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Conservatives’ Self-Delusion on Race

How the right created the illusion of colorblindness.
William Buckley stands behind a podium, surrounded by a throng of people, and waves.

The Real Bill Buckley

Even some liberals toasted William F. Buckley Jr. as a patrician gentleman. A long-awaited new biography corrects that record.
William F. Buckley reclines behind a desk, glasses in hand, a bulletin board of National Review magazine material behind him.

The Conservative Intellectual Who Laid the Groundwork for Trump

The political vision that William F. Buckley helped forge was—and remains today—focused less on adhering to principles and more on ferreting out enemies.
Photo of William F. Buckley Jr.

The Pen Is Mightier

Eight ways to understand the literary-political impact of William F. Buckley Jr.
Sen. Joe McCarthy confers with Roy Cohn during a hearing of the House Un-American Activities Committee.

A Not-So-Hostile Takeover

Long before the rise of Trump, the American conservative mainstream enjoyed a complex partnership with the Far Right.
William F. Buckley Jr. at a press conference.

An Implausible Mr. Buckley

A new PBS documentary whitewashes the conservative founder of National Review.
William F. Buckley Jr.

The Evolution of Conservative Journalism

From Bill Buckley to our 24/7 media circus.

The Spanish-Speaking William F. Buckley

Buckley’s seldom-acknowledged fluency in Spanish shaped his worldview—including his admiration for dictators from Spain to Chile and beyond.
John Birch Society banner over table with books

How the John Birch Society Won the Long Game

The American right doesn’t need the John Birch Society these days, but that is because it’s adopted the Birchers’ extremism wholesale.
A John Birch Society billboard in Stratton, Colorado, calls for the impeachment of Chief Justice Earl Warren, December 1962.

The Fringe Group That Broke the GOP’s Brain — And Helped It Win Elections

The John Birch Society pushed a darker, more conspiratorial politics in the ’50s and ’60s — and looms large over today’s GOP.
Pat Buchanan

Good Old Pat

Reflecting on Pat Buchanan's legacy.
Members of the John Birch Society pledging allegiance to the flag at a meeting, Chicago, 1961.

The Birchers & the Trumpers

A new biography of Robert Welch traces the origins and history of the anti-Communist John Birch Society and provides historical perspective on the Trump era.
Paul Ryan against a background of graph paper and a dotted line.

The Struggle for the Soul of the GOP

Is the Republican Party compatible with democracy?
Collage of William F. Buckley by Aaron Martin.

The Conservative and the Murderer

Why did William F. Buckley campaign to free Edgar Smith?
An illustration featuring Ronald Reagan, Donald Trump, and Marjorie Taylor Greene.

The John Birch Society Never Left

Why it’s foolish to think the modern GOP will ever break with its lunatic fringe.
Mitch McConnell wearing a mask
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McConnell’s Task: Purging the Crackpots and Bigots

The impeachment exposed the need for Republican leaders to banish the extremists and bigots from their movement.
Different colored pillars

The Capitol Riot Was an Attack on Multiracial Democracy

True democracy in America is a young, fragile experiment that must be defended if it is to endure.
Pat Buchanan surrounded by balloons at a campaign rally.

The Year the Clock Broke

How the world we live in already happened in 1992.

The Republican Tax Bill Is a Poison Pill That Kills the New Deal

Today’s Republicans would have fit right into Herbert Hoover’s administration.
Pete Seeger.

American Dreamers

Pete Seeger, William F. Buckley, Jr., and public history.
Abstract painting depicts faces staring at each other from either end of the canvas.

Bridging the Gap

A new book portrays five American historians who published popular books that sacrificed neither intellectual depth nor political bite.
William F. Buckley Jr. surrounded by piles of books in his office.

What Made William F. Buckley So Unusual

The author of a new biography talks about the conservative journalist’s life and legacy.
Photos of William F. Buckley and James Baldwin.

When William F. Buckley Jr. Met James Baldwin

In 1965, the two intellectual giants squared off in a debate at Cambridge. It didn’t go quite as Buckley hoped.
Chinese migrants wrapped in blankets on a beach, from the cover of "Camp of the Saints."
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Mutant Capitalism

How the dystopian visions of the nativist right are in keeping with a long tradition of neoliberal ideology.
Children peering through the fence around the white community near Johannesburg, South Africa in 1973.

American Conservatism's Home Grown Defenses of Apartheid

A long and ugly history.
William F. Buckley, Donald Trump.

The Modern Conservative Tradition and the Origins of Trumpism

Today’s Trumpist radicals are not (small-c) conservatives – but they stand in the continuity of Modern Conservatism’s defining political project.
College students studying in a campus lounge.

What the New Right Learned in School

Many of today's most influential right-wing tactics and arguments have their roots in 1960s-era college campuses.
Francisco Franco and Ronald Reagan in Madrid, 1972.

The Autocratic Allure

Why the far right embraces foreign tyrants.
A burning candle in front of the American flag.

The Origins of Conservatism’s ‘Gnostic’ Meme

You can thank Eric Voegelin for the right’s clichéd catchall critique for the left.
J. Edgar Hoover

How the FBI Aided the Rise of White Christian Nationalism in the US

It was J. Edgar Hoover who did more than any fire-breathing churchman to turn fearful white suburbanites into the crusaders of a renewed conservative backlash.

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