Michael Brendan Dougherty

Global capitalism talks about diversity and multiculturalism, but we are all modernizing toward conformity.

The people we miss around the table.

During a year in which it was an unrepentant geopolitical arsonist, China is emerging stronger than ever.

My Christmas time spent with Nat King Cole, G. K. Chesterton, and Mickey Mouse.

The sheer endlessness of this is mind-numbing.

So comes a close to five years of vain wishing.

Unlike most Republicans, Trump has done it. It’s a necessary first step. The next steps will be harder.

Why I’d be surprised, but not shocked, if Trump pulls off another upset victory.

The president’s notorious difficulties with recruiting and managing staff could become even worse if he’s reelected.

The next two debates will be better. They almost have to be.

By conceding RBG’s seat in a deal with Democrats, Republicans would have only perpetuated the morbid life of the anti-democratic progressive clerisy.

Shared sacrifice for the sake of others is a boon, but some varieties of nationalism are performative and selfish.

For many progressives, squaring up & beating Trump in an election isn’t enough. Instead Trump must be “toppled” somehow, preferably in a major confrontation.

The absolute vacuum in American politics is being filled by partisan rage.

Fraud, chaos, the end of the Republic?

Those conspiracy theorists who have clung to a stubborn faith in the president look set to soon find that he’s abandoned them in a world he hardly changed.

The president, faced with a true crisis, got bored.

The media has decided there’s more emotional satisfaction in failure than in performing the function with which the public entrusts it.

SCOTUS marks the ‘secular’ as a zone of taboo and superstition, and the Church as a refuge from ideological cant, metaphysical impossibility, and bullying.

Only a culture soaked in a belief in original sin can honor men for the good they did, for the events at which they were present.

Unlike his more hawkish advisers, the one bit of foreign-policy wisdom Trump has might be a form of self-awareness.

Brexit is proof that a democratic mandate can overturn the “inevitable.

Some of our responses to the pandemic and other crises echo the flagellant movement of the 14th century.

Increased funding has been key to the decades-long drop in our violent-crime rates.

Yesterday was the anniversary of his death by suicide. His model of curiosity and generosity is disappearing from the world when we need it.

Apparently, the social-distancing guidelines that were a matter of life and death yesterday can be disregarded today — for the right cause.