Ward on Words

The Edge of the American West blog has a wonderful post on Teddy Roosevelt. It's a lovely post with a lovely conclusion: "It is always easier to explain why Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln belong on Mount Rushmore. Lincoln is America’s Christ. And Washington plays God the Father to Lincoln’s martyred savior. Which leaves to Jefferson the role of Holy Spirit: just so, as the author of the Declaration of Independence, the deeply flawed Jefferson nevertheless carried enough divine fire to channel into words the nation’s enlivening ideal of equality and natural right. With such an established trinity, what need for a fourth figure? If we can see elements of the godly in each of Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln, what can we do with the rather thoroughly earthly Roosevelt? But perhaps that is the point. Alongside gods humanity also has a place, and a man who did so much to make daily life in America a little better, and to create the expectation that daily life in Ameri...

My son turned nine yesterday. He is my first-born; his birth nine years ago signified that precise moment when I became, like all parents, equally connected to the past and future. As a parent, I pass on the lessons I've learned through my life experiences to my children, who (one hopes) will use them as guideposts as they move forward to inhabit the future. The end of this dreadful year leaves me feeling melancholy, and it is my role as a parent that worries me most. I know that I will at some point have to answer to my children - I will have to explain how we took astronomical surpluses and made them vanish – poof – like Harry Potter vanishes when he drapes his invisibility cloak over himself. Of course, Harry reappears the moment he takes the cloak off. Our federal surplus, however, has vanished – and our children will be paying down this debt for many years to come. I'll have to explain to my children how a president who coined the phrase "compassionate conse...