Sublime
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Shimon Peres, who had long had a bitter rivalry with Rabin over leadership of the Labor party, became acting prime minister upon Rabin’s death.
Daniel Gordis • Israel: A Concise History of a Nation Reborn
Obviously Reich’s influence went way beyond just me. Alongside other authors such as Anthony Giddens[411] and Jeremy Rifkin[412], he was instrumental in crafting the message of a new generation of progressive leaders that the era of the steady, lifelong job was over. In a more global and unstable world, lifelong education was the new key to providi
... See moreNicolas Colin • Hedge: A Greater Safety Net for the Entrepreneurial Age
Liberals speak as if they believe in government and then pass policy after policy hamstringing what it can actually do. Conservatives talk as if they want a small state but support a national security and surveillance apparatus of terrifying scope and power.
Ezra Klein • Abundance
The great political defect of Locke and his disciples, from a modern point of View, was their worship of property.
Bertrand Russell • History of Western Philosophy
But what if Clausewitz and Tolstoy were wrestling with contradictions—perhaps even relishing the contest—rather than agonizing over them?13 Both see determinism as laws to which there can be no exceptions: “If even one man out of millions in a thousand-year period of time has had the possibility of acting freely,” Tolstoy writes, “then it is obviou
... See moreJohn Lewis Gaddis • On Grand Strategy
... See moreIn 1896, Brooks Adams wrote a book called The Law of Civilization and Decay. Like most late-19th-century commentators, he believed that his country was nearing a watershed in its history. But unless America rallied around a strong leader, the center of world power, which he thought might be about to shift from England to the United States, would sh
Populism gives life to Michel Foucault’s celebrated reversal of the Clausewitz dictum: Politics is the pursuit of war by other means.
Neil Howe • The Fourth Turning Is Here: What the Seasons of History Tell Us about How and When This Crisis Will End
“There never was perhaps a greater contrast between two characters than between those of the present president and his predecessor,” James Madison observed. “The one cool, considerate, and cautious, the other headlong and kindled into flame by every spark that lights on his passions.”28 For all his vast legislative experience, the temperamental Ada
... See moreRon Chernow • Washington
The European history of the twentieth century shows us that societies can break, democracies can fall, ethics can collapse, and ordinary men can find themselves standing over death pits with guns in their hands.