothing new under the sun, but the shocked indignation or rejoicing at discovery about things which were ever thus continues apace. Consider the complaints about Wal-Mart and Home Depot and Amazon destroying all the family businesses in your favorite town. Shop Local … [Read more...] about Shop Local