Popular • The Worthy House

Against Masks

Published by Charles

The great social argument of this instant is whether everyone should now, because of the Wuhan Plague, be required to wear face masks, and if so, under what circumstances....

May 28, 2020

comments 59

Analysis, Charles, Life Advice, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Social Behavior

Bronze Age Mindset (Bronze Age Pervert)

Published by Charles

I am fascinated by what is to come. For someone who came of age imbibing the narrow, facile, weak, always-second-place conservative pieties of the late 1980s and the 1990s,...

September 23, 2019

comments 20

Book Reviews, Charles, Classical History, Conservatism, Great Fragmentation, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism, Primitive Cultures, Sex Roles, Social Behavior

On Space

Published by Charles

I am often asked to define my political program, Foundationalism. In essence, this is a request to state its core principles. The ultimate, first-level principle of Foundationalism, is that...

July 13, 2019

comments 15

Analysis, Charles, Foundationalism, Popular, Science, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Technology

On Francisco Franco

Published by Charles

Few Americans know much about Francisco Franco, leader of the winning side in the Spanish Civil War and subsequently dictator of Spain. Yet from 1936 until 1975, he was...

April 16, 2019

comments 17

Analysis, Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, Communism, European History, Left-Liberalism, Military History, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism, War, Wars To Come

Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline (Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson)

Published by Charles

Anybody who has been paying attention has long grasped the truth: underpopulation, not overpopulation, is our problem. This will soon be true on a global scale, it is already...

February 12, 2019

comments 17

Apocalypse, Book Reviews, Charles, Political Economy, Popular, Science, Sex Roles, Social Behavior

On Battlefield V

Published by Charles

Last year, the giant gaming company Electronic Arts released the latest version of an extremely popular military game, Battlefield V. Each release in the series takes place in a...

January 16, 2019

comments 21

Analysis, Business & Money, Charles, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Sex Roles, Social Justice Warriors, Technology

The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age (Tim Wu)

Published by Charles

As the ideological tectonic plates shift in America, many apparently settled matters have become unsettled. This creates, at the same time, both conflict and strange bedfellows, though I suspect...

November 18, 2018

comments 7

American History, Book Reviews, Business & Money, Charles, Conservatism, Great Fragmentation, Political Discussion & Analysis, Political Economy, Popular, Social Behavior, Technology

How Democracies Die (Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt)

Published by Charles

This may be the worst well-written book I have ever read. That is, most awful books are bad in their writing, bad in their organization, bad in their reasoning,...

September 25, 2018

comments 8

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Conservatism, Great Fragmentation, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism, Social Justice Warriors, Wars To Come

On the “Dark Enlightenment,” and of Curtis Yarvin / Mencius Moldbug

Published by Charles

My project here is to analyze, in the detail required for all necessary understanding, the thought of Curtis Yarvin, who wrote under the pseudonym Mencius Moldbug. Yarvin is the...

June 27, 2018

comments 23

American History, Analysis, Atheism, Charles, Conservatism, Ethnography, Great Fragmentation, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup (John Carreyrou)

Published by Charles

While pretty much everyone in this book who is rich and powerful comes off looking bad, it is less a tale of typical fraud, like a Ponzi scheme, and...

May 24, 2018

comments 2

Book Reviews, Business & Money, Charles, Law, Popular, Science, Technology

The Power of the Powerless (Václav Havel)

Published by Charles

This book was once famous, but was mostly forgotten when Communism died and so-called liberal democracy seemed ascendant. It is increasingly famous again, and relevant, in these days of...

May 18, 2018

comments 14

Book Reviews, Charles, Communism, Conservatism, Eastern European History, European History, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism, Social Behavior, Social Justice Warriors, Wars To Come

Suicide of the West: How the Rebirth of Tribalism, Populism, Nationalism, and Identity Politics is Destroying American Democracy (Jonah Goldberg)

Published by Charles

I think this book is meant as a #NeverTrumper manifesto, an attempt to create intellectual backbone for that wispy band of conservative holdouts, who crouch behind the crenellations in...

May 2, 2018

comments 10

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Conservatism, Great Fragmentation, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism

The Revolt of the Masses (José Ortega y Gasset)

Published by Charles

Oh, but this is a fascinating book. Written in 1930 by the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset, it is one of those books that is occasionally mentioned, especially...

March 24, 2018

comments 6

Book Reviews, Charles, European History, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Social Behavior

Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (Steven Pinker)

Published by Charles

As with Steven Pinker’s earlier The Better Angels of Our Nature, of which this is really an expansion and elucidation, I was frustrated by this book. On the one...

February 16, 2018

comments 11

Book Reviews, Charles, Great Divergence, Left-Liberalism, Political Economy, Popular, Social Behavior, Technology

Why Liberalism Failed (Patrick J. Deneen)

Published by Charles

Poor Francis Fukuyama. He has been a punching bag ever since he unwisely declared the End of History, more than twenty-five years ago. Fukuyama, of course, meant that the...

December 19, 2017

comments 14

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Great Fragmentation, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Post-Liberalism, Wars To Come

The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America (Richard Rothstein)

Published by Charles

Some years ago, I lived for a time in Oak Park, Illinois. Oak Park has for decades been filled with rich white liberals, who live just across the street...

August 15, 2017

comments 2

Administrative State, Book Reviews, Charles, Ethnography, Law, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Political Economy, Popular, Social Behavior

All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.
T. E. Lawrence

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Light from the Christian East: An Introduction to the Orthodox Tradition (James R. Payton Jr.)

Published by Charles

I have always been keenly interested in comparative theology. However, as a recent adherent to Eastern Orthodoxy, I approach analysis, as opposed to knowledge, of Orthodox theology as presumptively...

December 3, 2020

comments 3

Book Reviews, Charles, Christian History, Christian Theology, Religion

On the Finnish Civil War

Published by Charles

You have likely never heard of the Finnish Civil War. A brief war, in some ways a simple war, it lasted only three months, from late January to late...

November 30, 2020

comments 6

Analysis, Charles, Civil War, Communism, Eastern European History, European History, Military History, Political Discussion & Analysis, War, Wars To Come

Apocalypse Never: Why Environmental Alarmism Hurts Us All (Michael Shellenberger)

Published by Charles

Whenever, which is often, I see in the media that “experts say . . . ,” I immediately assume what follows is lies. The utter tone-deafness of using this...

November 12, 2020

comments 3

Apocalypse, Book Reviews, Charles, Political Economy, Religion, Science, Technology

Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents (Rod Dreher)

Published by Charles

A disease is going around. No, not the Wuhan Plague. This malady only affects the Right, and I name it Scrutonism. The symptoms of Scrutonism are a razor-sharp ability...

October 19, 2020

comments 10

American History, Atheism, Book Reviews, Charles, Christian History, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Religion, Social Behavior, Social Justice Warriors, Technology, Wars To Come

Long Shot: The Inside Story of the Kurdish Snipers Who Broke ISIS (Azad Cudi)

Published by Charles

This book appears, to the casual reader, to be propaganda designed to persuade a Great Power, the United States, to aid the Kurdish fight for independence. Like all good...

October 12, 2020

comments 6

Book Reviews, Charles, Colonialism, Communism, Islam & The Islamic World, Military History, The Orient, War

Neuromancer (William Gibson)

Published by Charles

When I first read Neuromancer, a science fiction classic of the modern age, twenty-some years ago, serious people believed that our certain technological future was one of accelerating, boundless...

October 9, 2020

comments 6

Book Reviews, Charles, Fiction, Science, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Technology

A Concise History of Finland (David Kirby)

Published by Charles

Who thinks much about Finland? During the Cold War, because of its buffer position, it was occasionally in the news. More recently, Nokia was prominent for a while. But...

October 1, 2020

comments 5

Book Reviews, Charles, Eastern European History, Ethnography, European History

Long Range Shooting Handbook: The Complete Beginner’s Guide to Precision Rifle Shooting (Ryan M. Cleckner)

Published by Charles

Si vis pacem, para bellum. If you wish for peace, prepare for war. So said the Romans. But there is a corollary, another truth, also as old as mankind....

September 25, 2020

comments 3

Apocalypse, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, Guns, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, War, Wars To Come

The Soul of an Entrepreneur: Work and Life Beyond the Startup Myth (David Sax)

Published by Charles

The “why” of entrepreneurship varies by entrepreneur. My core “why” is money. I want, and have always wanted, money, for what money can do. Whether that is avarice, or...

September 22, 2020

comments 11

Book Reviews, Business & Money, Charles, Economics, Life Advice, Political Economy, Practical Skills

The Outlaws (Ernst von Salomon)

Published by Charles

The Outlaws is advertised to modern readers as a memoir of the post-World War I struggles between the armed German Left and Right, between the Communists and the Freikorps....

September 17, 2020

comments 4

Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, Communism, European History, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Totalitarian Socialism, War, Wars To Come

Why We Drive: Toward a Philosophy of the Open Road (Matthew B. Crawford)

Published by Charles

Philosopher Matthew Crawford’s third book is ostensibly a book about driving, but as with all Crawford’s works, that is merely the jumping-off point. Crawford expands our minds by exploring...

September 14, 2020

comments 6

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Life Advice, Practical Skills, Sex Roles, Social Behavior, Technology

The Stakes: America at the Point of No Return (Michael Anton)

Published by Charles

Michael Anton’s latest, half analysis and half prophecy, is simultaneously terrifying and clarifying. As I have said before, I align very closely with Anton in both core politics and...

September 8, 2020

comments 12

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Social Justice Warriors, Wars To Come

Why Liberalism Works: How True Liberal Values Produce a Freer, More Equal, Prosperous World for All (Deirdre Nansen McCloskey)

Published by Charles

This is a special review. It is special because it is the last of its kind. I no longer intend to spend my time, and your time, on books...

September 1, 2020

comments 38

Book Reviews, Charles, Economics, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Social Behavior, Wars To Come

Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire (Roger Crowley)

Published by Charles

Without specific intention, I seem to have turned into a Roger Crowley fanboy, as shown by that I have now read every one of his books. Crowley is a...

August 15, 2020

comments 4

Book Reviews, Charles, Colonialism, European History, Islam & The Islamic World, Military History, Renaissance History, The Orient, War

Ten Caesars: Roman Emperors from Augustus to Constantine (Barry Strauss)

Published by Charles

The Roman Empire, or at least the western Roman Empire, is a history of decline, as we all know. But not linear decline, and that matters. Ten Caesars, the...

August 8, 2020

comments 6

Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Classical History

The Saxon Savior: The Germanic Transformation of the Gospel in the Ninth-Century Heliand (G. Ronald Murphy)

Published by Charles

Immediately before the Ascension, the last command of Christ to the Apostles was to “make disciples of all nations.” Ever since, at least until very recently, proselytizing has been...

July 5, 2020

comments 0

Book Reviews, Charles, Christian History, Christian Theology, European History, Medieval History, Religion

The Moral Basis of a Backward Society (Edward C. Banfield)

Published by Charles

Most cultures throughout history have been terrible. The natural state of so-called civilized man is somewhere between today’s Venezuela and today’s Somalia. Large-scale success, exceptions to the general rule,...

June 27, 2020

comments 15

Book Reviews, Charles, Ethnography, European History, Great Divergence, Social Behavior

When Money Dies: The Nightmare of Deficit Spending, Devaluation, and Hyperinflation in Weimar Germany (Adam Fergusson)

Published by Charles

Inflation, like most society-wide monetary happenings, is always complex and often incompletely grasped. At least this is true of its causes; of its effects, most of all its social...

June 15, 2020

comments 3

Book Reviews, Charles, Economics, European History, Political Economy, Social Behavior

Against Masks

Published by Charles

The great social argument of this instant is whether everyone should now, because of the Wuhan Plague, be required to wear face masks, and if so, under what circumstances....

May 28, 2020

comments 59

Analysis, Charles, Life Advice, Political Discussion & Analysis, Popular, Social Behavior

SAM: One Robot, a Dozen Engineers, and the Race to Revolutionize the Way We Build (Jonathan Waldman)

Published by Charles

The classic American path to technological success has been for driven tinkerers to obsessively work to solve a problem, from Eli Whitney to Thomas Edison to Steve Jobs. Such...

May 23, 2020

comments 6

Art & Architecture & Building, Book Reviews, Charles, Practical Skills, Technology

Starship Troopers (Robert Heinlein)

Published by Charles

Starship Troopers, sixty years old, is a famous work of science fiction. As with most Robert Heinlein novels, the point is more the ideas than plot or character. Heinlein...

May 12, 2020

comments 10

Book Reviews, Charles, Fiction, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Sex Roles, Social Behavior, War

Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief (Lawrence Wright)

Published by Charles

We all know religious devotion has declined precipitously in America. Most of what religion remains is Moralistic Therapeutic Deism, which is the sherbet of religions, an unsatisfying imitation of...

May 4, 2020

comments 11

Atheism, Book Reviews, Charles, Foundationalism, Religion

Lord of All the Dead (Javier Cercas)

Published by Charles

Years ago, I lived in Budapest with an elderly Hungarian relative, my grandfather’s cousin. She had lived through World War II as a young woman. One day, as we...

April 22, 2020

comments 9

Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, Communism, European History, Military History, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Social Behavior, War, Wars To Come

Mine Were of Trouble (Peter Kemp)

Published by Charles

Among the many tools of the superbly effective Left propaganda machine, one of the most effective is its control of publishing. Leftists use this to ensure that innumerable books...

April 13, 2020

comments 3

Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Civil War, European History, Military History, War, Wars To Come

The Apple and the Arrow (Mary and Conrad Buff)

Published by Charles

Do any American children learn about William Tell today? Do any Swiss children learn about him? Very few, if any, I suspect. My children do, but only because last...

April 6, 2020

comments 14

Book Reviews, Charles, Children, European History, Fiction, Medieval History, Military History, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Sex Roles, Social Behavior, Wars To Come

The Decadent Society: How We Became a Victim of Our Own Success (Ross Douthat)

Published by Charles

Almost always one reads a book of future-looking political theory long before or long after its substance has been proven or disproven. It is quite another experience to observe...

March 28, 2020

comments 7

Apocalypse, Book Reviews, Charles, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism, Social Behavior

Great Society: A New History (Amity Shlaes)

Published by Charles

A few weeks ago, I watched Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, and Quentin Tarantino’s movie delivered to me what I have been seeking. Namely, the exact point America...

March 16, 2020

comments 4

American History, Book Reviews, Charles, Foundationalism, Left-Liberalism, Political Discussion & Analysis, Post-Liberalism

The Throne of Adulis: Red Sea Wars on the Eve of Islam (G. W. Bowersock)

Published by Charles

When we think of Late Antiquity, we usually think of Rome, either its decline in the West or its continuation in the East. When we are feeling particularly adventurous,...

March 9, 2020

comments 5

Book Reviews, Charles, Christian History, Classical History, Islam & The Islamic World, Military History, The Orient, War

Lee Kuan Yew: The Grand Master’s Insights on China, the United States, and the World (Graham Allison)

Published by Charles

For Americans who think that so-called liberal democracy is neither, and in any case is a dead end, successful modern societies with a different political model always intrigue. In...

February 9, 2020

comments 12

Biography & Autobiography, Book Reviews, Charles, Ethnography, Great Divergence, Political Discussion & Analysis, Political Economy, Post-Liberalism, The Orient

The Beekeeper’s Lament: How One Man and Half a Billion Honey Bees Help Feed America (Hannah Nordhaus)

Published by Charles

As befits one who seeks to be a man of wealth and taste (if I have to choose between them, the former), I aspire to live on a vast...

January 27, 2020

comments 6

Book Reviews, Business & Money, Charles, Gardening & Farming, Political Economy, Practical Skills