National Review articles from January 2004

National Review archives from January 2004

A union blows smoke.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 26, 2004... I was nearly through Richard Lowry's excellent article on the woebegone John Kerry ("The Bust," Dec. 31) when I came across his observation that "the New Hampshire firefighters have endorsed Kerry." Actually, the main firefighters' union, the...

A healthy investment.(Letter to the Editor)
January 26, 2004... The United States spends more per capita on medical care than any other industrialized nation. We spend two and a half times more than Great Britain; and we spend 13 percent of our GDP on health care, compared with the 8 percent spent by...

X? Nay!(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
January 26, 2004... Jay Nordlinger's piece, "December's C-Word" (Dec. 31), cleverly yet seriously expresses my feelings and those of many other "Neanderthals." But one disrespectful habit of our times was overlooked: substituting "X" for "Christ." Have we become...

Phenomenal.(War on Terror)
January 26, 2004... Among the instant cliches that sprang up after 9/11 was the notion that a "war on terror" is a meaningless concept. "It is misleading to talk of a 'war on terrorism,'" sniffed the distinguished British historian Correlli Barnett only last...

Tigers (not from Detroit).(Tamil Tigers)(stopping terrorism)
January 26, 2004... They were doing what most of the rest of us were doing--buying into the conventional wisdom that the "war on terror" was the war that dare not speak its name. But, funnily enough, intentionally or not, the Tamil Tigers wound up getting caught...

Try Saddam?(On the Right)(Saddam Hussein)
January 26, 2004... New York, December 17. What on earth is it that we should want from Saddam Hussein? The New York Times set are going on about an exemplary trial which will vindicate international tribunal procedures, abiding by "the complex legal issues...

Churchbound?(On the Right)(Christian behavior)
January 26, 2004... New York, December 19. Rush Limbaugh was talking about religion as also, that very day, Sean Hannity. One day earlier Christie Hefner was celebrating the 50th anniversary of Playboy. Rush said listen to this, folks, Catholic voters...

Carnivorous prophets.(On the Right)(presidential candidates)
January 26, 2004... New York, December 30. There is a great flurry on the question, Should competing presidential candidates speak about the weaknesses of other contenders? Howard Dean is at the center of the controversy because he chewed out Terry McAuliffe,...

Jerusalem.(Poem)
January 26, 2004... JERUSALEM Beautiful heights, city of a great King, From the western coast my desire burns towards thee. Pity and tenderness burst in me, remembering Thy former glories, thy temple now broken stones. I wish I could fly...

Space: the final frontier.(City Desk)
January 26, 2004... The New York papers featured an unlikely year-end story: Patrice Moore, a 43-year-old Bronx man, was trapped for two days in his studio apartment when a decade of magazines, newspapers, books, and catalogs fell in on him. After the landlord...

Manji vs. the Mullahs.(Shelf Life)(The Trouble with Islam: A Muslim's Call for Reform in Her Faith)(Book Review)
January 26, 2004... Monotheism has been afflicted throughout its history by backslidings into idolatry--the worship of the creature instead of the Creator. Mankind has been fortunate to have, in those periods of decay, prophetic voices of reform and restoration....

America's path.(The Pursuit of Happiness in Times of War)(Book Review)
January 26, 2004... The Pursuit of Happiness in Times of War by Carl M. Cannon (Rowman & Littlefield, 318 pp., $24.95) In this exceptionally friendly book, journalist Carl Cannon explores what the word "Happiness" means in the famous phrase, "Life,...

The fat police.(Food Fight: The Inside Story of the Food Industry, America's Obesity Crisis, and What We Can Do About It)(Book Review)
January 26, 2004... Food Fight: The Inside Story of the Food Industry, America's Obesity Crisis, and What We Can Do About It by Kelly D. Brownell and Katherine Battle Horgen (Contemporary Books, 352 pp., $24.95) It is difficult to single out what is...

Epic of the West.(The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, 200-1000 AD, 2nd ed.)(Book Review)
January 26, 2004... The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, 200-1000 AD, 2nd ed. by Peter Brown (Blackwell, 640 pp., $29.95) In this, his most mature book, Peter Brown, the author of the acclaimed biography of Augustine of Hippo,...

Rediscovering the family.(The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke (With Surprising Solutions That Will Change Our Children's Futures))(Book Review)
January 26, 2004... The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke (With Surprising Solutions That Will Change Our Children's Futures) by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi (Basic, 272 pp., $26) This book is a fine...

The long view.
January 26, 2004... Bush v. Dean, throughout the ages... FADE IN: Interior--Camp David-day President George W. Bush sits on a sofa, watching football and eating tortilla chips. Karl Rove enters, carrying a small bowl of avocado dip. ROVE...

Is that you, Hillary?(Help!)(Poem)
January 26, 2004... Just back from Kabul and Baghdad, She gets off broadsides from her pad In squishy New York that make Chuck--They nod, but loathe each other--cluck Like hens importuned by a cock. It's all so sudden: See her sock ...

A general's campaign: Kucinich, Moseley Braun, and Sharpton were supposed to be the kook candidates--have you been following Wesley Clark?(2004 II)
January 26, 2004... The entry of Wesley Clark into the Democratic race was interesting. Here was a highly decorated general, running for president in time of war. War and peace has not been the Democrats' strong suit, to put it mildly, since about JFK. Surely...

Giving Iowa a try: Gephardt vs. Dean, amid the corn.(2004)
January 26, 2004... Clarion, Iowa It's the loneliest time to be campaigning for president in Iowa, but Richard Gephardt is up and at it. Two days after Christmas, with the press corps nowhere to be found and many people still in a holiday blur, Gephardt rolls...

Amnesty again: this country should have learned--apparently, it has not.
January 26, 2004... President Bush has kicked off his reelection year by proposing an amnesty for illegal aliens dressed up as a guest-worker program, plus the importation of millions of new guest workers and a significant increase in immigration. What is the...

Golden days of the black arts: 'human intelligence,' the right way.(At War)
January 26, 2004... Technology and terrorism are unevenly matched. Undoubtedly it is helpful to be in a surveillance aircraft or at a computer terminal tapping terrorists' telecommunications, encrypted e-mails included. But terrorists have only to revert to...

Agendas all their own: the perils of NGOs--non-governmental organizations.(International Affairs)
January 26, 2004... In September, Secretary of State Colin Powell's Open Forum played host to "philosopher, philanthropist, financier" George Soros. In his remarks at Foggy Bottom, Soros called on the global community to empower "civil society" when governments...

Arnold's new role: Schwarzenegger has his hands full in Sacramento.(California)
January 26, 2004... This is a new political environment. This is the first time California has had an Austrian-born Mr. Universe as governor.--Arnold Schwarzenegger, November 17, 2003 When Arnold Schwarzenegger came calling on Halloween night--appropriately,...

Notes and asides.
January 26, 2004... * Memo to: WFB From: RL Dear Bill: I remember your thoughts as written in Nearer My God over the Turkish earthquake a dozen years ago. The terrible quake in Iran brought them to mind. Why not share them with our readers? Your...

The right amendment.(Marriage)
January 26, 2004... In 1998, Hawaii's Supreme Court attempted to foist gay marriage on that state. The voters amended the state constitution to preserve the definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman. In 2001, gay activists found a more hospitable...

Moammar Qaddafi: what got into him?(The Week)
January 26, 2004... * Asked what his favorite book of the New Testament was, Howard Dean answered, Job, thus disproving the old saw that the devil can quote Scripture. * Hot Howard Dean was asked by the Concord Monitor where Osama bin Laden should be tried,...

For the record.
January 26, 2004... "Last month she said she'd marry me, but now I'm being challenged in the primaries." * In CBS News poll, President Bush earns 60 percent approval rating, up from 49 percent in November... . In CNN/USA Today poll, 62 percent say it was...