Tag: Winston S. Churchill

Churchill and his Taxes: “Genius has many outlets”

Churchill and his Taxes: “Genius has many outlets”

Taxes and the Man

On the mat­ter of Churchill’s tax­es, a friend quotes a very good his­to­ri­an we both respect: “His rela­tion­ship with the tax­man was scan­dalous. As Chan­cel­lor of the Exche­quer, Churchill exploit­ed tax loop­holes and he retired as an author on more than one occa­sion to avoid pay­ing tax.”

My friend writes: “Sure­ly what Churchill did was just on the bor­der­line of tax-opti­miza­tion? It would only be scan­dalous if it was tax eva­sion. But it was in fact legal.”

I am not an expert on Churchill’s tax­es. I accept that he took what­ev­er mea­sures that were open and legal to min­i­mize the bite.…

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Churchill on the Optimist and the Pessimist

Churchill on the Optimist and the Pessimist

Opti­mist and Pes­simist: Fif­teen min­utes of fame! David Davis MP, Sec­re­tary of State for Brex­it, boots one in his recent speech and I’m final­ly in The Guardian. Prob­a­bly the first and last time, giv­en my opinions. **

Ques­tion: Refer­ring to your posts of quotations Churchill nev­er said, do you know who actu­al­ly did say “A pes­simist sees the dif­fi­culty in every oppor­tu­nity; an opti­mist sees the oppor­tu­nity in every dif­fi­cul­ty”? I find no attri­bu­tion oth­er than to Churchill.

Pessimist: Not Churchill’s Quip

Answer: Sor­ry. I can’t track it; nor can my col­league Ralph Keyes, edi­tor of The Quote Ver­i­fi­er.…

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Why the Turks Like Churchill

Why the Turks Like Churchill

"There is a long story of the friendly relations between Great Britain and Turkey. Across it is a terrible slash of the Great War, when German intrigues and British and Turkish mistakes led to our being on opposite sides. We fought as brave and honourable opponents. But those days are done, and we move forward into a world arrangement in which peaceful peoples will have a right to be let alone and in which all peoples will have a chance to help one another."

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The Anti-Semite was Diston, Not Churchill

The Anti-Semite was Diston, Not Churchill

.A life­long sup­port­er of Zion­ism and the Jews, Win­ston Churchill is some­times labeled an anti-Semi­te. The prof­fered evi­dence, an alleged arti­cle of his, has made the oblig­a­tory rounds of the Internet.

A 1937 arti­cle draft in the Churchill Archives sup­pos­ed­ly proves that Churchill’s off-expressed sym­pa­thy for the Jews was hypocrisy. Churchill was, if this arti­cle is to be believed, a clos­et anti-Semite.

Origins of a slur

The alle­ga­tions began with a 2007 arti­cle in Britain’s The Inde­pen­dent: “Uncov­ered: Churchill’s Warn­ings About the ‘Hebrew Blood­suck­ers.’”

The 1937 draft, “How the Jews Can Com­bat Per­se­cu­tion,” had “appar­ent­ly lain unno­ticed in the Churchill Archives at Cam­bridge since the ear­ly months of the Sec­ond World War,” stat­ed The Inde­pen­dent:

Churchill crit­i­cised the “aloof­ness” of Jew­ish peo­ple from wider soci­ety and urged them to make the effort to inte­grate themselves….Churchill…

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“Utmost Fish”: A Churchill Story that is No Old Cod

“Utmost Fish”: A Churchill Story that is No Old Cod

Q: What can you tell me about Churchill’s order for “Utmost Fish” in 1939. What did this have to do with his role as First Lord of the Admi­ral­ty?” —L.S, Spokane, Wash.

A: It had noth­ing to do with his role. It was char­ac­ter­is­tic of his atten­tion to detail, and will­ing­ness to stray out­side his limits.

“Utmost Fish”

Hills­dale College’s “The Churchill Doc­u­ments,” Vol. 14, for Sep­tem­ber 1939-May 1940, car­ries a rec­ol­lec­tion by Sir Geof­frey Shake­speare. Shake­speare (1893-1980) was a Lib­er­al MP, 1923-45. He served Churchill as Par­lia­men­tary Under-Sec­re­tary of State for Domin­ion Affairs from 1940 to 1942.…

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Churchill Qualities: Leadership, Judgment, Humanity

Churchill Qualities: Leadership, Judgment, Humanity

Qualities

Writ­ten for a col­league who asked var­i­ous con­trib­u­tors for 300 words on the qual­i­ties of Win­ston Churchill they most admire.

Leadership

Few great lead­ers are also great writ­ers; none who were both com­pare with Win­ston Churchill. In 1940 he saved civ­i­liza­tion by keep­ing Britain in the fight until those “who hith­er­to had been half blind were half ready.” His his­tor­i­cal and bio­graph­i­cal elo­quence won a Nobel Prize. Unique­ly for a politi­cian, he thought and wrote deeply about the nature of man. He hat­ed and tried to pre­vent war. He fought to pre­serve con­sti­tu­tion­al liberty.…

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“Churchill’s Unmerited Nobel Prize”

“Churchill’s Unmerited Nobel Prize”

Where do people get these false, sad notions? The ​late Harry Jaffa said it stems from a public appetite for articles which denigrate nobility or idealism​: "Young people are led to believe that to succeed in politics is to prove oneself a clever or lucky scoundrel. The detraction of the great has become a passion for those who cannot suffer greatness." Professor Jaffa said that thirty years ago. He hadn't seen anything yet.

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Fateful Questions: World War II Microcosm (2)

Fateful Questions: World War II Microcosm (2)

Fateful Questions

Fate­ful Ques­tions, Sep­tem­ber 1943-April 1944, nine­teenth of a pro­ject­ed twen­ty-three doc­u­ment vol­umes in the offi­cial biog­ra­phy, Win­ston S. Churchill, is reviewed by his­to­ri­an Andrew Roberts in Com­men­tary. 

These vol­umes com­prise “every impor­tant doc­u­ment of any kind that con­cerns Churchill.” The present vol­ume sets the size record. Fate­ful Ques­tions is 2,752 pages long, rep­re­sent­ing an aver­age of more than eleven pages per day. Yet at $60, it is a tremen­dous bar­gain. Order your copy from the Hills­dale Col­lege Book­store.

Here is an excerpt from my account, “Fresh His­to­ry,” which can be read in its entire­ty at the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project.

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Critique Down Under: Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel

Critique Down Under: Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel

Par­tic­u­lar­ly on the Fall of Sin­ga­pore (see ear­li­er post), a new cri­tique of Churchill miss­es the for­est for the trees and fails on the facts. Real­ly, Churchill made lots of mis­takes worth con­tem­plat­ing. But these aren’t among them.

The arti­cle appeared in south­west Australia’s Sun Coast Dai­ly on April 26th. Not exact­ly The Times, and if you don’t sub­scribe to Google Alerts you missed it. For the fun of shoot­ing fish in a bar­rel, how­ev­er, it’s worth a few min­utes of your time.

 

Critique 1: Self-Interest

“Churchill had a long and var­ied career in pol­i­tics, man­ag­ing to swap par­ties as his career needs required.” …

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75 Years On: What We Learn from the Fall of Singapore

75 Years On: What We Learn from the Fall of Singapore

This arti­cle first appeared as “Churchill and the Fall of Sin­ga­pore” in The Amer­i­can Spec­ta­tor, 22 Feb­ru­ary 2017.

“There is no worse mis­take in pub­lic lead­er­ship than to hold out false hopes soon to be swept away…peo­ple can face per­il or mis­for­tune with for­ti­tude and buoy­an­cy, but they bit­ter­ly resent being deceived or find­ing that those respon­si­ble for their affairs are them­selves dwelling in a fool’s par­adise.” —Win­ston S. Churchill, 1950

On the last day of Jan­u­ary, 1942, the British blew up Singapore’s cen­tral cause­way to the main­land in a vain attempt to stop the onrush­ing Japan­ese.…

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