It is good to see the British conservative philosopher, Michael Oakeshott, featuring in the American Conservative, because, as Kenneth McIntyre explains, mainstream American conservatives don’t really get Oakeshott: “This lack of influence among the movers and shakers of American political life should not be surprising, given Oakeshott’s insistence on the irrelevance of political philosophy to […]
Of the many inconsistencies associated with the Tory ‘modernisers’, one of the most glaring is the moderniser label itself. As all the cool kids know, modernism is terribly 20th century. We’re very much into the post-modern era now. (In case you're not up to speed with the philosophical niceties, the basic distinction between modernism and […]
Last week, our esteemed editor, Mr Timothy Montgomerie, made the case for taxing wealth in preference to income (The Times (£)). In doing so, he provoked a fierce reaction from his fellow rightwingers. The counter-arguments varied widely in their intelligence. At the stupid end of the spectrum was that old cop-out about more growth or […]
To which Whitehall department would you look to first for proof of an authentically conservative government? How about the Treasury, for a recognition of marriage in the tax system? Or the Foreign Office, for the repatriation of powers from the European Union? Alternatively, one might look to the Home Office, for a real return to […]
Cristina Kirchner, Argentina’s, ahem, colourful President, is up to her old tricks again – asserting her country’s claim to the Falklands by placing an advert in the Guardian (where else?). It is easy to laugh at this latest stunt, but Kirchner’s campaign is raising the profile of the Falklands dispute and encouraging commentators in other […]
In the latest edition of Radio 4’s Beyond Belief, Ernie Rea and his guests discussed the place of apocalyptic prophecies in the modern world. As demonstrated by the fuss surrounding the end of the Mayan calendar, there is no doubt that predictions of doom continue to exert a powerful hold on the human imagination. But […]
Shell-shocked Republicans are still trying to work out how they managed to lose to Barack Obama. Demographic change is one of the favoured explanations/excuses – in particular the growth of America’s Hispanic population. However, in an important piece for the Weekly Standard, Jonathan Last argues that there’s another, much more important demographic factor at work […]
In the process of becoming rich, famous and outspoken, Nassim Nicholas Taleb – the best-selling author of The Black Swan – has accumulated enemies. With the publication of Taleb’s latest book, entitled Antifragility, his critics are out in force and putting the boot in. A prime example is a hostile review by David Runciman in […]
Now that George Osborne has had his say, shall we all shut up about American politics for a while? You must be joking! As the popularity of programmes like Silent Witness proves, there’s nothing we enjoy more than a good post-mortem. And so, with the corpse of the Romney campaign still on the slab, let’s […]
Britain is unusual in having a mainstream Conservative Party. In most other European countries the conservative political forces of the 19th century became thoroughly discredited by their defence of the pre-democratic order or by their subsequent collaboration with fascism. The failure of the right should have enabled the left to completely dominate the post-war politics of […]
In an interview in last week’s Spectator, the Conservative MP and Cameroonian cheerleader, Nick Boles, expressed some bracing views on the ‘modernisation’ project that he himself was a part of: “Boles concedes that ‘for classic, relatively low income, Midlands and northern towns and cities there was something missing’. He blames this on the modernisers being ‘very carried away […]
The Closing of the American Mind by Allan Bloom is regarded by supporters and opponents alike as one of the most important modern works of conservatism. When it was first published, 25 years ago, it stirred up a raging storm of controversy and became a bestseller. As noted before on the Deep End, the irony […]
As we saw yesterday on the Deep End, the idea that the rich pay more than their fair share of tax is wrong. Taking all taxes into account, what people pay as a percentage of their income is remarkably even across income groups. But what if we also take benefits into account? Surely, those disproportionately […]
The case for a ‘wealth tax’ has supporters on both left and right. Those on the right say that taxing wealth – for instance, by creating new Council Tax bands for high value properties – is less discouraging of hard work and enterprise than taxing income. However, those on the left – who don’t much […]
Mitt Romney’s ‘secret speech’ (the remarks he made at a fundraising event in which he appeared to express a total lack of care for the 47% of Americans too poor to pay federal income tax) has unleashed a storm of criticism – and not just from the left. From a British Conservative perspective, one of […]