R. R. Reno

The New York Times reports the founding of a new company here in New York. It’s called SheTaxis—SheRides. Here’s how the Times describes it: “The new livery service starting Sept. 16 in New York City, Westchester County and Long Island will offer female drivers exclusively, for female riders.” Continue Reading »

The radical Islamic movement ISIS is more radical than Islamic. It is true, of course, that this group’s vision of a restored caliphate in the Middle East, like its other ambitions, only makes sense in an Islamic context. But its methods—ruthless violence and criminality, grandiose goals framed in world-historical terms, leadership cadres regularly purged to ensure purity, and bloody public spectacles—are familiar elements of the modern European experience of radical politics. Continue Reading »

The Seventh Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals put out its ruling on same-sex marriage yesterday. A unanimous three-judge panel declared that Wisconsin and Indiana’s refusal to recognize same-sex marriage (misdescribed by the press as a “ban”) is unconstitutional. Continue Reading »

I remain struck by the character of the many responses I’ve read to my postings on women and politics (as well as those on race and violence). There’s been a strong tone of horror and denunciation. Of course, when it comes to social media and blogging, there’s a bias in favor of shrillness and extremism. But what I’ve been reading accords with my experiences in higher education where certain thoughts trigger an almost primitive response from liberal intellectuals. Continue Reading »

Over at Slate, Amanda Hess takes issue with my analysis of the “gender gap” in American politics. She accuses me, in effect, of a male arrogance for imagining I know better than women what they really think and want. Continue Reading »

A GOP poll confirms recent trends. Single women don’t like the conservative message. The poll takers and those running the focus groups asked about various policies about equal pay, education, jobs, and so forth, which is natural. That’s typically what we debate in politics. But I think the gap has a deeper explanation that brings the challenge we face into focus. Continue Reading »

I want to come back to accusations that my column discussing Ferguson, Missouri is animated by racism. I observed that young black males attract the “special attention” of law enforcement, and that any population focused on by people with guns—even law enforcers—will suffer a disproportionate amount of police violence. I also made the observation that this sad truth is hard to avoid, because young black males are often rightly the focus of police attention. Continue Reading »

Yesterday I made observations about the sad way events in Ferguson followed a familiar script. Some readers responded in a fashion that was also very much on script. In various ways they accused me of racism. Continue Reading »

My web exclusive yesterday took up that oft-repeated script we saw enacted in Ferguson, Missouri—police violence against young black males, protests that shift toward retributive violence, hand-wringing, soul-searching, and then little change. Thorough reflection on that script needs to take in the quite different trajectory of similar events here in New York. Continue Reading »

It pains me to admit it, but I see nothing new in the tragic events in Ferguson, nothing new in the protests, which often blended into festivals of destruction, nothing new in the extensive coverage and the calls for our nation to confront racism. It’s an old script, often replayed. Continue Reading »