Along with his work at National Review, Sobran spent 21 years as a commentator on the CBS Radio "Spectrum" program series, and is still a syndicated columnist, first with the Los Angeles Times, and later with the Universal Press Syndicate. His newsletter is currently distributed by the Griffin Internet Syndicate, a public relations firm. Sobran wrote a column for the Catholic newsweekly The Wanderer entitled Washington Watch from 1986 to 2007. He also has a monthly column which appears in Catholic Family News. He writes the "Bare Bodkin" column for Chronicles. Sobran was named the Constitution Party's vice presidential nominee in 2000, but withdrew in April 2000 citing scheduling conflicts with his journalistic career[1]. In 2001 and 2003 Sobran spoke at conferences organized by Holocaust denier David Irving.[1] Holocaust denial movement sharing the podium with Sobran included Paul Fromm, Charles D. Provan, and Mark Weber, director of the Institute for Historical Review. In 2002 he spoke at the Institute for Historical Review's annual conference.[2]
On Jan 19, 1:26 pm, Bruce Majors <[email protected]> wrote: > where did he go afterwards > > On Tue, Jan 19, 2010 at 2:23 PM, plainolamerican > <[email protected]>wrote: > > > > > Sobran was fired from National Review in 1993 and was accused of being > > an anti-Semite (most notably by Jewish neoconservative writer Norman > > Podhoretz). Podhoretz wrote that "Joe Sobran's columns ... [are] anti- > > Semitic in themselves, and not merely 'contextually.'" Buckley > > disagreed with Podhoretz's accusation, noting that he "deemed Joe > > Sobran's six columns contextually anti-Semitic. By this I mean that if > > he had been talking, let us say, about the lobbying interests of the > > Arabs or of the Chinese, he would not have raised eyebrows as an anti- > > Arab or an anti-Chinese."[3] > > > On Jan 19, 7:12 am, "M. Johnson" <[email protected]> wrote: > > > The Reluctant Anarchistby Joseph Sobran > > > My arrival (very recently) at philosophical anarchism has disturbed some > > of my conservative and Christian friends. In fact, it surprises me, going as > > it does against my own inclinations. > > > As a child I acquired a deep respect for authority and a horror of chaos. > > In my case the two things were blended by the uncertainty of my existence > > after my parents divorced and I bounced from one home to another for several > > years, often living with strangers. A stable authority was something I > > yearned for. > > > Meanwhile, my public-school education imbued me with the sort of > > patriotism encouraged in all children in those days. I grew up feeling that > > if there was one thing I could trust and rely on, it was my government. I > > knew it was strong and benign, even if I didn't know much else about it. The > > idea that some people – Communists, for example – might want to overthrow > > the government filled me with horror. > > > G.K. Chesterton, with his usual gentle audacity, once criticized Rudyard > > Kipling for his "lack of patriotism." Since Kipling was renowned for > > glorifying the British Empire, this might have seemed one of Chesterton's > > "paradoxes"; but it was no such thing, except in the sense that it denied > > what most readers thought was obvious and incontrovertible. > > > Chesterton, himself a "Little Englander" and opponent of empire, > > explained what was wrong with Kipling's view: "He admires England, but he > > does not love her; for we admire things with reasons, but love them without > > reason. He admires England because she is strong, not because she is > > English." Which implies there would be nothing to love her for if she were > > weak. > > > Of course Chesterton was right. You love your country as you love your > > mother – simply because it isyours,not because of its superiority to others, > > particularly superiority of power. > > > This seems axiomatic to me now, but it startled me when I first read it. > > After all, I was an American, and American patriotism typically expresses > > itself in superlatives. America is the freest, the mightiest, the richest, > > in short thegreatestcountry in the world, with the greatest form of > > government – the most democratic. Maybe the poor Finns or Peruvians love > > their countries too, but heaven knows why – they have so little to be proud > > of, so few "reasons." America is also the mostenviedcountry in the world. > > Don't all people secretly wish they were Americans? > > > That was the kind of patriotism instilled in me as a boy, and I was quite > > typical in this respect. It was the patriotism of supremacy. For one thing, > > America had never lost a war – I was even proud that America had created the > > atomic bomb (providentially, it seemed, just in time to crush the Japs) – > > and this is why the Vietnam war was so bitterly frustrating. Not the dead, > > but the defeat! The end of history's great winning streak! > > > As I grew up, my patriotism began to take another form, which it took me > > a long time to realize was in tension with the patriotism of power. I became > > a philosophical conservative, with a strong libertarian streak. I believed > > in government, but it had to be "limited" government – confined to a few > > legitimate purposes, such as defense abroad and policing at home. These > > functions, and hardly any others, I accepted, under the influence of writers > > like Ayn Rand and Henry Hazlitt, whose books I read in my college years. > > > Though I disliked Rand's atheism (at the time, I was irreligious, but not > > anti-religious), she had an odd appeal to my residual Catholicism. I had > > read enough Aquinas to respond to her Aristotelian mantras. Everything had > > to have its own nature and limitations, including the state; the idea of a > > state continually growing, knowing no boundaries, forever increasing its > > claims on the citizen, offended and frightened me. It could only end in > > tyranny. > > > I was also powerfully drawn to Bill Buckley, an explicit Catholic, who > > struck the same Aristotelian note. During his 1965 race for mayor of New > > York, he made a sublime promise to the voter: he offered "the internal > > composure that comes of knowing there are rational limits to politics." This > > may have been the most futile campaign promise of all time, but it would > > have won my vote! > > > It was really this Aristotelian sense of "rational limits," rather than > > any particular doctrine, that made me a conservative. I rejoiced to find it > > in certain English writers who were remote from American conservatism – > > Chesterton, of course, Samuel Johnson, Edmund Burke, George Orwell, C.S. > > Lewis, Michael Oakeshott. > > > In fact I much preferred a literary, contemplative conservatism to the > > activist sort that was preoccupied with immediate political issues. During > > the Reagan years, which I expected to find exciting, I found myself bored to > > death by supply-side economics, enterprise zones, "privatizing" welfare > > programs, and similar principle-dodging gimmickry. I failed to see that > > "movement" conservatives were less interested in principles than in > > Republican victories. To the extent that I did see it, I failed to grasp > > what it meant. > > > Still, the last thing I expected to become was an anarchist. For many > > years I didn't even know that serious philosophical anarchists existed. I'd > > never heard of Lysander Spooner or Murray Rothbard. How could society > > survive at all without a state? > > > Now I began to be critical of the US Government, though not very. I saw > > that the welfare state, chiefly the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal, > > violated the principles of limited government and would eventually have to > > go. But I agreed with other conservatives that in the meantime the urgent > > global threat of Communism had to be stopped. Since I viewed "defense" as > > one of the proper tasks of government, I thought of the Cold War as a > > necessity, the overhead, so to speak, of freedom. If the Soviet threat ever > > ceased (the prospect seemed remote), we could afford to slash the military > > budget and get back to the job of dismantling the welfare state. > > > Somewhere, at the rainbow's end, America would return to her founding > > principles. The Federal Government would be shrunk, laws would be few, taxes > > minimal. That was what I thought. Hoped, anyway. > > > I avidly read conservative and free-market literature during those years > > with the sense that I was, as a sort of late convert, catching up with the > > conservative movement. I took it for granted that other conservatives had > > already read the same books and had taken them to heart. Surely we all > > wanted the same things! At bottom, the knowledge that there were rational > > limits to politics. Good old Aristotle. At the time, it seemed a short hop > > from Aristotle to Barry Goldwater. > > > As is fairly well known by now, I went to work as a young man for Buckley > > atNational Reviewand later became a syndicated columnist. I found my niche > > in conservative journalism as a critic of liberal distortions of the US > > Constitution, particularly in the Supreme Court's rulings on abortion, > > pornography, and "freedom of expression." > > > Gradually I came to see that the conservative challenge to liberalism's > > jurisprudence of "loose construction" was far too narrow. Nearly everything > > liberals wanted the Federal Government to do was unconstitutional. The key > > to it all, I thought, was the Tenth Amendment, which forbids the Federal > > Government to exercise any powers not specifically assigned to it in the > > Constitution. But the Tenth Amendment had been comatose since the New Deal, > > when Roosevelt's Court virtually excised it. > > > This meant that nearly all Federal legislation from the New Deal to the > > Great Society and beyond had been unconstitutional. Instead of fighting > > liberal programs piecemeal, conservatives could undermine the whole lot of > > them by reviving the true (and, really, obvious) meaning of the > > Constitution. Liberalism depended on a long series of usurpations of power. > > > Around the time of Judge Robert Bork's bitterly contested (and defeated) > > nomination to the US Supreme Court, conservatives spent a lot of energy > > arguing that the "original intent" of the Constitution must be conclusive. > > But they applied this principle only to a few ambiguous phrases and passages > > that bore on specific hot issues of the day – the death penalty, for > > instance. About thegeneralmeaning of the Constitution there could, I > > thought, be no doubt at all. The ruling principle is that whatever the > > Federal Government isn't authorized to do, it's forbidden to do. > > > That alone would invalidate the Federal welfare state and, in fact, > > nearly all liberal legislation. But I found it hard to persuade most > > conservatives of this. Bork himself took the view that the Tenth Amendment > > was unenforceable. If he was right, then the whole Constitution was in vain > > from the start. > > > I never thought a constitutional renaissance would be easy, but I did > > think it could play an indispensable role in subverting the legitimacy of > > liberalism. Movement conservatives listened politely to my arguments, but > > ... > > read more »
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