R. Emmett Tyrrell

Washington — As I wrote many years ago, when an entity falls under the control of liberalism, it eventually loses all sense of what its purpose was to begin with. The entity can be as small as a schoolroom or as vast as a great city or even a nation. Hand over a schoolroom or a vast city to the leadership of a cabal of liberals, and you will eventually see the schoolroom devoted to teaching…

Washington — You might recall last week that I began calling President Vladimir Putin of Russia “KGB Col. Vladimir Putin.” I meant to diminish him in the eyes of my readers. I asserted that he rose to the rank of colonel when he was in the KGB, or, rather, when there was a KGB. Well, this column has a very erudite audience, and several of my readers protested that Vlad never achieved the rank…

Washington — I hate Russian President Vladimir Putin! I would put him in a category with Fidel Castro, Adolf Hitler, and his countryman, J.V. Stalin. It took Castro, Hitler and Stalin years to achieve their distinction, at least with me. KGB Col. Putin moved more rapidly, but now he has arrived. He is a full-blooded tyrant. People throw the term “hate” around very cavalierly, at least in…

He is alive! Norman Podhoretz is alive, and he agreed to an interview with The Wall Street Journal's very perceptive Barton Swaim this weekend. He says that many of his peers are now deceased but not him, and he certainly did not sound deceased. Bill Buckley and Irving Kristol have given up the ghost, and American political commentary is the poorer for their passing, but Norman is…

Washington -- I am probably one of the few conservatives in America who wanted to see Terry McAuliffe win his lackadaisical campaign for a second term as governor of Virginia last week. He spent munificently. He brought in all the Democratic Party's big guns for help. He even tapped Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden, as unlikely as they were to give him a boost. He wore a…

Washington -- Several years ago, while perusing material for my favorite department of “The American Spectator,” the Current Wisdom, I came across an obvious lie perpetrated by Terry McAuliffe, this season's Democratic candidate for governor of Virginia. It was a pretty bold lie, too, and he was quite proud of it as you will see. The Current Wisdom is a department of “The American Spectator”…

Washington -- I have been in London visiting old friends, keeping up with changes in our alliance system -- among which were last week's developments in the alliance of the English-speaking peoples called Aukus -- and going to church. Yes, church! Seriously, I am at that age when I hear Him calling. I have actually been at that age for a while now, but in recent years, His calls have become…

Washington -- One of the unsung prophets of Aukus last week was the great British historian Andrew Roberts, who soon will be recognized throughout the English-speaking world as the man who has attempted to retrieve the reputation of King George III from the sneers of ... well, of people like me. His biography of George III will come out in early November, and of course, I have not had a chance…

Washington -- Or should I dateline this column "Mid-Atlantic" or just "On the Ground at Heathrow?" Whatever, I feel this column is being written at 35,000 feet above the Atlantic Ocean, and I am anticipating great fun when I arrive in London. London is always great fun: nightclubs, restaurants, dozens of literate friends -- even a few useful lectures and concerts. Years ago, I could boast of…

Washington -- How did the weekend that commemorated the 20th anniversary of 9/11 -- America's Pearl Harbor for the 21st century -- go for you? There were huge American flags draping the skyscrapers of northern Virginia. The streets below, however, were relatively deserted. Across the river, there was a more traditional scene. Groups of tourists were parading around the remaining statues of…

Washington -- How could a comic figure from the world of politics such as President Joe Biden suddenly become such a tragic figure on the American scene? One minute he is bringing all civilized observers to laughter by telling Katie Couric that former President Franklin Roosevelt dealt with the 1929 stock market crash by getting "on television" and reassuring his fellow Americans as only FDR…

Washington — Donald Rumsfeld, the two-time secretary of Defense, adviser to presidents and three-term member of Congress, was buried at Arlington National Cemetery on Aug. 23 after a stately ceremony in the cemetery's large chapel. His friends and associates filled the chapel, and I wish I could report on what luminaries were present, but I cannot. Everyone was wearing a mask. The media…

Looking back on the contradictory pronunciamentos uttered by President Joe Biden so solemnly over the last few months on the subject of Afghanistan, what has struck me is how inane they show him to be. When he was affirming that everything in Kabul, Afghanistan, was hunky-dory or when he was sounding the alarm, he was inane. His statements were vacuous. How did this man become president of the…