The Latest(ish)

Thanks to the combination of curiosity, camera-phone, the Internet, and, now, YouTube, the culture of celebrity, never that sane in the first place, has seemed to have taken another lurch deeper into the madhouse. In recent weeks those of us who could spare time from the Lohan implosion, the Kramer collapse, or the vital Simpson debate (Jessica or Ashlee?), and who were so inclined, could have seen much more of seedy Britney than nasty Kevin has managed of late, or, if we preferred, we could have contemplated the rise, fall, and possible rise again of this nation’s most recent “troubled” [...]

Here’s Lucy

January 9, 2007

Dirt; published originally in National Review Online

If, in 1932, nearly 15 years after the catastrophe of the “war to end all wars” had finally drawn to a close, any Britons were still foolish, complacent, or naïve enough to cling to their island nation’s traditional sense of inviolability, Stanley Baldwin, the country’s once-and-future prime minister, wanted to smash that illusion beyond repair. Speaking to the House of Commons in November of that year, he warned that the “man in the street [had] to realize that there is no power on earth that can protect him from being bombed. Whatever people may tell him, the bomber will always [...]

Battered Kingdom

January 3, 2007

Blitz: The Story of December, 29th, 1940 by Margaret Gaskin; published originally in The New York Sun