The Month of February
T. S. Eliot was wrong. (I rather like that beginning to a newsletter!) April is not the cruellest month. Au contraire. After all, April features the culmination of March Madness, the beginning of the baseball season, and the start of the NBA and NHL finals. And it includes my favorite Jewish holiday (if it’s not inappropriate to put it that way), Passover.
No, it’s clearly February that is the cruelest month. (I’m reverting to the American spelling. Eliot used the British double “L.”) College and pro football are over. Baseball’s spring training is yet to begin. College and pro basketball and ice hockey chug along toward the playoffs in a seemingly endless series of games that only a real fan can relish.
There are, to be sure, occasional bright flashes of lightning that relieve February’s tedium. For example, last Monday’s amazing Wizards-Cavaliers game, tied by LeBron with an unbelievable shot as time ran out in regulation and won by the Cavs in overtime. Here’s an account of the game and a highlight reel that you’ll surely enjoy. Fred Barnes was at the game, and had a spring in his step in the office the whole rest of the week, despite rooting for the Wizards. As he said, it was a noble defeat.
But it doesn’t make up for the fact that it’s February.
And one last word on the Super Bowl. I give it to Sally Jenkins, who had a fascinating column in the Washington Post Monday. Here are the first two paragraphs, which I reproduce just to torment the Belichick and Brady haters among you!
He is still upright, having proved that there is no sneaky ball trick, no amount of air that can put the substance and composure in a man to come from 25 points down with less than 18 minutes to go in the biggest game and win. His legacy is not just the record-tying five Super Bowl rings; it’s the lasting influence he will have on younger players, guys such as wide receiver Chris Hogan, who was all of 14 when Brady won his first title, in how to go about things in the face of reversal and reseize the narrative of your own life and career. You wait patiently for your chance, and you play “to the last whistle,” Brady said as he put an arm around Hogan in the postgame locker room. “To the last whistle.”
Well, come to think of it, the Super Bowl was early in February. So maybe the month’s not as bad as I’ve been saying. But T. S. Eliot is still clearly wrong.
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Lincoln’s Birthday
Writing this on Lincoln’s birthday, I’m reminded Which reminds me of a point I think we’ve made in TWS before: If members of Congress really want to make America great again, they should make clear that what we are celebrating next weekend is Washington’s Birthday, not what has become known as “President’s Day.” By restoring Washington to his rightful place, we can acknowledge Lincoln the week before, without lazily assuming both presidents (and all the others!) are incorporated, as it were, in “President’s Day.” “President’s Day” is, after all, almost a parody of a kind of democratization that flattens real greatness.
The political philosopher Leo Strauss remarked, shortly after the death of Winston Churchill, that:
Perhaps some enterprising member of Congress will restore Washington (and Lincoln) to their rightful place in the national pantheon.
Well, perhaps some enterprising member of Congress will lead a move to restore Washington (and Lincoln) to their rightful place in the national pantheon. Meanwhile, here’s an excellent selection of readings for Washington’s birthday. And as for Lincoln, here’s a minor tweet storm I indulged in Saturday, turned for your reading pleasure into a normal paragraph:
Here’s a link to the Lincoln eulogy of Henry Clay from which I quote. It’s well worth reading in full. The truth is our leaders can’t really aspire to be Lincoln—it’s too high a standard. But perhaps Henry Clay is a more achievable model for our politicians, and it would be one very much worth achieving.
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Constitutionalism in the Age of Trump
By a happy coincidence, our cover story by Adam White on Judge Neil Gorsuch coincides with the release by the Foundation for Constitutional Government of a conversation with Christopher DeMuth and (the same) Adam White. The article is, in my view, THE must read piece on Gorsuch. And I think you’ll find the Conversation worth your while too, as DeMuth and White diagnose the problems of the modern administrative state and reflect on how the Trump administration, Congress, and the courts might go about reforming it and restoring a regime of constitutional accountability.
And while I’m mentioning Conversations, I should note a discussion I had with Charles Murray this week at AEI that you might find of interest. We considered questions related to Charles’s recent work on class divisions in America and especially the challenges facing the working class. Charles is always provocative, and I gather from the online reaction to the YouTube posting of the panel that I said one or two politically incorrect things myself…
And while I’m recommending things—here’s a terrific column by our friend Kevin Ferris of the Philadelphia Inquirer, which brightens February and gives one hope.
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Onward.
Bill Kristol
