Annihilation is a disappointing swan song from Houellebecq, though. As many novelists do late in their careers, he tries to do too many things at once. Worth reading, but forgettable in a way his earlier work is not.

Yes. All of Houellebecq's novels seem to ask whether love is possible under conditions of nihilism and relativism. For the first time, in Annihilation, he seems to suggest that the answer is yes. Not entirely clear whether his heart is in it though.

People just say things.

Our greatest queen in terms of military glory and European dominance, via the sword of Marlborough, unsung Anne. Who also teaches a more complex lesson than Elizabeth I’s convenient founding fable of supposed English tolerance

Oh, interesting, the progs are embracing laissez faire economics and libertarian anti-welfare state policies.

Napoleon LARPed his whole life. The Founders were grade-A LARPers. Come to think of it, America is one extended LARP. You need to be LARP-maxxing.

The Protestant Work Ethic is a myth. The phenomenon in England and the Germanic countries long predated Luther and his theses.

The Musk Fellowship

Kawase Hasui’s brilliant woodblock prints. I can almost hear the birds of the shore and the night crickets.

In his memoirs, Nixon said Lee was one of the two most capable leaders he had ever met. The other? Charles De Gaulle. Nixon's high praise wasn't because Singapore at the time was rich. In 1970, the city state's per capita income was just ~$925 U.S. dollars - just a little

Very amusing that JFK gets all the style hype on here. This is the last real American aristocrat.

For the record, I dislike the politics of both. But if you’re going to aesthetically revere the WASPs, revere an actual WASP, dammit!

This is a great example of why T. Greer is right — WASP is a misleading term, it’s just an imperfect stand in for the Eastern Establishment. From which southerners are definitely excluded.

I like the idea that their grand conspiracy would hinge on buying off, of all people, Michael Tracey.

Patriot

In 1953, George and Barbara Bush lost their daughter Robin to leukemia. She was three years old. Barbara's hair turned white that year — she was 28. By anyone's expectation, mine included, their grief should have defined the rest of their lives. Instead they made a decision:

The blue button lets you feel morally superior while forcing everyone to risk death. The red button makes you feel bad but would, if everyone selected it, means nobody dies. Classic left/right divide. And of course blue wins, because people just want to feel nice.

Trying to imagine a weirder set of circumstances from POV of Henry VIII, Cranmer, Clement VII, Washington, Jefferson, Leo XIII, et al. than today, when an American Pope hosts British Archbishopess of Canterbury on same day as the American President hosts British King and Queen.