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The hater always suffers more than the object of his hatred.
Bret Stephens -
I write my columns pretty carefully.
Bret Stephens
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Do I think police chiefs, many of which are African-American or Hispanic, wake up and say, 'Let's systemically oppress African-American communities?' No, I don't. Are there instances in which that happens? I'm sure there are.
Bret Stephens -
There was a time when the conservative movement was led by the likes of Bill Buckley and Irving Kristol and Bob Bartley, men of ideas who invested the Republican Party with intellectual seriousness.
Bret Stephens -
Censoriously asserting one's moral superiority and treating skeptics as imbeciles and deplorables wins few converts.
Bret Stephens -
Democrats should have learned in 2016 that what counts in American politics is location, not turnout.
Bret Stephens -
Humanitarianism is commendable, but not when you're demanding that others share the burdens and expense.
Bret Stephens -
Of course ABC and its parent company Disney were right to cancel the sitcom 'Roseanne' after its eponymous star, Roseanne Barr, wrote a racist tweet.
Bret Stephens
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People want leaders. Not ideologues. Not people whose life experiences have been so narrow that they've been able to maintain the purity of their youthful ideals. Not people whose principal contact with political life comes in the form of speeches and sound bites rather than decisions and responsibilities.
Bret Stephens -
The more Mr. Trump traduces the old established lines of decency, the more he affirms his supporters' most shameless ideological instincts.
Bret Stephens -
For the anti-Semite, the problems of the world can invariably be ascribed to the Jews; for the Communist, to the capitalists.
Bret Stephens -
The most interesting conversation is not about why Donald Trump lies. Many public figures lie, and he's only a severe example of a common type. The interesting conversation concerns how we come to accept those lies.
Bret Stephens -
My office-hour reading is fairly ad hoc: I generally read whatever seems relevant to what I'm editing, writing, or thinking about writing.
Bret Stephens -
Listen carefully to the global warming alarmists, and the main theme that emerges is that what the developed world needs is a large dose of penance. What's remarkable is the extent to which penance sells among a mostly secular audience. What is there to be penitent about?
Bret Stephens
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Free trade was once a Republican conviction.
Bret Stephens -
If a public figure tells a whopping lie once in his life, it'll haunt him into his grave. If he lies morning, noon and night, it will become almost impossible to remember any one particular lie.
Bret Stephens -
Among the events of John McCain's five-and-a-half years of imprisonment and torture in North Vietnam, probably the most heroic, and surely the most celebrated, was his refusal to accept an early release from his captors.
Bret Stephens -
Donald Trump is a demagogue. Period. The fervor of his crowds recalls Nasser's Egypt. His convictions are illiberal. His manners are disgusting. His temper is frightening.
Bret Stephens -
In place of presidential addresses, stump speeches, or town halls, we have Trump's demagogic mass rallies. In place of the usual jousting between the administration and the press, we have a president who fantasizes on Twitter about physically assaulting CNN.
Bret Stephens -
The United States survives so long as at least one of its major parties is politically and intellectually healthy. I don't think the Republican Party, or I should say the Republican Party as the vehicle for modern American conservative ideas, survives with Donald Trump.
Bret Stephens
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In every generation, there's a strong tendency for everyone to think like everyone else.
Bret Stephens -
Institutionalized racism is an imaginary enemy.
Bret Stephens -
Movements that hector and punish rather than educate and reform have a way of inviting derision and reaction.
Bret Stephens -
The criterion for racism is either objective or it's meaningless: If liberals get to decide for themselves who is or isn't a racist according to their political lights, conservatives will be within their rights to ignore them.
Bret Stephens