Yesterday marked the centennial of Calvin Coolidge’s swearing in as president. Phillip Linderman has marked the occasion for us with a call to consider and emulate the taciturn man’s many virtues. Coolidge paired an understanding of the latest technologies and cultural trends with a commitment to principle and character. He held more in-person press conferences than any president before or since, and, in fifty radio broadcasts, it was he, not FDR, who pioneered speaking directly to the American people. From war to immigration, the Great Refrainer has things to teach us, and: “During his six years in the White House, he reduced the national debt by about a third, cut federal spending, and balanced the budget each year of his administration, a record unmatched by any president since.”

The latest indictment of Donald Trump has the country digging into entrenched epistemic battle lines. Few by now can fail to know where they stand, and new developments change little. But however above or below board you think the 2020 election was, as managing editor Jude Russo reminded readers in his column this week, it is an incontrovertible fact that President Trump shifted the discourse on a host of political questions, apparently permanently. Now both parties are preoccupied with China, trade, and industrial policy; we are out of Afghanistan; and the electorate continues to demand its representatives do something about the crisis at our southern border. In all that, at least, Trump won.

And he is winning the Republican primary so far, handily. Sohrab Ahmari summarized the state of play in a column Tuesday. In particular, he looked at why Ron DeSantis’s campaign has faltered in its attempt to give voters Trumpism without Trump. In Ahmari’s telling, DeSantis’s attempts at conveying both populist mojo and the competence and discipline he brought to his Florida governorship has failed because, with a mixed or weak message on foreign wars and protecting Social Security, he has focused his campaign on issues the proverbial base cares little about.

Best,
Micah Meadowcroft
Web Editor

―St. Augustine

George Washington’s Commitment to Human Dignity

Alexandra Hudson