By profession M. E. Bradford was a literary scholar, and Original Intentions, issued shortly after his untimely death, manifests his sure touch for the nuances of words.
Peter Abelard confounded the readers of Sic et Non by placing side-by-side opinions of the Church Fathers that seemed contradictory, while offering no reconciliation.
"You ought to see...some things that are regularly said over the airwaves in America today," the indignant president announced. "There is nothing patriotic," Clinton preached, about "pretending that you can love your country but despise your government."
The cords that bind the Union together are weaker than they have been in more than a century. Many states are entering into political revolt against federal encroachment. But this situation is no departure from American tradition. Revolting against consolidated government has been a key to keeping the government in check.
Patrick Allitt's excellent book may be approached at two levels.
David Frum has identified a central problem affecting much of the American Right.
Michael Lind maintains that intellectual conservatism collapsed over the past decade.
Franklin Roosevelt "did bring us out of the Depression," Newt Gingrich told a group of Republicans after the recent election, and that makes FDR "the greatest figure of the 20th century." As political rhetoric, the statement is likely to come from someone who does not support a market economy. The New Deal, after all, was the largest peacetime expansion of federal government power in this century. Moreover, Gingrich's view that FDR saved us from the Depression is indefensible; Roosevelt's policies prolonged and deepened it.
America's bankers consider Robert Morris a hero. More than 15,000 of them belong to Robert Morris Associates. Founded in 1914, the RMA organization strives for professionalism in banking practice and considers ethics paramount.
So who is the revered figure after whom this association of ethical bankers is named?
Federal bureaucrats think they, not the financial markets should direct investment spending. They want to rebuild "infrastructure," fund space stations, install magnetic supertrains, and set up information highways (or redistribute the existing ones). That's what President Clinton means when he says he'll "grow the economy" through "investment."
