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Joseph Sobran, a syndicated columnist for more than 20 years, is an author and lecturer. He is a contributing editor to Chronicles.
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Articles and Posts by Joe-sobran:

  • Calling Dr. Johnson(12)

    On September 30, at 3 P.M., our longtime colleague and friend Joe Sobran passed away. This is the last column he was able to write for us, published in the July 2010 issue.

  • Calling Dr. Johnson(17)

    Obama may be the perfect representative of a nation that no longer speaks the language of its ancestors. True, he is more fluent than George W. Bush, but both have done much to bring government into disrepute.

  • A Few Simple Questions(4)

    The best way to get rid of corruption in high places, it has been said, is to get rid of high places. That is the American political genius in a nutshell. But the liberal instinct always demands that power be concentrated and centralized.

    The most obvious lesson of socialism still hasn’t sunk in. Man may be a rational animal, but he’s a mighty slow learner.

  • The Eclipse of the Normal(13)

    Nearly a century ago, G.K. Chesterton wrote of “the modern and morbid habit of always sacrificing the normal to the abnormal.” Today the very word normal is almost taboo. Perish the thought that there is anything abnormal—let alone sinful, vicious, perverted, abominable, sick, unhealthy, or just plain wrong—about sodomy. (Unsanitary? Let’s not go there.)

  • Shattering Lincoln’s Dream(19)

    Though Lincoln was largely right about slavery, he was wrong about secession—a separate question, as most Northerners once understood. During his war, millions of Northerners who opposed slavery also recognized the right of a sovereign state to secede from the Union. This led Lincoln to crack down on dissent, closing down hundreds of newspapers (many permanently) and having a few thousand war critics arrested.

  • Papismo Pickwickiano(8)

    Editor’s note: The following is the second in a series of translations of Chronicles articles into Spanish, as part of our outreach to the Spanish-speaking world. (Thomas Fleming)

  • The Atheist’s Redemption(44)

    In my last appearance in this space, I wrote erroneously that Christopher Hitchens had favored both Anglo-American wars on Iraq. In fact, he strongly opposed the first one, back in 1991. I remember this so vividly (I was delighted with him at the time) that I can’t understand how I could be so embarrassingly forgetful when I wrote as I did. I owe him an apology, which I cheerfully offer.

  • The Atheist Renaissance(19)

    Atheists are feeling their oats these days. Three militant unbelievers—Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens—have recently hit the best-seller lists and talk shows. Not since Bertrand Russell have we seen atheism so prosperously married to celebrity. Why now?

  • Was George Will Wrong?(11)

    If Rush Limbaugh can pass for a conservative these days, it’s no marvel that George Will can, too. Unlike Limbaugh, he at least reads books, especially Victorian ones. (He even named his daughter Victoria.) But he shares with Limbaugh an easygoing approach to defining conservatism, to the extent that a tabloid tramp such as Rudy Giuliani makes Will’s cut, while a far more principled man such as Rep. Ron Paul (one of the very few members of today’s Congress who could converse about something other than the weather with James Madison) is faintly risible—at best, “a useful anachronism.” Yes, this of one of the few who opposed invading Iraq from the start.