Archive

Mazal tov! Partisans on the left and on the right, fighting bitterly for a larger swath of America’s increasingly divided political landscape, have now found a goal around which...

Jews, the late Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik observed, were given the Torah at Sinai not as mere passive recipients but as builders of worlds, as partners with the Almighty...

If you happened to tune in to America’s most popular podcasts these last few months, you might’ve heard some peculiar voices.  Joe Rogan is a big deal. He averages...

Super Bowl ads are a great American art form. Paying eight million dollars or more for a chance to capture the collective national imagination in thirty seconds isn’t merely...

The real protagonist of Captain America: Brave New World—the fourth in the franchise, if you’re keeping score—isn’t the man with the star-spangled shield. It’s the American president, and he...

One recent afternoon, while visiting Universal Studios, I found myself seriously contemplating socialism. I was standing in line for one of the theme park’s most popular attractions, huddled with...

Though they probably don’t realize it, many Americans spent the tail end of 2024 engaged in a serious theological debate about the nature of evil. This being America, the...

Awoman, sitting behind the wheel of her car, is hollering. She’s alternating between “why, why, why,” and “no, no, no,” all at the top of her lungs while slamming...

I’m a great lover of the English language, but I must confess that, lately, I’ve come to dread three words in particular. You hear them everywhere—at dinner, at the...

I was recently sipping on chocolat chaud while visiting Paris, observing life leisurely unfurling in the charming Place des Vosges. I found myself contemplating a very difficult question. Like everything of consequence...

How to make sense of the upcoming presidential election? Those of us reared on reason, logic, and basic human decency find ourselves a bit befuddled these days, trying to...

Once upon a time, in a faraway place called Brooklyn, there lived a museum director named Anne Pasternak. Because she was a member of America’s self-appointed cultural elite, she...

Good news, fellow Americans: It’s civil war time! The violence, praise the Lord, unfurls exclusively on the silver screen, where the tortured protagonists of Alex Garland’s new blockbuster—unimprovably named...

The central commandment found in American etiquette Torah is this old chestnut: Never discuss religion or politics. Do so, and you run the risk of offending those who hold...

The other month, I attended a conference thick with members of the clergy. It had everything you would expect: bad bagels for breakfast, a hurried nondenominational prayer to kick...