After liberalism | The Spectator

Epicenes and epicures

The last time I saw Paris, it was the early spring of 2017. A pallor hung over the city, the grands boulevards had lost their charm and downcast Parisians hurried about the streets with uncharacteristic alacrity. The day I arrived, a letter bomb exploded at the IMF’s headquarters on the Avenue d’Iéna, blocks away from where I was sitting on the terrace of a café on the Avenue Kléber. That the bomb turned out to be from Greek anarchists and not the usual Islamist suspects was little comfort; it had already ruined my café express. Two days later, a French-born Muslim took a female soldier hostage at Orly airport. A standoff ensued, with him holding a pistol to her head while her comrades aimed at his. ‘Put down your weapons!

Celia Walden

Celia Walden: the birth of ‘corona kissing’ in LA

Los Angeles If you want to know the general consensus on any given topic in LA, it’s not the cabbies you listen to, but the nail salon buzz. Everything from Michael Bloomberg’s failure in the presidential race and Russian collusion claims to coronavirus conspiracy theories gets thrashed out while women and men have their cuticles trimmed — because, unlike back home in the UK, bankers, bricklayers and Larry David will all come in for regular mani-pedis. As in a chamber of Congress — one offering $1-a-minute shoulder massages — there’s always a dominant topic, and right now it’s Meghan Markle. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been apologized to ‘for Meghan’ in LA nail salons over the past year.

Chilton Williamson, Jr.

No one in Jefferson’s day suspected the contradiction between commerce and education

Laramie, Wyoming Historians of democracy know that the phenomenon was built upon two principal social structures: bourgeois commerce and popular education. The first developed during the Middle Ages and grew until eventually it replaced war as the means by which states and individuals acquired wealth; the feudal class gave way to the bourgeoisie. The second developed in the late 18th and early 19th centuries in North America, the United States in particular. The two institutions were widely regarded as socially, morally, economically and politically complementary; necessary to the growth of a solid middle class, of capitalism and of republican government.

Digby Dent

A tale of three dogs

Florida Hullo, readers. I’m down Florida way for a bit of warm weather. The Bermuda Race Organizing Committee has been commandeered by a coterie of crapulous ingrates, leaving your correspondent on the outs. Nothing a little R&R can’t cure, but I’m sour. I hate trekking up to Newport for nothing. I’m in no mood for correspondence, but an interested reader inquired some days ago how I fell into journalism. I shall endeavor to answer. Stick me on a psychiatrist’s sofa and I’ll happily discuss my lifelong love of loquacity. It maddened Mother, who labeled me an ‘ecstatic’ child. She would be equal parts unsurprised and appalled by this hobby. Fortunately she doesn’t read this magazine.

Jeff Mills

Lure of the jungle

A short flight from the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur, the island of Langkawi is a wise choice for anyone seeking to shake off the woes of city life. Apart from the odd bit of tourist tackiness on roadside billboards, there’s no escaping the sheer, virtually unspoiled natural beauty of the place. Even my hotel, the Datai — which recently underwent a year-long, $60 million refurbishment — feels like a traditional rainforest villa. When I step out on to the veranda, I revel in the ancient jungle just beyond the sun loungers.

Bill Kauffman

The guns of Alexander

Batavia, New York I’m motoring down Route 98 on my yearly trek to the triannual Alexander Gun Show, held in the Alexander volunteer fireman’s hall. I’m croaking, blissfully off-key, to the music of Gram Parsons, the Florida trustfund Harvardian (one semester) who countrified the Byrds and sought to bring together hippies and rednecks and truck drivers and churchgoers and groovy chicks under his Cosmic American Music banner. It’s a dream still worth dreaming.

Life