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at WGU. E. E. Hello

0:38

everyone and welcome to Q&A.

0:40

I'm Jay Nordlinger and my

0:42

guest today are two eminences

0:45

at National Review and in

0:47

American journalism at large. Richard

0:50

Brookyzer is a long-time senior

0:52

editor of the magazine and

0:54

of course a prolific

0:57

historian. Ramesh Pinuru is editor

0:59

of the magazine, also a

1:01

columnist for the Washington Post.

1:04

and the senior fellow at

1:06

the American Enterprise Institute.

1:09

Rick is a Yalei, Ramesha

1:11

Princetonian. Hello, my

1:14

friends, and thank you for

1:16

joining me and the audience.

1:18

What the heck? Thanks for having

1:20

us. Ramesh. Here's a biggie,

1:23

or at least a fundamental

1:25

question. What is the place of

1:28

National View magazine in American

1:31

life? So

1:34

National Review has

1:36

been the premier

1:38

journal of conservative

1:40

opinion in the United

1:42

States for decades now

1:44

and we seek to

1:46

bring right reason as

1:49

our founder Bill Buckley

1:51

often put it on

1:53

public affairs politics

1:55

and culture generally

1:57

and the service of

2:00

both assessing the national

2:02

condition and improving it.

2:04

Hmm. Well, Rick, can you improve on

2:06

that or add to it or dissent

2:09

from it or what do you have

2:11

to say? No, I think that's

2:13

the mission. That's the core

2:15

mission always has been at

2:18

different times. We've occupied

2:20

different places in the

2:23

political world and in

2:25

the conservative political world.

2:27

When we started out we thought

2:29

the Republican Party

2:31

was a stray. It was the

2:34

political party we

2:36

were more closely associated with,

2:38

but it was not going

2:40

the way we would have

2:42

liked it to go in

2:44

many ways, domestically also

2:46

foreign policy. And

2:48

then there was a period

2:51

where we felt it had

2:53

come around to our views,

2:56

Ronald Reagan's presidency. primarily.

2:58

Now I think we feel the conservative

3:01

movement, such as it

3:03

is, is like the

3:05

Republican Party back in the

3:08

50s, a stray. I would say

3:10

it's a personality cult, at

3:12

least officially. There are

3:15

certain interests that persist,

3:17

long-running interests. Rich people

3:19

still don't want to

3:21

pay a lot of

3:24

taxes. various industries

3:26

that would be good for

3:28

the United States want to

3:30

be able to do what

3:32

they do, such as energy

3:35

industries, and so on and

3:37

so on. And those are

3:39

ongoing. And then there are

3:41

smaller mobilized interests. There is

3:44

a pro-life movement, very dedicated,

3:46

been working for decades, still

3:48

added, and that's still out

3:50

there. But the conservative movement

3:53

as a whole. Apart from

3:55

National Review and very few other

3:57

places, it's like invasion of the

3:59

body snatch. And so our role

4:01

is to try and

4:04

revive those persons and

4:06

institutions that have lost

4:09

their way. So I do

4:11

think that the future

4:13

of conservatism is

4:15

up for grabs in this

4:18

era. The very meaning

4:20

of conservatism is up

4:22

for grabs in this

4:25

era. The very meaning

4:28

of conservatism. always been

4:30

contested. Sure. And, you know,

4:33

part of what conservatism is,

4:35

is a continuing debate about

4:38

what conservatism is. I would

4:40

say the thing about the

4:42

sort of Trump cult of personality,

4:46

to the extent that that

4:48

is what conservatism is. And

4:50

I think to a considerable

4:53

extent it is, but not

4:55

to a complete extent. That

4:58

comes with a built-in

5:00

expiration date and suggests

5:02

that there are all

5:04

kinds of arguments about

5:06

America's rule in the

5:09

world, about the appropriate

5:11

extent of free markets,

5:13

about what kind of

5:15

moral principles we ought

5:17

to stand for. All of

5:20

those things still need to

5:22

be engaged and are... are

5:24

not are not lost causes.

5:27

I mean I've just more

5:29

and more I think about

5:32

that Elliot line that Bill Buckley

5:34

loved to quote about there being

5:36

no lost causes because there are

5:38

no gained causes. And we have

5:41

seen that in action on the

5:43

right in particular in the last

5:45

10 years. We saw we have

5:47

seen the return of a kind

5:50

of conspiracy theorizing that we had

5:52

hoped that that Bill and others

5:54

had kind of exercised from conservatism

5:56

but turned out to be a

5:59

kind of. of perennial temptation

6:01

for conservatives. But battles

6:04

that were once, one can be

6:06

one again. Guys, I'm reminded of

6:09

a meaningful conversation I had

6:11

last year in Montgomery, Alabama.

6:13

I gave a talk at

6:15

a college about Bill Buckley

6:17

in anticipation of his centennial,

6:19

which is this year, 2025,

6:21

and afterward a man came

6:23

up to me. I think

6:25

he was a retired professor

6:27

or administrator. And he said, you know,

6:30

Bill Buckley meant a lot to

6:32

me. I saw him debate George

6:34

Wallace when I was a college

6:36

student, and that set the course

6:39

of my life politically. I decided

6:41

I was a Buckley conservative

6:43

and not a Wallace populist.

6:46

And I said to him, Wallace has

6:48

one, hasn't he? And the man

6:50

got very somber and said, yes.

6:52

Rick, I wonder if you agree with

6:55

that. And I bear in mind both

6:57

Penuru and Elliot, and there's a heck

6:59

of a combination. There are no lost

7:02

causes, there are no gain causes, but

7:04

for now it seems to me that

7:06

George Wallace has won with some

7:09

Henry Wallace combined, frankly.

7:11

Well, populism is one. George

7:13

Wallace hasn't won. George Wallace's

7:16

speech writer who wrote the

7:18

segregation now, segregation forever speech

7:20

was a Nazi. He was

7:22

a Nazi. Now, Wallace did not

7:25

know he was a Nazi, but

7:27

he knew he was a very

7:29

hard, hard segregationist, as Wallace himself

7:32

became. I mean, Wallace famously

7:34

said he lost some statewide

7:36

race and he said, I'll

7:38

never be out segued again.

7:40

So for Wallace, it was

7:42

part of an accountability. Segued,

7:44

I believe, is the bowlerization.

7:46

No, no. He meant segued, meaning

7:49

being pro segregation. There's a

7:51

debate about that, but yeah,

7:53

okay. Well anyway, but so that's

7:55

gone. And on our populist in

7:57

chief, you know, he boasts about.

7:59

how he got a much

8:02

bigger slice of the Hispanic

8:04

vote than any previous Republican

8:07

recently has. His votes among

8:09

black males went up a

8:11

bit, not nearly so dramatically,

8:14

but so that that part

8:16

of George Wallace is gone.

8:18

But the populist part, yeah,

8:21

there it is. And that's a

8:23

very old American thing and it

8:25

keeps coming back. Well sure, and

8:28

I think of Bill's statement that

8:30

within every conservative is

8:32

a streak of libertarianism.

8:35

And I always say, my streak

8:37

is like an accordion. It expands

8:39

or contracts depending. But I think

8:41

within all of us, I guess

8:44

left and right, is a streak of

8:46

populism. However we define it.

8:48

Ramesh, you want to

8:51

get in

8:54

on this,

8:56

my friend?

8:58

I think

9:00

that that

9:03

that. remains

9:05

true today,

9:07

that left

9:09

populism and

9:12

right populism

9:14

do have

9:16

characteristic differences,

9:18

and that sort of

9:21

the left versus the right

9:23

still matter more than the

9:25

populism versus the anti-populism.

9:28

Rummesh, aren't all populism,

9:30

populisms, so to speak,

9:32

rooted in at least

9:35

some grievance, resentment, envy,

9:37

us and them, Those

9:39

fancy folk are screwing

9:41

me. Or sometimes the fancy

9:44

folk are. Yes, that's right.

9:46

Or yes, that, let's say

9:48

big business, big

9:51

government, big labor,

9:53

are acting in concert

9:55

against the interests of

9:57

the people. I think.

10:00

That is sometimes true

10:02

and that has sometimes

10:04

helped to fuel healthy

10:07

political movements,

10:09

including the

10:12

populist inflected

10:14

conservatism of Ronald

10:17

Reagan, where populism goes

10:19

awry, I think, is

10:21

when it regards. some

10:23

members of the citizenry

10:26

as being sort of

10:28

more authentically or truly

10:30

Americans and and everybody

10:32

else isn't as an

10:35

enemy or an outsider

10:37

but a but a

10:39

nationalist coalition that

10:41

truly did seek to

10:43

think in terms of

10:46

the national interest and

10:48

of national cohesion I

10:50

think would be a very great

10:52

thing for us to have in

10:54

our country. The problem, I mean,

10:56

one of the problems with the

10:58

populist nationalism that we've seen over

11:00

the last few years is a tendency

11:02

towards exclusivism. Mm-hmm. You remind me

11:04

because I've been boning up on

11:07

the life and career of Jean-Marie

11:09

La Penn in order to write

11:11

about him. And he referred to

11:13

the conservative leader, Nicholas Sarkozy, as

11:15

the foreigner, because Sarkozy has

11:17

some Jewish and Hungarian Hungarian

11:20

Hungarian Hungarian, ancestry.

11:23

Guys, I want to ask

11:25

about magazines and the

11:27

media. Today there's a

11:29

great appetite for the

11:32

visual and a lot of podcasts

11:34

are produced as videos,

11:36

not mine. Maybe this

11:38

one should be, but

11:41

people apparently want to

11:43

see people. They want

11:45

to see period. you know,

11:47

and maybe the appetite for

11:49

the written word, or at

11:51

least the unaccompanied written word,

11:54

unaccompanied by videos and other

11:56

things, has diminished. Rick, do

11:58

you have a thought on this? that print

12:00

will never be passé because

12:02

print will appear somehow somewhere

12:04

in some form but perhaps

12:06

I'm an old foggy but

12:08

this sort of this this demand

12:11

for the visual I'm not sure

12:13

that's so great for ink-stained

12:16

wretches like us not that

12:18

you aren't also a documentarian and

12:20

a PBS television star and

12:22

all that Rick I beg

12:24

your part well I see strollers,

12:27

parents with strollers,

12:29

little stroller size

12:31

kids in them. And very

12:34

often they're looking at

12:36

little kid devices. You

12:39

know, they've got a

12:41

little kid laptop that

12:43

they're looking at. And

12:45

that's, those are the coming

12:47

generations. I mean,

12:50

you and I had to

12:52

learn this stuff because we

12:54

didn't grow up with that. And

12:56

even we know how compelling

12:58

it is. We grew up

13:00

in CC Spot Run and

13:02

Dick and Jane and Parson

13:04

Weem is in the Cherry

13:06

Tree and Dr. Seuss. And

13:08

three television networks.

13:11

Yes. And PBS with, you

13:13

know, professors doing extension courses.

13:15

I mean, and that was

13:18

it. But, but. And even

13:20

though I'm a late comer to it, I

13:22

spend more time on acts than I should,

13:24

I'm sure I do. And it's very

13:27

compelling, and it's designed to be

13:29

compelling. You know, twitch, twitch, twitch,

13:31

twitch, and you, you know, you

13:34

go, you're off. Let's remember that

13:36

Bill Buckley, whose centennial year

13:38

we're celebrating, he had a

13:40

TV show. Now that was a

13:42

big part of his appeal. That's

13:45

where I encountered where I

13:47

encountered him. I saw him on television

13:49

first. My family saw him on

13:51

firing line first. Then we got

13:53

one of his books. Then we

13:56

subscribed to the magazine. And, of

13:58

course, the print was wonderful. and

14:00

the print also inflected how

14:02

he appeared on television, his

14:04

choice of words, the way

14:07

he spoke and so on.

14:09

But he was also a

14:11

very visual performer,

14:13

and that was a key

14:16

part of his appeal. So...

14:18

True enough, but let me

14:20

ask you this. It's not

14:22

something new. It's just that

14:24

it's gotten much... bigger in

14:26

our minds that occupies more space

14:28

in our minds than it used

14:30

to. Bill fortunately his show was

14:33

not on commercial television. And here

14:35

he had an hour and a

14:37

half, I think it was an

14:39

hour and a half at first and

14:42

then shortened, of debate

14:44

or conversation, often rather

14:46

high-minded and intellectual, and

14:49

Bill using unusual words

14:51

and foreign phrases, Latin

14:53

and other phrases. Would people

14:56

put up with that today,

14:58

do you think? Oh, there'd

15:00

be a market, but it'd

15:02

be smaller. It'd be a niche.

15:05

Yeah, he'd have a niche, but

15:07

it would be a smaller one.

15:09

Because he was watchable. You

15:12

could not not watch him

15:14

when he was on screen.

15:17

Man, can I testify to

15:19

that? You know, the way he

15:21

moved. The imitators did the

15:23

tongue, but the real thing

15:25

was the eyes. Yeah. You know,

15:28

the eyes, how they widened,

15:30

they glittered, they sparkled, they

15:32

did all kinds of stuff.

15:34

And that flashed grin. Yeah.

15:36

Yeah, the grin. Yeah. It

15:38

was marvelous. When he grinned

15:41

at you, you were really

15:43

grinned at, baby. And when

15:45

he scowled, that was a

15:47

hell of a scowle. Rummesh? It

15:49

would be a niche, right? But

15:51

it's a marketplace of niches now.

15:54

And I think that each of

15:56

the media that we use is

15:58

a way of communicating. to, in

16:00

different ways, to different sets

16:03

of people, and we should

16:05

use them all, but we

16:07

should play to the strengths

16:09

of each medium. So,

16:11

for example, when we

16:14

recently moved the print

16:16

edition monthly and longer issues,

16:18

part of the idea was

16:20

that when National Review launched

16:22

as a print magazine there

16:24

was no web and we

16:27

didn't have a website and

16:29

now sort of the day-to-day

16:31

and more passing commentary we

16:33

can handle there and we

16:35

can do more of the

16:37

sort of longer reflective pieces

16:40

in in the magazine. Now

16:42

that's not a stark division

16:44

because we do cover the

16:46

news of the day in the

16:48

print edition as well and we

16:50

do have essays about matters with

16:52

longer perspectives on the website

16:55

as well. But as a

16:57

matter of sort of what

16:59

each medium strength is, I

17:01

think that that's a good

17:03

division of labor. And

17:05

it's also, you know, it's not

17:08

just a matter of visual versus

17:10

audible. In the case of

17:12

print, there's something about

17:15

being tactile. that I

17:17

think has value as well.

17:19

And that's a dimension of

17:21

the beauty. I often think

17:24

of something you said to

17:26

me a long time ago,

17:28

Jay, about classical music and

17:30

the people who worry about

17:32

whether it will have an

17:35

audience in the future. And

17:37

your point is that it

17:39

will never be sort of,

17:41

you know, pop. But there will

17:43

always be people. who wanted and

17:46

are interested in it. And that's

17:48

a little bit how I feel about print.

17:50

Me too. Always a healthy minority.

17:52

You know, I say that there's

17:54

a reason they call pop music,

17:56

pop music. It's popular. Classical music

17:58

has never been pop. It's not supposed

18:01

to be popular, but if you'll

18:03

pardon my French, classical

18:05

music industry, people are always boring

18:07

after popularity in trying to be

18:10

cool and hip and all that.

18:12

And it's pathetic. I think they

18:14

should accept being boutique, so to

18:16

speak. And there will always be

18:19

a minority who love it, nourish

18:21

it, perpetuated, and so on. But

18:23

the urge for popularity, I guess,

18:26

is a generally human thing. Right,

18:28

but the course of the flip

18:30

side is there's there is the

18:32

danger of glory in your minority

18:35

status and thinking, you know, you're

18:37

better than everybody else because of it.

18:39

Yeah, I mean, which of course we

18:41

are. Look, I'm happy that

18:43

orchestras and opera companies and

18:46

chamber music groups and so on

18:48

can keep the lights on on

18:50

on a demand overflow crowd, but

18:52

can you keep the lights on

18:54

and if magazines can keep the

18:56

lights on too? Great. Rick, you're

18:58

such a well-known

19:01

historian, but I'm not sure

19:03

as I sit here today, as

19:06

they say in courtroom dramas,

19:08

as I sit here today, I

19:10

can't say for sure that you

19:13

majored in history, did

19:15

you? No, English. Ah. No

19:17

wonder you know so many

19:19

novels and poems and all

19:21

of that. Who were your big

19:24

teachers in... In English...

19:26

Maynard MacI caught him at the

19:28

end of his career. He was a

19:30

great Alexander Pope

19:32

scholar, but also everything

19:34

else. I took a very

19:37

important course from Gary Wills,

19:39

was on the faculty of

19:41

Johns Hopkins, but he was

19:44

coming up to do seminars

19:46

as an adjunct. And his

19:48

seminar was on Thomas Jefferson,

19:50

because he was getting ready to

19:53

write the first of a number

19:55

of books he wrote about the

19:57

founders and the first one was

19:59

about was about Jefferson. I

20:01

think it was called Inventing

20:04

America. And he liked Jefferson.

20:06

He thought Jefferson was

20:09

interesting, quirky. He liked rooting

20:11

around in Jefferson's writing in

20:13

his mind. But he clearly

20:16

loved George Washington. And

20:18

he would use Washington as a

20:20

stick to beat Jefferson with gently

20:23

now and again, particularly

20:25

on the issue of slavery. Because

20:27

these were two. both to Virginia

20:30

plant or slave owners, but

20:32

it was Washington who freed

20:34

all his slaves and his

20:36

will. Jefferson was unable to

20:38

do it, even if he'd

20:41

wanted to, because he was

20:43

bankrupt. So that was a

20:45

very important teacher. The other

20:48

one had been dead for

20:50

many, many years. It was

20:52

Colonel Trumbel, who had left

20:54

his paintings to Yale College.

20:56

in return for an annuity

20:58

as an old man. And I

21:01

saw those in the Yale Art

21:03

Gallery. And so those

21:05

paintings plus Gary Wills

21:08

turned me maybe interested

21:10

in George Washington and

21:12

produced my first book about

21:15

Washington in 1996 and all

21:17

the others about the people

21:19

that he knew the people

21:21

in his world that I've

21:23

been writing ever since. You

21:25

know, pay attention in college.

21:28

You might, as something important

21:30

might happen to you.

21:32

Rumash Panoura, you are a

21:35

famous political journalist, but I

21:37

think I'm correct that you

21:40

did not major in politics.

21:42

You're correct. I majored

21:44

in history, actually. I

21:46

was very interested in

21:49

politics, and my thinking at

21:51

the time was that I was... so into

21:53

politics and I was going to read a

21:55

lot and I was going to learn a

21:57

lot about that and I probably do something.

22:00

with that after college. But

22:02

I wanted to learn something

22:04

more than just that. And

22:07

that's why I decided to

22:09

major in history, something the

22:12

idea was that I might

22:14

not have just sort of

22:16

picked up naturally without

22:18

making a special effort.

22:20

Did you accent some

22:22

part of history, European

22:25

or US? Well, in those

22:27

days, and I gather it's

22:29

a little bit different now,

22:31

we had what is called

22:34

fields of concentration within the

22:36

majors, which mostly just determined

22:38

what your departmental examination would

22:41

be on, and mine was

22:43

intellectual and cultural history. But

22:45

beyond that question of what

22:48

test you took, it didn't

22:50

have a huge effect on

22:52

the courses you took, and

22:54

I kind of ranged freely.

22:56

took some some great classes

22:58

Bob Darton on the French

23:00

Revolution and I would have

23:02

loved to be that class.

23:05

Bill Jordan on the high

23:07

Middle Ages, James McPherson,

23:09

the Civil War. Goodness

23:11

gracious. It was really

23:14

tremendous actually. as you

23:16

know, my eldest is at Princeton

23:18

now as well and has now

23:20

taken two of the same professors

23:23

that I did in two of

23:25

the same classes. I think

23:27

that is so neat. I'm

23:29

all for that continuity. I love

23:31

that sort of thing. Ramesh,

23:34

tell me about Robbie and

23:36

Cornell. And by Cornell,

23:38

I do not mean Cornell

23:40

University. I mean Cornell with

23:43

one L. Tell me about those

23:45

men and your experience with them.

23:47

So I took both Cornell West's intro

23:49

to African-American studies, or I

23:51

think it was actually Afro-American

23:53

studies at the time, so

23:55

hard to keep track of

23:57

those sorts of changes in

23:59

fashion. over the years. And

24:02

I took some courses

24:04

with Robbie George as

24:06

well. That was before,

24:08

I think, the flowering

24:11

of their friendship and

24:13

their joint appearances in

24:16

place after place. In

24:18

fact, years, years later.

24:20

I moderated one of

24:22

their discussions. So it

24:24

was nice to be

24:26

asking the professors

24:29

the questions instead

24:31

of vice versa for once.

24:34

And I gather that Robbie

24:36

and Professor West are coming

24:39

out with a book now

24:41

in their discussions. And

24:43

you know, the differences are

24:46

you know, stark and obvious

24:48

and I'm fully on Robbie

24:50

George's side of them and

24:52

I am maybe a little

24:54

bit I have a harder time

24:56

as much as I like Cornell

24:59

West personally I have a

25:01

harder time with some of

25:03

the stances he's taken

25:06

particularly on Israel. Yeah.

25:08

But they are both committed

25:11

to certain ideals of what

25:13

academic life and scholarly conversation

25:15

should look like. And that,

25:18

I think that kind of

25:20

engaged civility is what they

25:23

are trying to advocate and

25:25

model. And I think it's

25:27

worth doing. Yes. I discovered

25:29

sometime last year, I think

25:31

that if you if you

25:33

want to dislike Cornell

25:35

West, don't ever meet them.

25:38

Rick, I want to ask

25:40

you, and then Ramesh,

25:43

what made you a

25:46

conservative in your

25:48

understanding of

25:50

conservative, and what

25:53

makes you one today?

25:55

Bill Buckley, off

25:57

from liberalism.

26:00

mention of people? Yeah. Yeah,

26:02

his third book, Little

26:04

Paperback, my father bought it

26:06

on a drugstore.

26:08

I could find the page,

26:10

it was about the Chris

26:13

Crossing dollar, and he was

26:15

describing how in New

26:17

York State to pay for

26:19

the subway to keep the

26:21

fares low, there had to

26:23

be subsidies from

26:25

Albany. Well, and if you

26:28

keep doing that, At some point,

26:30

apple pickers in Cayuda County

26:32

are going to need help

26:35

because they're being taxed.

26:37

And so Albany helps

26:39

them. But they do

26:41

that by expending revenue,

26:43

which comes from New

26:45

Yorkers among other people.

26:47

And the conclusion of

26:49

all this was the

26:51

sky is darkened with

26:54

criss-crossing dollars. An accountant.

26:56

watching the purposeless palmel would

26:58

ask what is going on.

27:00

It is liberalism on the

27:02

wing. So I'm still practically

27:05

quoting this decades later, but I

27:07

read that and I thought, ah,

27:09

that's good. That's really good. So

27:11

that was the, that was the

27:14

hook in the mouth of the

27:16

fish. What, what, what keeps me?

27:18

Yes, what are that, let me

27:20

rephrase my question. What are the,

27:22

what are the, qualities

27:25

and ideas and

27:27

beliefs, some of

27:30

them that make

27:32

you a conservative.

27:34

Respect for

27:36

what's best about

27:39

America, seriousness

27:42

about the world,

27:45

respect for people,

27:47

for what they're

27:50

owed as people.

27:53

So I think my first exposure

27:55

to Bill Buckley was saving

27:58

the Queen first of it. Oh

28:00

my goodness. You were reading a

28:02

dirty book on at least one

28:04

or two pages. Well, it

28:06

was particularly for the age

28:08

at which I read it.

28:11

It was a bit racy.

28:13

Marvelous read. Marvelous. Yeah. Yeah,

28:15

which was, you know, part of

28:18

its appeal. So I came

28:20

to conservatism, you know, just

28:22

I was interested in

28:24

politics and public

28:26

affairs. I was more of

28:29

a liberal. when I first

28:31

started reading things. The Economist

28:33

magazine helped my education in

28:36

free market economics. I had

28:38

friends who were very conservative and

28:40

they kept trying to get

28:42

me to read Atlas Shrugged

28:44

and I eventually did and

28:47

it probably delayed my moving

28:49

right by a year. Never found. that

28:51

appealing. I did start reading

28:54

National Review around 1990. I

28:56

think the 35th anniversary issue

28:58

was the first issue I read all

29:01

the way through, and it really

29:03

was my first exposure to arguments

29:05

for, I guess, what we'd

29:07

called nowadays, social conservatism,

29:10

ethical or moral conservatism.

29:12

And, you know, I'd

29:14

never really considered

29:16

a lot of these points before,

29:18

but they seemed... reasonable

29:21

and forceful and over

29:23

time I came to

29:25

appreciate sort of the

29:27

utility of social conservatism

29:29

and then eventually decided

29:31

that these things were useful

29:34

to people because it's the way

29:36

we were meant to live. And

29:38

similarly I had an evolution on

29:40

the on the right to life which

29:43

as you know became a great cause

29:45

of mine as of as of many

29:47

others and there Again, I started

29:49

out as liberal and I just

29:51

I couldn't sustain that the

29:54

pro-choice position intellectually. It

29:56

just you know, I couldn't I

29:58

couldn't rationalize the unborn. human

30:00

being is something other than

30:02

living and something other than

30:05

human. And then if it's

30:07

a living human being,

30:09

couldn't rationalize it as

30:11

not having the right to

30:14

be protected from deliberate

30:16

harm, the way all other living

30:18

human beings are. So that

30:20

was sort of the process

30:22

in terms of why I still

30:24

think of myself on the right

30:27

as being a conservative

30:29

today. It's roughly the same

30:31

things that that that Rick

30:33

said if I put maybe

30:36

a slightly different accent on

30:38

it but I doubt it's

30:40

one that he would disagree

30:43

with I would say a

30:45

kind of a kind of

30:47

sense of also respect for

30:50

the achievements of the past

30:52

and a sense that real

30:55

progress in the human condition

30:57

is based on building on

30:59

those achievements. And then specifically,

31:02

a sense that our constitutional

31:04

inheritance or political inheritance

31:07

from the founders is

31:09

particularly valuable and worth

31:12

preserving. Of course, that's just

31:14

kind of a subset of

31:16

our Western civilization inheritance, but

31:18

obviously as American conservatives,

31:20

it's one that we

31:23

have. particular

31:25

obligations toward?

31:27

Well, guys, I myself

31:29

have a 6,500-word speech

31:31

titled, What is Conservatism?

31:33

And I will spare

31:35

you it. But I'll

31:37

just say to the

31:40

two of you here,

31:42

here, for now. You two are

31:44

writers. Your journalists. You

31:46

work in the media.

31:49

A lot of people work in

31:51

the media, I would say, are

31:53

more political activists and

31:56

partisans and tribalists. Journalism

31:58

is a funny... place,

32:00

also a big and various

32:02

place, and I've noticed in

32:04

the last 15, 20 years,

32:06

more and more members of

32:08

the public are treating journalists

32:11

like politicians. And I don't

32:13

think the public is at

32:15

fault. I think many so-called

32:17

journalists are because they act

32:19

like politicians. They tow a line. They

32:21

have an eye toward a base.

32:24

They cultivate constituencies. They craft

32:26

applause lines. And they sort

32:28

of... or themselves like politicians.

32:30

As someone said to me,

32:32

do you realize you've

32:34

offended millions of voters?

32:37

And I'm not running for office for

32:39

God sex. And also, you know, who

32:41

are you going to endorse? And

32:43

I sound like Kevin Williamson. What

32:45

am I the mayor of Omaha?

32:48

Do you know what I mean? And I

32:50

wonder if some of the journalistic

32:52

qualities of journalism,

32:54

so-called straight journalism

32:56

or opinion journalism. are being

32:59

lost. And it seems to

33:01

me that a lot of

33:03

people in the media are

33:06

really activists who choose or

33:08

somehow exercising their activism, performing

33:10

their, carrying out their

33:12

activism through a media outlet,

33:15

which is a different thing

33:17

from journalism. Rick

33:19

Brookhiser, say whatever you want.

33:21

Well, look, some of the

33:23

greatest American journalism.

33:26

I think the greatest lead ever

33:29

is the American crisis by

33:31

Tom Payne. These are the

33:33

times the tribe on souls

33:35

and that was very partisan.

33:37

He was trying to revive

33:39

the spirits of the American

33:41

revolutionaries. You know, I don't

33:43

think the problem was partisanship

33:45

so much stupidity. It's just

33:47

that so many of these people

33:50

are just, they're just dumb

33:52

and they can't write or

33:54

think. And partly that's because

33:56

the way the media is

33:58

now, there are... Well, there

34:00

are no gatekeepers, there are no

34:03

gates. It's like it's all

34:05

open. It's here comes, everybody,

34:07

everybody can do it, and

34:09

everybody does do it. And

34:11

since, you know, most people

34:13

are not so bright and

34:15

some people are somewhat bright

34:18

and a few people are

34:20

really bright, you know, you get

34:22

a lot of junk out

34:24

there. You know, look, if

34:26

we're honest, journalism has very

34:28

raggedy origins. The historian said

34:30

that the founder of

34:33

modern journalism was this

34:35

Renaissance man Piero Aratino.

34:38

There's a portrait of him

34:40

at the Frick, if you ever

34:43

want to look at him. But

34:45

he was a black mailer and

34:47

a pornographer. Yeah, that's what

34:50

he did. If you paid him

34:52

off, he'd write you. You know, God

34:54

he tributes to your excellent

34:57

qualities and all the wonderful

34:59

things you were doing. And

35:01

if you didn't, he'd abuse

35:03

you obscenely. And he had

35:05

a monthly newsletter. He'd write

35:08

this stuff and circulate it

35:10

through Europe. And that's how

35:12

he made his daily bread.

35:14

So our origins are not

35:16

divine. We try to make them

35:18

better. Many of us, some of us

35:21

do. And so we just have to keep

35:23

at it. Yes, and find a way to

35:25

make money and stay afloat. Right?

35:27

I mean, that porn's the most

35:29

popular thing in the world.

35:31

You'll never go broke. Well, it's

35:34

the leading edge of all, all media.

35:36

I guess, look, I mean, if you think

35:38

about the discontent of journalism

35:40

today, a lot of it has

35:42

to do with that very last

35:45

point that you made. It's,

35:47

we're having difficulty finding a

35:49

viable economic model. for quality

35:52

journalism. And different

35:55

people are trying different

35:57

things. And I achieved.

36:00

different kinds of success. But

36:02

I do think that, look, I do

36:04

think that there are plenty of journalists

36:06

who do treat their job

36:08

as activism, often without even

36:11

really sort of thinking about it.

36:13

You know, once you've, once you've

36:15

sort of accepted the idea

36:17

well on trying to make the world

36:19

a better place, and you don't sort

36:22

of differentiate sort of particular

36:24

rules, different kinds of people

36:26

play in that large. job

36:29

description, then it's going to

36:31

be hard for you to make

36:33

a distinction between the jobs journalists

36:35

and activists in the same way

36:37

that, you know, it's been hard

36:39

for judges sometimes to make

36:42

that kind of distinction. And

36:44

really, and really all institutions

36:46

in our day, this is a

36:48

point that that that my friend

36:50

Yvalovin has has made a lot

36:52

and very persuasively over the last

36:54

few years. All kinds of

36:57

institutions are now

36:59

treated as platforms

37:01

for individual

37:03

expression more than they

37:05

are as sort of

37:08

formative institutions that that

37:10

that the individual is

37:12

supposed to serve and

37:15

and does important

37:17

work for the public good

37:20

by serving. Journal, that doesn't

37:22

mean, and here I think, you know,

37:24

it's easy to, to slip up, to

37:27

be, believe in journalism rather

37:29

than activism, is not, I

37:31

think, to necessarily believe in

37:33

the kind of ideal of

37:35

objectivity. Oh no, heaven's that

37:38

was, yeah, that was

37:40

really cultivated by sort

37:42

of the mid 20th century press,

37:44

which was a press that was

37:46

in a lot of ways unusual.

37:49

historically in the U.S. and brought

37:51

about by kind of national

37:53

mass market conditions that

37:56

hadn't obtained before and

37:58

haven't obtained since then. Rick

38:00

once pointed out to me

38:02

or more than once that

38:04

lots of newspapers in this

38:06

country were called something Republican

38:08

or something Democrat and I'm

38:11

always stressing to audiences especially

38:13

student audiences when I talk

38:15

about journalism independent-mindedness but independence

38:17

of thought and so on

38:19

does not mean moderation or

38:21

centrism or neutrality. In fact,

38:23

one can be an extremist

38:26

and independent-minded. All it means

38:28

is that you've arrived at

38:30

your opinions independently

38:33

and that you're not towing the

38:35

line. Right, and I'm, so I don't

38:37

say I'm an unbiased observer, but

38:39

my biases are disclosed. I

38:42

think about them. Do you agree

38:44

with me? I think that

38:46

bias often expresses itself in

38:48

omission or commission. What do

38:50

you address and what do

38:53

you ignore? Absolutely, what's a

38:55

story? Yeah. What is the story

38:57

that ought to have

38:59

journalistic resources expended on

39:01

it and that ought to be

39:03

brought to the attention of readers

39:05

and viewers? And so what do

39:08

you editorialize about? And what

39:10

do you... decide not to

39:13

editorialize about. And bias, bias,

39:15

some terribly interesting question, you

39:17

know, there was a, I

39:20

think, is a press watchdog

39:22

called accuracy in media.

39:25

And accuracy, of course,

39:27

is very important. Inaccuracy

39:30

is bad, but bias is

39:32

different. You can, you can, you

39:34

can. You can conduct yourself in a

39:36

biased way without committing many inaccuracies.

39:38

And I think of that as

39:40

an interviewer, not this kind of

39:42

interviewer, but an interviewer for print,

39:44

for a print piece. I mean,

39:46

I think a cagey guy and

39:48

a principal guy could talk to

39:50

Einstein for an hour and then

39:53

imprint portray him as a dunce

39:55

for that ever misquoting him.

39:57

You know, as far as sheer accuracy

39:59

is concerned. Rick

40:01

Bricheiser, haven't heard from

40:03

you in a while, I should stop

40:05

running my mouth. Oh, what? So I should tell

40:07

our audience that I can't

40:09

see either Rick or Ramesh. And

40:11

so if I'm, but a little

40:13

bit halting and moving between them,

40:16

that's the reason. Rick, I want

40:18

to talk to you, both you

40:20

and Ramesh about comment sections. I

40:23

mentioned a comment section once, and

40:25

Rick, this is years ago, and you

40:27

said, oh, come on Jay, sooner read

40:29

graffiti on bathroom walls, you said to

40:31

me. I think comment seconds are

40:34

very bad, and they have in

40:36

particular a deleterious effect on young

40:38

writers, because these commenters who

40:40

tend to be of a certain type

40:42

get into their heads and affect their

40:45

work, affect their very state of

40:47

mind. And I wonder whether either of

40:49

you agrees with me or disagrees with

40:51

me. I think comment sections

40:54

are a bane in

40:56

journalism myself are in

40:59

fact anti-journalistic. I'm for letters

41:01

to the editor. Well, I

41:04

think that the great error

41:06

in looking at comment sections

41:08

or just sweep a little

41:11

bit more broadly also

41:13

things like reactions to

41:15

you on Twitter. is assuming

41:17

that what gets

41:19

expressed there is

41:22

somehow representative of

41:24

your readership. And that's

41:26

a very natural human

41:28

inference to draw,

41:30

even though a false

41:32

one, because we weren't

41:34

built to operate in

41:37

this kind of technological

41:39

or information.

41:41

environment and you always

41:43

have to remember not to

41:45

not to assume that. So,

41:47

you know, partly because the

41:49

people who are unhappy about

41:52

something you said are much

41:54

more likely to say so

41:56

than the people who quietly

41:59

not along. Yeah, of course. Someone

42:01

once said on our website in

42:03

fact that someone was disliking something

42:06

that someone else had published and

42:08

he said, you know, I see

42:10

by the comments that our readers

42:12

aren't fooled. Well, you know, what do

42:15

you mean our readers? Who are they? Well,

42:17

one thing that's been helpful to

42:19

me is also noting how

42:21

different kinds of hosts or

42:23

stories perform very differently

42:25

in different... website. So

42:28

something can be a success on

42:30

Facebook and not on Twitter and

42:32

vice versa. Sure. You remind me

42:35

something else for mesh. People

42:37

in our business say a piece did

42:39

well or a piece did badly. All

42:41

they mean is it was popular or

42:43

not. That doesn't seem to

42:45

be very journalistic at all. Oh

42:47

gee, I think a piece could do well. It

42:50

was horribly unpopular. Yeah.

42:52

Isn't the metric reactions, right?

42:54

I mean, rather than favorable

42:56

ones, if it stirs up

42:59

the animals, then, you know,

43:01

then that was a successful

43:03

piece also. Right, but that's

43:06

also the formula for click

43:08

bait, right? That is not

43:11

said in good faith,

43:13

but purely to rile people

43:15

up. Right, right, right. John

43:17

Lukash, who died a number of

43:20

years ago, he, I knew

43:22

him a little bit. He

43:24

wrote some very shrewd books

43:26

about mid-century Europe and I

43:28

remember one point he made

43:30

he liked to make

43:32

a distinction between public

43:35

opinion and popular sentiment

43:37

and he said public

43:39

opinion public opinion is

43:41

what everybody thinks everybody

43:43

else thinks. Yeah. Popular

43:45

sentiment is what everybody

43:48

thinks. And he said one

43:50

way he tries to gauge

43:52

popular sentiment when he's looking

43:54

back at a period is

43:56

reading letters to editors in

43:58

the small newspaper. because he

44:00

said they they get relatively fewer

44:02

letters so they very have

44:05

to publish the ones they get

44:07

so they don't call them you know

44:09

they don't say oh well that's a

44:11

little that's below the salt you

44:14

know or that's that's something we

44:16

don't want to encourage let's

44:18

not publish that they have

44:21

to publish something so they

44:23

publish whatever comes in and

44:25

his point was you could

44:27

sometimes get sometimes a better read

44:30

on what on what a

44:32

lot of people were really

44:34

thinking in these more unbuttoned

44:37

letters to smaller newspapers. Now

44:39

is that in fact true? I

44:41

don't know but it was it

44:43

was an interesting argument

44:46

that he was making.

44:48

You know there's also

44:50

the the problem which I

44:52

think has gotten worse in our

44:55

time that people are performing.

44:57

And I think for many

44:59

years you've seen that in

45:01

the coverage of Iowa and

45:04

New Hampshire every four years

45:06

where so many of the

45:08

voters seem to have kind

45:10

of polished pundit-like answers and

45:13

wonder whether they're holding

45:15

back something more unvarnished. And

45:17

I think, you know, somebody

45:19

was making this point the

45:22

other day about the sudden

45:24

collapse in various spheres of

45:27

wokeness as an ideology, that

45:29

you had probably almost certainly

45:31

lots of people in a

45:34

lot of institutions who disliked

45:36

or resented the reign of

45:38

wokeness, but... would have probably

45:41

mouthed the same platitudes

45:43

as everybody else until

45:45

it became clear that it

45:47

was safe to mouth the

45:49

contrary ones. This is summed

45:52

up in the familiar phrase,

45:54

the fear factor. Oh, is that

45:56

fear? Guys, I want to ask

45:58

you now about reading. George Wells

46:00

said something interesting on this

46:02

program not long ago. He

46:04

said, if someone asked me,

46:06

Mr. Will, what do you

46:09

do, I would say I'm a writer, but really

46:11

I'm a reader, because I have

46:13

to read three, four, five hours

46:15

every day to get the material

46:17

books, articles, and so on. A

46:19

writer has to be a reader.

46:21

Now I know that you too

46:23

don't have very much time given

46:25

your profession for leisure reading. But

46:28

when or if you do have

46:30

such time? I wonder, do you

46:32

read novels or do

46:35

you stick with articles,

46:37

essays, history books, and

46:40

the like? Rick? Try to

46:42

read novels and poetry,

46:44

maybe more poetry than

46:47

I otherwise would because

46:49

most poems are short.

46:51

That helps to digest

46:54

them. I read, as

46:56

I said, I read too much

46:58

acts. That's, look, it's fun.

47:00

I've got good followers, but

47:03

it does, it does take

47:05

time. Right now I'm reading

47:07

Emma aloud to my wife.

47:09

We've done that a number

47:11

of times. When she talks

47:13

about how Mr. Woodhouse loves

47:15

to have basins of gruel,

47:17

it always, you have to

47:19

laugh. And I'm sure when

47:21

Jane Austin hit on the

47:23

basins of gruel, she must have

47:26

laughed. It is so perfect and

47:28

so perfectly funny. I've often thought,

47:31

and I can't remember to whom

47:33

to attribute this, I think it

47:35

might have been Morris Bowera, but

47:37

it was some Oxford Don, and

47:40

I always thought this was the

47:42

highest compliment ever given a writer.

47:44

Someone said to him, whoever this was,

47:46

well, you don't read novels, do you?

47:48

And he said, Yes, I

47:51

do. I read

47:53

all six of

47:56

them every

47:58

year. Leisure

48:00

is hard to come by.

48:02

Yeah. But I do try

48:04

to read a mix of

48:07

things. Recently I

48:09

was reading a poet that

48:11

I think I remember

48:13

correctly, I first

48:16

read 30 years ago

48:18

because of a Jeffrey

48:20

Hart review, a rave

48:22

review in National Review,

48:25

and it was Jack

48:27

Gilbert. Yeah. the great

48:29

fires and I was reading

48:32

his refusing heaven recently and

48:34

you can see some of

48:36

the same talent some of

48:38

the same spark but I just

48:40

I haven't been enjoying it as

48:43

much. Well Jeff Hart we could

48:45

spend an hour on

48:47

Jeff but he was a

48:49

very very very very

48:51

conservative person with very very

48:54

strong opinions but in his

48:56

field of scholarship literature.

48:58

He liked talent for talent.

49:01

He said Alan Ginsburg

49:03

had a lot on the ball, for

49:06

example. And he was

49:08

a real literary scholar,

49:10

you know, in addition

49:12

to his political side,

49:14

I think. Jeff brought Alan

49:16

Ginsburg to National Review. There

49:19

was a book party for

49:21

one of Jeff's books and

49:23

Alan Ginsburg showed up with

49:25

Peter Orlovsky, his longtime companion.

49:27

And, you know, I saw the two

49:29

of them and then Jeff

49:31

said later he was talking

49:34

to Ginsburg and Ginsburg said,

49:36

well, no, I don't, I

49:38

don't write like Whitman. I

49:40

write like Christopher Smart. That's

49:42

the model for my line,

49:44

not Whitman's lines, which is

49:47

a very interesting, kind of

49:49

technical poet's point and interesting

49:51

that he tossed that off

49:53

at this cocktail party. Rick, do

49:55

you have any heretical

49:57

political beliefs? I mean,

50:00

belief or two that

50:02

depart from your general

50:04

political outlook? Do what

50:06

I mean by that? Yeah,

50:08

I've come over the years

50:10

to think more highly of

50:12

Mr. Jefferson. I mean, I'm

50:15

a federalist. Boy, was he

50:17

a snake in the Washington

50:19

administration? And boy, did

50:21

he misread the French

50:24

Revolution? And you know,

50:26

you can go down the

50:28

list. It seems to me

50:30

the two things I realize

50:33

that he most strongly believed

50:36

were that there are rights

50:38

and that the people overall

50:40

are right. Those are not

50:43

obviously congruent beliefs.

50:46

I mean, they might

50:48

be contradictory. Some people

50:50

would say they're

50:52

always contradictory, but

50:54

Jefferson believe both

50:57

of those and

50:59

I've come to think

51:01

if he's wrong America's

51:03

wrong. Because America

51:06

also believes those

51:08

things. Rick tell me

51:10

what Dumas or Dumas

51:12

Malone said. Oh well I

51:14

heard this I heard this

51:16

from a man a judge

51:19

in Virginia who said he'd

51:21

been a student at UVA when

51:23

Dumont Malone was still there at

51:25

the end of his career. And

51:28

this man saw a notice that

51:30

Professor Malone was going to give

51:32

a talk and he was very

51:35

excited to go. And he asked

51:37

him a question, which was, do

51:39

you like Thomas Jefferson? And

51:42

he was kind of startled

51:44

that Malone said no. Now I

51:46

don't know if that was the

51:48

fatigue of age. I don't know

51:51

if it was the fatigue of

51:53

having written so much. About a

51:55

year's. Yeah, yeah, he was

51:57

projecting seven. I never.

51:59

got around in the silence,

52:02

but I didn't know that.

52:04

I could see just wearing

52:06

out, or maybe there was

52:08

something deeper that he found

52:11

and was reacting to. I

52:13

don't know. This is just

52:15

the one little vignette that

52:18

I heard at a lunch.

52:20

Rick, remind me what Albert

52:22

Murray said. Oh

52:26

yes, Albert Murray, the black intellectual,

52:29

wrote a lot about jazz

52:31

and all kinds of things.

52:33

And he was being interviewed

52:35

by my friend Richard Snow,

52:37

who was the editor of

52:39

American Heritage for many, many

52:41

years. And the talk turned to

52:43

Jefferson and the Sally Heming story

52:45

was in the news at that

52:47

moment. And Murray said, he said

52:49

to Richard, he said, he said,

52:51

he said, he said, he said

52:53

to Richard, he said, That man

52:55

invented liberty. I'd give him five

52:57

more slave girlfriends. And then he

52:59

said, you better not print that.

53:01

I get him as much, you

53:03

know, I get in enough trouble

53:05

as it is. So now, that man

53:08

invented liberty. Yeah, right. Obviously, he

53:10

didn't literally mean it. Oh, no,

53:12

it was just making a point.

53:14

But yeah, he's making a point.

53:17

That man, and founded liberty. Yeah.

53:19

He didn't invent liberty,

53:21

but he certainly expressed

53:23

it. Immorous. Ramesh

53:25

Panoro, do you have what

53:27

I've labeled, I've labeled

53:29

kind of cheekily, a heretical

53:32

political belief or two? I've

53:35

been culling through them in

53:37

my mind while also listening

53:40

to Rick, and I guess

53:42

maybe one that might work

53:44

particularly with this audience

53:47

is I do, I think the

53:49

Goldwater campaign may have been a

53:51

mistake in that No Goldwater,

53:54

I think, probably

53:56

means no great

53:59

society. and in particular

54:02

the way it has unbalanced

54:04

our federal government

54:07

in a way that has

54:09

never been undone and is

54:11

proving more and more dangerous

54:13

to the health of the

54:16

country. Well, we'll say William

54:18

Scranton or someone

54:20

like that, or George

54:22

Romney had been a

54:25

Republican nominee in 64.

54:27

Would the LBJ full

54:29

term have been different,

54:31

do you think? Maybe I

54:33

misunderstood you.

54:35

It wouldn't have

54:37

been as lopsided a

54:40

victory in 64 with

54:42

the huge congressional majorities.

54:44

Oh, I see. That

54:46

we're able to do

54:48

more than any. You

54:50

mean there's a practical

54:53

matter? Since 33 to 34.

54:55

Yeah, I see. One of

54:58

my favorite answers of all time

55:00

in an interview, I just loved

55:02

this, I think it was Larry

55:04

King, the questioner. And he was

55:06

interviewing on television, Liza Menelli, and

55:08

he said, who's the best singer? And

55:10

she said, you mean besides Ella? Which

55:12

I just thought was a lovely answer.

55:15

And I say that when I'm asked

55:17

my favorite president. I said, can we

55:19

just say besides Lincoln, because then we

55:21

can, then let's have a serious talk,

55:23

but you've got to take that off

55:26

the table. No,

55:28

obviously there's George Washington.

55:30

This is just a

55:32

way of my asking. Do

55:34

you have a favorite president

55:37

or say three of them? Well,

55:39

Washington and Lincoln, and

55:42

that's what's more

55:44

important, founding something

55:46

or saving it. You know,

55:48

and there are moments you

55:50

could think one moments

55:53

you could think the other. Who

55:55

would number three be? Well,

55:57

obviously I'm very fond of Reagan.

56:00

Yeah. He won a war.

56:02

He won a world war

56:04

without horrendous

56:07

casualties. FDR

56:09

did a number of

56:12

things that were

56:14

still struggling with,

56:16

but he also won a

56:19

war. And he saw it

56:21

coming. You know he saw

56:24

it coming and he readied himself

56:26

for it and he tried to

56:28

ready the country. I mean he

56:31

was very cautious, politically possibly even

56:33

too cautious, but he did see

56:36

it coming and he tried to

56:38

do what he could behind the

56:40

scenes so as not to scare

56:42

the voters to prepare the country

56:45

for it. And the world

56:47

certainly owes him for that. Well,

56:51

yes, Lincoln and Washington,

56:54

clearly, at the top and then

56:56

everybody else. Now were

56:58

you going in alphabetical

57:01

order? Because you weren't

57:03

going in chronological

57:05

order, or should I ignore

57:07

the order? Really hard to

57:09

write the two of them,

57:11

as Rick suggested. And then

57:13

whoever is in third place

57:15

has to be a distant third,

57:17

I think. Yes. Sure. Sure. Sure.

57:20

Well, gentlemen, and sticking with

57:22

Ramesh for the moment, do

57:25

you have a broader political

57:27

pantheon? I mean, you can

57:29

pluck someone from antiquity like

57:31

Pericles. You can go to

57:33

the United Kingdom for Gladstone,

57:36

Israeli, or if you want

57:38

to go. Well, if I'm going to

57:40

the UK, I'm going to go with

57:42

a politician who was also a

57:44

writer, which may reflect a writer's

57:46

bias, and that is horse Burke.

57:49

Rick Kaiser? Dr. Johnson said

57:51

if you stood in a shed

57:53

out of the rain with Edmund

57:55

Burke for half an hour you

57:57

would know he was a great...

58:00

What did he mean by

58:02

that, Rick? That his

58:04

superiority and his quality

58:06

were so evident that

58:08

you could tell in half

58:11

an hour. You know, just a

58:13

casual meeting, it would beam

58:15

out at you. I'll say the

58:18

person that I'm writing

58:20

about right now, you

58:22

know, because I'm immersed

58:24

in him. And that's

58:26

Lafayette. And I find a lot

58:28

to admire in this man. I

58:30

mean, there are limitations. There

58:33

are definitely limitations

58:35

and failures, but I'll

58:38

pay him the compliment that

58:40

was paid by his

58:42

old school fellow, the

58:44

Comte d'Artois, the future

58:46

Charles the Tenth, the

58:48

most reactionary of the

58:50

bourbon, late bourbon. monarchs.

58:52

But they went to riding school

58:54

together when they were young men.

58:56

They were approximately the

58:59

same age. And riding school

59:01

was something French nobility and

59:03

aristocrats and royalty had to

59:05

do and had to master.

59:07

And that's where they met

59:09

and they bonded. And years

59:11

later, Charles the Tenth said

59:13

there are only two people

59:16

in France who have not

59:18

changed since 1789. One is Lafayette

59:20

and the other one is me.

59:22

And then he also said, our

59:24

minds are very similar. It's

59:27

just that we have different

59:29

ideas of them, which I think

59:31

is a rather profound

59:33

comment. Yes. Well, ladies

59:35

and gentlemen, I just want

59:37

to remind you that I'm talking

59:39

with two of my friends and

59:42

colleagues at National Review,

59:44

Ramesh Panuru and Richard

59:46

Brookizer. And I want to see

59:49

here at the end, I sometimes speak of

59:51

public wishes, by which I mean

59:53

wishes for the public wishes for

59:55

the electorate and so on. And I've said

59:57

over the last 10 years in particular,

1:00:00

I would like to see a

1:00:02

recovery of a proper sense, a

1:00:04

good sense, a real sense of

1:00:07

patriotism, what it means

1:00:09

to be a patriot, and

1:00:11

the recovery of a proper

1:00:13

sense of manliness, what it

1:00:15

means to be a man

1:00:18

and be manly. You know,

1:00:20

not brutish, not belligerent, and

1:00:22

so on and so forth. I could

1:00:24

go on, but I'd rather you

1:00:26

two went on. Rumesh if

1:00:28

you could. I don't know.

1:00:31

What's a public wish

1:00:33

of yours? I wish

1:00:35

that people, etc.

1:00:37

Mm. There are so

1:00:39

many things one wishes.

1:00:42

Right to life is

1:00:44

I... Yeah. You're so

1:00:46

eloquent about it

1:00:49

written a marvelous

1:00:51

book about. Well, I

1:00:53

guess, what I would like

1:00:55

to see... that would affect a

1:00:57

lot of other things for the

1:00:59

better, would be a revival of

1:01:02

a marriage culture in our

1:01:04

country in which people are maybe

1:01:06

a little bit more willing than

1:01:09

young people in recent years have

1:01:11

been to take the risks to

1:01:13

make the leap, but then also

1:01:16

to honor the seriousness

1:01:18

of the commitment. Well,

1:01:20

that would be a sea

1:01:22

change. Rick Perkizer? I

1:01:26

wish people would count their

1:01:28

blessings. Marvels. Marvels.

1:01:31

Well, this program,

1:01:33

Q&A, is produced by

1:01:35

Madeline Osbrough. I'm Jay

1:01:38

Nordler, and it has

1:01:40

been a kick to

1:01:43

speak with Richard Bricheiser

1:01:45

and remeshed for the

1:01:48

world. Thank you gentlemen,

1:01:50

and see you next

1:01:52

time, everyone. So long.

1:02:54

Ricochet. Join the

1:02:57

conversation.