February 2012 - Richard M. Langworth

Churchill as Racist: A Hard Sell

27 February 2012 Comments 2 Comments

Racist still? In “To See Humans’ Progress, Zoom Out” (The New York Times, 26 February 2012), Professor Steven Pinker asserts that for all their faults, educated people today are getting better:

Ideals that today’s educated people take for granted — equal rights, free speech, and the primacy of human life over tradition, tribal loyalty and intuitions about purity — are radical breaks with the sensibilities of the past. These too are gifts of a widening application of reason.

Fair enough, but to contrast what educated people were like in the bad old days, Prof.…

“An empty taxi arrived and Clement Attlee got out”

27 February 2012 Comments 2 Comments

Though it's all over the Internet, Churchill never said this about Clement Attlee, and quoting Churchill to this effect considerably misses his attitude toward political opponents. Queried about the remark, Churchill replied to the effect that Clement Attlee was an honorable and gallant gentleman and that he, Churchill, would deprecate any such remark.