The Great Depression (Full Lecture)
Why the 1930s were “red.”
TR, Wilson, or Coolidge? (full lecture)
President Calvin Coolidge–one of the best men in American history. I’d take one Coolidge over a thousand Wilsons.
“When a man begins to feel that he is the only one who can lead in this republic, he is guilty of treason to the spirit of our institution.”–The Autobiography of Calvin Coolidge
Progressivism’s Origins: In Pure and Unadulterated Racism
Just a quick note–the quotes below from E.A. Ross–a leading public intellectual during the Progressive Era–are quite disturbing and despicable. Still, when Progressives claim they favor equality, they must at least acknowledge their rather brutal past. Ross’s views are typical of the era, especially when all Eugenists were Progressives.
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The following quotes are all from Edward Alsworth Ross, The Old World in the New: The Significance of Past and Present Immigration to the American People (New York: The Century, 1914).
“The influence of the Germans in spreading among us the love of good music and good drama is acknowledged by all. But there is a more subtle transformation that they have wrought on American taste. The social diversions of the Teutons, and their affirmance of the ‘joy of living,’ have helped to clear from our eyes the Puritan jaundice that made all physical and social enjoyment looks sinful. If ‘innocent recreation’ and ‘harmless amusement’ are now phrases to conjure with, it is largely owing to the Germans and Bohemians, with their love of song and mirth and ‘having a good time.’” (pg. 54)
Civil War Battle Study Guide
Birzer Civil War Study Guide, Spring 2017
Battles to Know/Army of the Potomac Leaders (No naval battles listed)
1861
Battle of First Bull Run
Battles of Wilson’s Creek/Lexington (Missouri)
Battle of Ball’s Bluff
1862
Battle of Forts Henry and Donelson
Battle of Shiloh
New Mexico/Southwest Campaign
The Peninsular Campaign
Antietam Campaign
Battle of Fredericksburg
The Killing Fields, Study Guide
[Originally published at TIC]
Review of “The Killing Fields,” by Roland Joffe (director), Warner Brothers, 1984. Re-issued on Blu-ray, 2014 in hardback digi-book form.
Based on the true events of a New York Times employee, Dith Pran, (a native Cambodian; Khmer) who has to escape the Cambodian gulag, ca. 1976, the movie follow Pran through his horrific and terrifying escape from the Khmer Rouge, a journey that took four years from beginning to end.
Horrors of Communism (Full Lecture)
With an emphasis on the Hiss-Chambers trial, the horrors of communism.
The “Machine” of Ideology (Full Lecture)
My follow-up to last week’s talk on Progressivism. Now, the meaning of ideology and its inherent and inevitable demeaning of the human person. All ideologies–left and right.
Matthew Colville’s Dungeons and Dragons Videos
I’ve been proudly playing Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) since 1980.
Yes, 1980 was back when a number of folks feared that the game itself was evil. Jack Chick was worked up as was Tom Hanks. I still remember my mother talking to another friend’s mother, worried that we might be doing something to conjure up the devil.
Honestly, I’ve never understood this, as D&D more than anything else taught me the glory of the ideas of imagination, free will, and morality. D&D seemed not just the opposite of evil, but a very refuge from the evils that seemed to lurk on all sides of life back in 1980 (most of the chaos and evil was personal and in my very family, as I tried to navigate around and away from it all).
Progressivism (Full Lecture)
A look at the theory behind progressivism and why it is a theory of history, neither left nor right.
I, Hayekian
Friedrich August von Hayek
I’ve been writing a weekly column for The Imaginative Conservative for almost seven years now. Of the roughly 350 pieces I’ve written, this is among my favorites.
So glad to be able to thank men such as Walter Grinder, Leonard Liggio, David Hart, Chandran Kukathas, David Beito, Peter Boettke, and David Schmidtz, Since 1990, I can also thank Steve Horwitz, Randy Simmons, and Jim Otteson.
I’m not sure if they’ll agree with what I’ve done to our beloved Hayek, but here’s hoping. . .
Through these mentors, I found out rather quickly that Hayek wrote not only about economics, but also about law, constitutionalism, culture, history, individualism, associationalism, psychology, the social sciences, and the Greats of Western Civilization. He was, I realized, a true Renaissance man, in the very best sense of this term. As a history major, though, I tried very hard to apply all that I’d learned of Hayek to my own chosen craft. Sometime around 1992, it hit me that all real history came down to biography. Whether or not the generous mentors listed above or Friedrich Hayek would recognize my statement as true, I must attribute this insight to them and their influence. Indeed, if I have had any success at contributing anything to the fields of history or biography, it is this extremely Hayekian insight.
To keep reading (and please do!), go here: http://www.theimaginativeconservative.org/2017/03/hayek-and-me-bradley-birzer.html
I, Hayekian.
Dare We Hope? Deleting the State.
The man.
Happy birthday to my wonderful friend and ally in this crazy world, Aeon Skoble. Here is my review of his 2008 book, a book I want very much to be true, whatever skepticisms linger (about the idea, not the book).
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“Centralized, coercive political authority–the State–is not necessary.”
So writes Aeon Skoble, a philosopher possessed of an all-too-rare combination of rigorous logic, empathy, and imagination. This opening line ably and honestly captures the essence of his 2008 book, Deleting the State.
Something in me–at some level–says that Skoble’s desire for political anarchism must be wrong. But, admittedly, I have a hard time finding what it is, no matter how hard I try after reading Deleting the State. Not only can Skoble write very well (and, for an academic, very clearly), but he writes in such an earnest and intellectual manner, that it’s hard to disagree with him.
Some of my historian training might find fault with some of his philosophical training, but my criticisms at a scholarly level are rather minor. I’m only sorry I waited two years to delve into the book with any seriousness. I’ve been told by many of my friends how important this book is, and I’ve even lectured on Skoble’s arguments in my now sadly defunct course on American notions of order and disorder (frankly, a course on Anglo-American Christian Humanism in the twentieth century). But, only recently did I purchase and read the book.
Stormfields 