Articles from American Spectator

The Prisoner of the Vatican

In one of his last speeches before abdicating in 2013, Pope Benedict XVI decried the liberalism that had seeped into the Church after Vatican II. To this liberalism, he traced “so many problems, so much misery, in reality: seminaries closed, convents closed, the liturgy was trivialized.” But he then proceeded to hand the Church to the very liberals responsible for these problems and to a successor set upon liberalizing the Church even more.

From the Archives: Remembering Roger Scruton

Death finds us all, but rarely is it as cruel as it was in taking Roger Scruton. He was the real deal, a genuine humanist and great philosopher and his depths of understanding brought rare authority to his scholarship and writing. Between 2006 and 2012 he wrote monthly columns for us, and below we include the first of them and the final one, along with one other, just to give you a better sense of his breadth (and love for America, where he lived for a time, in the Virginia countryside).

Secretary of Happy Talk

Elites sneered when Norman Vincent Peale said similar stuff.

In fact, during his 1956 presidential campaign, Adlai Stevenson, who fancied himself an intellectual and didn’t mind if others did too, snarked that, “Speaking as a Christian, I find the Apostle Paul appealing, and the apostle Peale appalling.” Clever line. Advanced thinkers of the time laughed. (These are always with us.)

Joker’s Success and the Success of Postmodern Liberalism

Months after the film’s release, we are now enduring Round 2 of the left-elite’s handwringing over Joker, the brilliant origin story of Batman’s arch-nemesis starring Joaquin Phoenix. When the movie came out, there were innumerable columns and tweets lamenting another cinematic glorification of “white male rage,” “toxic masculinity,” and alt-right incel culture. Of course, as more people saw Joker (it grossed over a billion dollars), it quickly became apparent that the film didn’t “glorify” any of those things. Nor was it a defense of Trumpism.

Enforcing President Trump’s Executive Order on Campus

With attacks targeting Jews now exceeding record levels, President Trump’s executive order implementing an internationally accepted definition of anti-Semitism is crucial in the overall efforts to protect Jewish students from on-campus discrimination.

Before anti-Semitism can be effectively dealt with, it must first be clearly and concisely defined.

Women, the White House, and Halitosis

Can a woman get elected president? Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren’s possible disagreement was a cause célèbre at the most recent (and boring) debate among six Democrats vying for their party’s nomination.

Is their question the same as “Can a woman be president?” The question presumably asks if a woman can be a successful president. The two questions are related: if enough people think a woman cannot be a successful president, then that woman won’t be elected president.

From the Spectator Archives: Jimmy Carter and the Ayatollah

What is happening in Iran right now began this time 40 years ago. On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants seized the U.S. embassy in Tehran, taking 66 hostages, 52 of which would be held for 444 days. It signaled the fall of the Shah and the rise of the Ayatollah. Offering insights into the chaos in the pages of The American Spectator was founder and editor in chief, R.