Like many observers, I have wondered at the motivation for the rash of atheistic books that have achieved best seller status over the past year or so. All of a sudden, they are everywhere, and the electronic media has picked up the lead with follow up interviews and debates pitting their author/celebrities against surrogates for the Judeo/Christian tradition. Of course, much of it is political in motivation, but as Harvey Mansfield has noted, these atheistic attacks are no longer limited to the personification of “organized” religion, the institutional church, but attempt to reach more deeply into religion itself as manifest in the faith of the believer.

Well, the jury is still out on all of this, I suppose, but in spite of my bias, the defenders seem to have the upper hand. For one thing, the atheists clearly hold believers to a much higher standard than for non-believers. After all, the sole source of tyranny, whether religious or secular, is human, and there has clearly been much more tyranny led by atheistic secular humanism just in the past century alone than all of it that has been led by religious zealots in history combined—if you doubt it, count the bodies. For another and more important point, what has atheism ever produced for the benefit of mankind that even remotely compares with the beauty, hope, faith, and perseverance instilled and nurtured over the years by the religious impulse and religious sources? Not to mention the contribution of religion to the greatest achievements of human culture, including most of the values and virtuous human attributes revered by the authors of these atheist tracts.

I think Hitchens, Dawkins, and their ilk would be well advised to be on the winning side of Pascal’s “wager”—it’s a good bet and one I wouldn’t want to lose.

After Jimmy Carter, Yasser Arafat, and now Al Gore, can Michael Moore be far behind as a prime candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize? It truly makes one wonder if there are any standards for truth and objectivity in awarding the prize, or has it entirely become a form of ratification of politically correct leftist dogma.

And in the aftermath, Tom Friedman, a columnist and author for whom I have (now dwindling) respect as a professional in spite of my disagreement with him on many issues, wants to know “who will succeed Al Gore?” as a world leader. I was halfway through his article on this point before I realized that he was actually being serious.

But, hey, the demagogues are winning the global warming debate, even to the point of the successful discrediting as Holocaust denial equivalency anyone who might challenge them on the science at issue. The truly damaging part of this is that the credibility of the entire scientific enterprise is at stake, for as Patrick Basham of the Democracy Institute so well notes, at the heart of the scientific enterprise is a curious and always difficult tension between certainty and the possibility that certainty can suddenly dissolve. As a result of this age old and well founded tension, the skeptic has a right to ask first, that the normal standards of scientific evidence are brought to the climate debate and second, to make certain there is not some politically driven and premature closure of what is a scientific controversy. Gore and his fellow travelers have failed at both, and the rush to judgment that they are pursuing is not only dangerous to our long term economic growth, but a threat to the scientific method.

My wife and I just returned from a very busy three-week tour of Rome and Central Europe, including stays in Warsaw, Krakow, Budapest, Vienna, and Prague, and other interesting stops between in places like Auschwitz and Birkenau, Czestokova, and the Slovak Republic. Lots of history here, and it was greatly enhanced with several cultural events as well as commentary from our tour guide, who holds a graduate degree in European history, in addition to the very knowledgeable local guides.

Impressions? There were several. First, in all this history of the various founding tribes and their many conflicts over the centuries, one important characteristic of European history and culture stands out, particularly in contrast to American culture. This is that European (particularly continental Europe) loyalty is mainly expressed in terms of two aspects—religion and language—and that citizenship is not an important factor in this mix. I have often commented about American exceptionalism, and here is an area in which I think it is most manifest. Uniquely among the world’s nations, citizenship is a primary element of American cultural loyalty to a set of ideas, and this has made a huge difference in our development.

Second, after witnessing almost constant daily anti-American demonstrations in London last year, I expected at least some of that phenomenon in continental Europe. To my pleasant surprise, in all our travels, there was not one incident of anti-Americanism or any physical evidence of it, either in the streets or in the media. In fact, the only criticism of the U. S., in English at least, was in the editorial pages of the International Herald Tribune, a publication of the NYTimes.

Third, we probably toured or at least visited about 50 churches, cathedrals, and synagogues, and all of them were fascinating. Of course, it was no surprise that many of them are now operational mainly as museums—revered for their beauty, but also for their quaintness, almost as relics from a world that many in the last two generations no longer recognize. This was true to a greater or lesser extent in all places we visited, but Poland was an exception in many ways. In fact, Soviet assimilation, collectivization of agriculture, and other totalitarian measures didn’t work with the Poles very well. It’s therefore no surprise that they led the purge of Communism in the 1980’s. This is part of the same resilience that caused them to persevere as a culture while not even being on the European map for 123 years. It’s no coincidence that the church remains strong here.

One final point. It was well noted that the Slovak Republic approved a flat income tax rate almost immediately upon achieving independence in 1993, and that their average annual per capita income has increased almost 450% since then. Poland and even Russia are currently considering the adoption of a flat tax. When will we learn?

Great trip, good to be back home, lots to be thankful for as Americans.

Michael Barone has it about right—so far we are witnessing a presidential campaign completely devoid of themes. As he characterizes it, neither party’s candidates have a convincing narrative.

I’m afraid that what we now see is what we’re going to get, and I am singularly unimpressed by the field in this possibly most important watershed election at least since 1980 and possibly since 1932. Come to think of it, we have had only two big narratives since 1932—the New Deal and winning World War II under FDR and rolling back the Great Society and winning the Cold War under Ronald Reagan. Neither narrative is relevant to 2008; unfortunately, many of the structures and worldviews put in place to deal with critical policy issues during those days are still in place. For the Democrats, continuing to demonize and run against George W. Bush will not be enough, and for the Republicans, the fear of Hillary Clinton as President alone will not be enough for them to prevail. Still, one year is a lifetime in politics, and there is plenty of time for many surprises and possibly even the development of a new narrative, although realistically, I am not optimistic. So far, the only public figure even close to articulating one has been Newt Gingrich, and the Republican candidates could benefit by taking a few pages from his book.

Shelby Steele calls him the “freest black man in America”, and the more I read of the life and worldview of Justice Clarence Thomas as reflected in his new book, My Grandfather’s Son and related interviews, the more I am convinced that he is correct in the purest sense of the word. Here is a man who has battled all the demons of growing up poor and black in the cauldron of the mid-20th century American South and the rage of the 1960’s and lived to be an embodiment of strength and courage of conviction in spite of a long list of grievances that might have withered smaller people. And the key to his perseverance was “the greatest man I have ever known”, his grandfather, whose example of character and hard work sustained over a lifetime became the beacon for his life as well as his judicial philosophy. Some reviewers of this book have been disappointed that it does not include more detailed analysis of his opinions and judicial philosophy, but I beg to differ. The arcane legal details are for another book, but there is no question about his worldview as a constitutional originalist and its source in the founding principles and documents of America, nor is there any doubt about the degree to which these natural law principles were manifest in the living example set by his grandfather.