I debated University of Queensland professor John Quiggin at a wonderfully full auditorium in Brisbane, Australia. Quiggin argued that postmodernism is a right-wing phenomenon, as evidenced by climate-change denialism and the presidency of Donald Trump. I argued the negative. An hour of debate, followed by audience questions. Also a brief comment from John Anderson, former […]
Debate: Is Postmodernism Right-Wing or Left-Wing? Read More »
… that it’s come to this: Politicians feel they can/must nudge them or coerce them into basic intellectual civility. The President of the United States uses the financial big stick: “Many have become increasingly hostile to the First Amendment and free speech. Under the guise of speech codes, safe spaces, and trigger warnings, these universities
Universities should be deeply embarrassed … Read More »
Our head politician wants to use political leverage to fix higher education’s semi-censorship problem. Universities should be ashamed that it has come to this — those universities, at least, that do not have healthy free-speech cultures. Of course politicians already use their power — financial threats and regulatory compulsion — to make universities do what
Politicians Should *Not* Enforce Free Speech at Universities Read More »
From a review of always-thoughtful Mark Lilla’s 2018 book on how to revive liberalism. The question, says Samuel Moyn, is: “How did we get here? Much depends on how one narrates the path from 1968 to Trump’s election.” Moyn’s suggestion is: ‘After 1968, disaster set in. Faced with the sins of Vietnam, the Democrats flirted
A leftist on how we got to Trump Read More »
[Reposting from its first publication at EveryJoe.] Is a seismic change rumbling through Left-wing circles? In the hard-Left Jacobin magazine, two young philosophers bemoan their discovery that postmodern strategies have now been captured by the hateful and hated Alt-Right — and so in reaction they propose that socialists embrace the philosophy of the Enlightenment.[1] President Donald
Will the Alt-Right make the Left embrace the Enlightenment? Read More »
Leftists have long been apoplectic about Koch money on campus, especially when used to support discussions of free-market principles. Now they are strange bedfellows with the Trump right-wing, which also attacks free markets, especially on immigration and trade. Here’s Donald Trump dissing Charles and David Koch: “‘I never sought their support because I don’t need
Anti-liberals — Left and Right — versus the Kochs Read More »
Alt-Right philosopher Jason Reza Jorjani is taken on by hard-left philosophers at Jacobin magazine. My commentary article begins this way: Is a seismic change rumbling through Left-wing circles? In the hard-Left Jacobin magazine, two young philosophers bemoan their discovery that postmodern strategies have now been captured by the hateful and hated Alt-Right — and so in
Alt-Right versus Hard Left — Forcing a Return to the Enlightenment? Read More »
First in a series tracking Donald Trump’s presidency and its anti-free-market policies. 1. Pence and Trump explicitly criticize free markets. The New York Times. 2. Direct dealing with an individual company: Carrier will not move. The Fiscal Times. 3. Close up parts of the Internet. “We’re losing a lot of people because of the Internet,”
Trump versus Free Markets, late 2016 edition Read More »