Sunday, November 22, 2015

Jeff Jacoby of The Boston Globe is of that rare breed, the conservative of gratitude

Here, celebrating National Review's 60th anniversary:

"IF GRATITUDE IS the quintessential conservative virtue, then Thanksgiving must be the quintessential conservative holiday. And with Thanksgiving 2015 comes an additional reason for gratefulness on the right: National Review has turned 60 and is marking the occasion with a grand anniversary issue. ... National Review’s 60th birthday is a milestone not just for a magazine, but for an ongoing commitment to the conviction that ideas matter, and that good writing can change lives. Its longtime readers have much to be thankful for. Of course, conservatives always do."

Anyone in this day and age who does not immediately define conservatism in the economic terms of libertarianism and ideology and who knows how to use "its" in a sentence is OK in my book. However bad National Review has become since its (!) ejection of the so-called nativists, it's (!) still nice to read someone who remembers the magazine which once steered by the conservative lodestar.

"Look over the whole creation, and you shall see, that the bond or cement, that holds together all the parts of this great and glorious fabrick, is gratitude."

-- Robert South (1634-1716)