Author: Thomas Fleming

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Fleming / Free Content

3 Apr, 2019

St. Thomas Economicus

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Many libertarians and classical liberals regard St. Thomas Aquinas as one of the enemies of liberty, of economic liberty in particular.  According to these critics (and to some self-described Thomists, Thomas is supposed to have devised an abstract and systematic theory of an ideal state, which would have the power to regulate the marketplace by establishing a quasi-Marxian “just price” for all goods and by prohibiting all interest on investments.  This opinion of Thomas’s economic views is substantially wrong, both in the details and in its overall point of view.  Although Thomas was far from being a classical liberal, his...

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Feature / Fleming / From Under The Rubble

20 Mar, 2019

Two Oinks for Democracy, Conclusion: Dealing with Muslims

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Any honest evaluation of US foreign policy over the past 50 years would lead to one conclusion: Any effort to build a stable regime friendly to US interests will have to construct its programs on a population that has some understanding of the West and some institutions—religious or cultural—compatible with our own.  On this basis, we can appreciate at least one of the reasons why we have chosen Israel, for all the troubles this special relationship has cost us, to be the focus of our influence in the Middle East: Israel is a European colony in the Arab and Muslim...

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Fleming / On the House

18 Mar, 2019

Two Oinks for Democracy, Part I of II

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Over the years, much of our critique of American imperialism was made on the level of principle: Preemptive wars, inherently wrong in themselves, would eventually justify the militarization of American life and the final destruction of our constitutional order.  Reconstruction abroad, we argued, would inevitably justify reconstruction at home. 

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Feature / Fleming

12 Mar, 2019

Generations of Impotence, Conclusion: The Cruelty of Nerds

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Like so many modern American males, the Marquis de Sade was incapable of taking pleasure in the ordinary things of life.  Morally and intellectually feeble, he wallowed in fantasies of sexual violence.  The history of civilization might be written as a series of social inventions for the proper application of violence: boxing matches, duels, warfare.  When civilizations die, men cannot fall back on the killer instincts of barbarians who control their violence.  They are like the jackdaws studied by Konrad Lorenz:  Not genetically programmed to fight and kill, they do not have the ritual off-switch to stop violence, once it...