God Save the Capitol

How a Cold War Spiritual Arms Race Led to the Jan. 6 Plot to Overthrow the Government

“I am here by special divine appearance, a living soul,” Pauline Bauer stated in federal court this summer while standing trial for crimes including violent entry. “I do not stand under the law. Under Genesis 1, God gave man dominion over the law.”

Bauer and some of her fellow Jan. 6, 2021 rioters have testified that they were divinely inspired to participate in insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. They carried crosses and religiously themed posters and participated in a prayer on the Senate floor. Testifying to a congressional committee a few …

by Terry Shoemaker | January 5, 2022

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America’s Shortest Founding Father Knew How to Save Our Big, Corrupt Republic

James Madison’s Call for a ‘Defensive Concert’ Against Political Factions and Careerism Resonates Today

by Stephen Erickson | January 3, 2022

One of the many law firms advertising in my part of Florida proclaims on a big billboard: “Size matters.” The crude innuendo is by now old and hackneyed. But America’s …

Why Do We Count Down to the New Year?

How the Doomsday Clock, a German Sci-Fi Film, and Dick Clark Got Us to ‘5-4-3-2-1’

by Alexis McCrossen | December 27, 2021

Few people counted down to anything until the 1960s and 1970s—and yes, that included the new year. Celebrations and midnight kisses on December 31, of course. Countdowns, no. How, then, …

Theater Understands Your Holiday Dinner Angst

Family Tables, Real and Imagined, Serve Up ‘Birthrights, Grudges, Feuds, Illicit Unions, and Deeply Buried Secrets’

by Oliver Mayer | December 23, 2021

This is the time of year when families come together, crossing county and state lines and national borders, traversing bodies of water and mountain ranges that made cannibals of our …

Why Ewe Eat Lamb on Holidays (but Not the Rest of the Year)

A Brief History of Sheep On—but Mostly off—the American Table

by IKER SAITUA | December 20, 2021

The United States doesn’t eat much sheep. In 2020, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Economic Research Service, Americans consumed less than one pound of lamb or mutton (the …

How Everyday Britons Forced Their Government to Save Itself

During the 1832 “Days of May,” Citizens Threatened Outright Revolution Until Parliament Passed a Landmark Bill

By Tom Zoellner | December 16, 2021

The legislature had ground to a standstill on countless issues of national import. Special-interest dark money poured freely into the legislative process, and the public could never be sure whose …

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