Articles by R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr.
On August 8 one of the great historians of his generation, and — for a certitude — one of the great teachers of any generation, passed away, Robert H. Ferrell. He was 97. Some thought he was too old to die, but nonetheless he worked to the end. When he retired from Indiana University we thought he would quietly subside. He did not. He continued to write. Even after pulling up stakes and heading off to Michigan to live with his daughter he continued to write. The result was that he wrote or edited more than 60 books, but books were not his only area of fecundity. As I said, he was a great teacher.
Published
August 21, 2018
Shares A fellow Spectatorian is under enemy fire, and we all must rally around him, particularly because he has done nothing wrong and because if those attacking him triumph we shall all suffer. The cause is free speech. The free speech that is endangered is in Great Britain, but if the forces of censorship win in London it is only a matter of time before the forces of censorship will be bringing their muzzles to our shores.
Published
August 14, 2018
Shares Did you see this Wall Street Journal front-page headline on Monday? It read, "Profits Soar as Economy Advances." That headline will probably be the most important headline of the week. It certainly is of colossal importance.
Published
August 7, 2018
Shares It has been a pretty good week for Donald Trump. The economy is growing faster than anyone on the left or in the middle or among the Never Trumpers believed possible.
Published
July 31, 2018
Shares Here is my World Exclusive for the week. The Secret Service adores its boss, President Donald Trump. Some government employees may be a bit wobbly in their loyalty to the president but not the Secret Service. Never Trumpers, remember the Secret Service's steadfast loyalty, when next you contemplate a coup. For that matter, George Will, remember the Secret Service's ardor for the president, when next you compose an indignant column.
Published
July 24, 2018
Shares Mr. Strzok looked like a cocky crook testifying to Congress about a failed con job. His appearance was utterly astounding. He actually smirked at the assembled elected officials of government. He smirked from morning until late in the afternoon when Congress finally adjourned, though admittedly by late in the afternoon the wind was pretty much out of his sails, and his smiling face most assuredly ached. He looked deflated, and if he was eager for anything it was for the exit and the arms of his FBI paramour Lisa Page.
Published
July 17, 2018
Shares Have you been keeping up with the charges against Congressman Jim Jordan? They first wafted from the swamp around July 3, when NBC News quoted three former wrestlers as saying the congressman had to know about "inappropriate" behavior by an Ohio State University team physician toward some Ohio State wrestlers.
Published
July 10, 2018
Shares Happy Birthday America! Sing "Yankee Doodle!" Light firecrackers! March in a parade! We have something to celebrate this year. What a difference a week makes.
Published
July 3, 2018
Shares I have in my office a framed note from Donald Trump. It says, "Bob, Now We Really Did It. Thanks For All Of Your Help!" The note is dated Jan. 13, 2017. He was responding to my congratulatory email to him earlier acknowledging that indeed he "did it."
Published
June 26, 2018
Shares Do you remember when we called those utterly frivolous though dreadfully ominous news stories of yesteryear Black Cat news stories? They filled the media in the 1980s during the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Not a week passed when a Reaganite was not being hounded by reporters for committing some minor misdeed or often no misdeed at all, for instance, forgetting to wash one's hands after lunch or neglecting to hold the door for a lady. That was back in the days when it was permissible to call a lady a lady, and her gender was a matter of fact not of litigation.
Published
June 19, 2018
Shares On Friday, Charles Krauthammer, the Pulitzer Prize-winning conservative journalist and writer, released a noble statement to the public. Its final words were:
Published
June 12, 2018
Shares During the current hysteria about sexual harassment within elite circles, one of the most revered of our elites, Bill Clinton, has been hiding under his bed. He has not been seen in public for eight months.
Published
June 5, 2018
Shares I have never believed in conspiracy theories. Though some critics have lumped me in with conspiracy theorists excogitating on Clinton aide Vince Foster's death in Fort Marcy Park and other such phantasmagorias, I plead innocence.
Published
May 29, 2018
Shares On May 14 a star failed to come out. Tom Wolfe passed away that day. With his passing the conservative movement lost its greatest social critic, and America lost one of its greatest novelists. As a writer Tom was his own man. He died as he lived, on his terms, or at least as much on his terms as a man can have it.
Published
May 22, 2018
Shares I once did a weekly column for The Washington Post. It appeared on Mondays, and was picked up in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, Boston, possibly Chicago and I believe Bull Snort, Georgia. It ran in a lot of newspapers, but that was many years ago. Things were different in America. Liberals were different then. For one thing liberals were liberal.
Published
May 15, 2018
Shares There is a whiff of the absurd about former Secretary of State Jean-Francois Kerry's recent "aggressive yet stealthy mission" to New York City. "Aggressive yet stealthy" is how the Boston Globe described his mission, though to serious observers of this elongated buffoon the diplomatic mission was also comic. His return to diplomacy was as comic as his episodes of hang-gliding while running for president, mad bicycling jaunts across Europe in what looked like his underpants, and recreational surfing — all while ostensibly on duty.
Published
May 8, 2018
Shares Milton Friedman was not only a brilliant economist — a Nobel laureate in fact — but he was a gifted writer. In his 1962 book, "Capitalism and Freedom," he presciently explained how health care costs were going to leap out of control over the next decades. Sure enough they did. They multiplied from spending roughly one of every 20 dollars on health care in the 1960s to spending roughly one of every 5 dollars on healthcare today.
Published
May 1, 2018
Shares Has it been noted that the country's political disagreements are becoming increasingly violent? About 15 years ago "the angry left" appeared on the scene, and its indignant members got a lot of attention from the media. The enormous volume of press attention signaled the media's manifest approval, if sotto voce. Next came the Occupiers' movement, and again these ruffians came with the media's approval, at least sotto voce. Then gun-toting cowards began shooting people for humanitarian reasons, and the media did not know what to think. The assassination attempt on House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and his colleagues comes to mind.
Published
April 24, 2018
Shares William Casey was my lawyer. One day I came into my office and found a large man sitting on my desk. I greeted him amiably, and he greeted me amiably. Yet, he was still siting on my desk. At some point in our meeting we settled into a more conventional seating arrangement, and Bill began to tell me about the world as he analyzed it at the time, the late 1970s. I then made two decisions. If Bill agreed to be my lawyer I could take on anyone. What is more, he knew prodigious amounts about the world. He had brought charts and maps. He would be my foreign policy adviser.
Published
April 17, 2018
Shares The markets are on edge. Yet, then again, inflation is low, employment is high — in the case of blacks and Latinos historically high — and growth is healthy and looking to become very healthy. Dare we say it, robust? The reason for the edginess in the markets is that President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs on Communist China and threatens to impose still more tariffs. There is talk of a trade war. That should worry any champion of free markets.
Published
April 10, 2018
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