Samuel Johnson said that patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels. In this election year, that’s good to keep in mind. But in education rather than politics, Johnson needs to be amended: PROCEDURALISM is the last refuge of scoundrels. In this regard, unionized education is the belly of the beast. When was the last time [...]

A new book called Sex and God at Yale (Thomas Dunne Books, 2012), by recent Yale graduate and conservative blogger Nathan Harden, understandably seeks, and is receiving, comparison with William F. Buckley’s classic God and Man at Yale, originally published in 1951. However, the denigration of religious faith and the preaching of secularism in American [...]

Last week I praised a film called Margaret by the American playwright and film director, Kenneth Lonergan. The film makes splendid use of a couple of famous operatic arias. I went so far as to say that Mr. Lonergan’s use of the “Barcarolle” from Les contes d’Hoffmann at the end of his film was “sublime.” Of [...]

A film based on a poem. I guess that’s what they’d call “high concept” in Hollywood. True, Margaret, which had a (very) limited release last fall and is just out on DVD, is about as far from a Hollywood film as you can get—which just goes to show that abstract ideas and art are not necessarily [...]