But if you’re joining me in The Discourses I’ve started it.

A note to those of you still reading The Prince or wanting to read it, I will still cover it. Likely I’m going to make a video on one of the chapters this week, I believe chapter 15. And The Discourses expands the concepts introduced in The Prince, so much of what’s discussed from The Discourses will apply.

The Discourses is a sizable book. It will take some time to go through. Do not worry about reading speed or falling behind. Chew what bites you can, enjoy what bites you can, and any analysis, observations, understandings, struggles, or questions, feel free to mention in the chat or in the comments.

Also, last week’s livestream was stellar. You can watch th…

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Livestream

This week, Friday, April 3rd, I’m going to do a Livestream right here on Substack.

If you can join me live, I would love to have you on. It looks like I can now host live via my desktop, I hope it’s a smooth experience. Come on, ask some questions, share some observations, or anything Machiavelli you got go right ahead.

If you can or cannot make it — questions or observations you’d like answered or addressed, go ahead and share those either by commenting here below or sharing it in the chat thread.

Schedule

Right now, I’m on Chapter 15. I’m changing my reading schedule a bit this week to get an hour on certain mornings. So I might make easy work of the rest of The Prince. If you’re planning to join me on the Discourses, let’s plan Monday, April 6th as the start. But I will still be…

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With Machiavelli, it was the modern experience — he speaks of hs lunga esperienza delle cose moderne in his Dedicatory Letter to The Prince (written in 1513) — that found its own expression. In Machiavelli modernity found an interpretation of itself that determined the orientation of the European mind, and hence European political history, from that moment on.

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As I said in the video, he and Pierre Manent arrive at the same conclusions, and often through the same pathways, despite Manent and Grafton holding different worldviews. To me, with vetted thinkers like this, that same conclusion offers weight to both, and means we should take what they say with gravity and it’s a worthwhile compass to help us grasp, understand, and enjoy The Prince.

Here are some passages I believe relevant to the introduction, and passages that will help us tackle this iconic work.

From: Natural Law and Human Rights: Toward a Recovery of Human Reason, Pierre Manent

These are curated from the introduction by Daniel J. Mahoney:

It wads the classics and the Christians who defended “reflective choice” and “free will,” the preconditions of all meaningful action. By contrast, Machiavelli, writing at the dawn of modernity, substituted a theoretical perspective on action that eclipsed the agent’s poin…

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Some of you are joining me for The Prince, some for The Discourses and some for both. Again, no need to be reading along to engage in the topic of Machiavelli. This is open to all paying members. If you have questions, you can ask in the comments, you can ask in the dedicated chat thread, or you can ask on the livestream videos.

I’m starting The Prince today. As I discussed in the video I sent the other day, I will engage with the introduction, and will do a video on it. Those of you reading The Prince, please do offer your analysis and walkaway from the introduction. An introduction to a work like this sets a tone. Good introductions, and hopefully this one is good, give signposts, questions and ideas to look for, and some under…

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That the “ideological” project to replace the only human condition we know with a utopian “Second Reality” oblivious to — indeed at war with — the deepest wellsprings of human nature and God’s creation has taken on renewed virulence in the late modern world, just thirty-five years after the glorious anti-totalitarian revolutions of 1989.

The Persistence of the Ideological Lie: The Totalitarian Impulse Then and Now, Daniel J. Mahoney

Modern political discourse is many things, but a commonality is each side believes the other to be crazy. That’s a given. Political disagreements have always occurred, and past discourse wasn’t as civil as people envision, yet the internet has made politics far more divisive by fueling the innate impulse of tribalism. The Left, whether legacy media, institutions such as hospitals or schools, or individuals, wears its politics on its sleeve to signal a self-believed and self-appointed moral rectitude while claiming it isn’t politics but rather that it’s being a good person. But they posture their beliefs, perhaps more so, to display loyalty because, as Daniel J. Mahoney succinctly states in his latest work, “Progressive Ideology requires absolute fealty to the cause.” The Right, on the whole, is less keen on performative public displays given elements of the right-leaning nature, and those who do display it display it more along the vibes of exasperated 1980s punk rockers going against the approved grains of institutions since Progressive ideology crowded itself into every corner of life from Catholic leaders, local coffee shops, movies, hospital patient forms, and on and on the list goes.

So while it’s not new that the other side thinks the other is crazy, here is a reality of one side:

• Can’t define what a woman is

• Believes sex isn’t determined at birth but is an identity picked by the individual and the individual can choose from over 74 choices of genders or from an infinite spectrum

• Has infiltrated institutions best exemplified by the Language Games

• That America’s founding was purely racist, and that the slaves in America freed themselves from slavery

• That the Revolutionary War was fought to keep slavery

• That the laws of this country were set up to favor wealthy white men

• That there is no true good or bad and that it’s relative and subjective

• That human rights should define laws and anything pertaining to natural law must be supplanted by these rights

• That a school curriculum including LGBTQIA curricula, 1619 Project and or Southern Poverty Law Center History Curricula, Marxism good capitalism bad curricula, and teachers walking out on classes to protest ICE is not at all political or politics, and saying anything otherwise is political

• That equity can be attained in society without consequence and disparities in outcome reveal systemic issues such as racism, misogyny, privilege, so on and so forth.

• That 2+2=5

This side does live in a Second Reality, and this side demands uniformity. Not everyone on the Left holds those convictions, but if put on national television, 99% would almost certainly parrot them for fear of being canceled and outcast. I’ve been told that the other side thinks that I’m crazy, that my side lives in a Second Reality, but I and others on the Right can tell you what a woman is; I can tell you that the Revolutionary War was not fought to keep slavery, and, while no math whiz, I can take two apples and know that if I add two more apples I would then have four apples.

The ideological conviction of the Left poses profound concerns for our country. And Daniel J. Mahoney’s The Persistence of the Ideological Lie: The Totalitarian Impulse Then and Now is a work of penetrating cultural analysis and penetrating political philosophy. The work articulates the philosophy and nature of Progressive Ideology, the influences, why it’s a conviction for those with that worldview, and the totalitarian consequences of that worldview.

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Quick Background Mahoney

Daniel J. Mahoney is a conservative intellectual, has published multiple books, and is a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute and a senior writer at Law and Liberty. His writings make frequent appearances in The Claremont Review of Books and The New Criterion. His specialty is political philosophy, and the politics, philosophy, and art of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. His mastery is his ability to analyze the background of political worldviews, categorize without generalizations, and then unveil the arguments, positions, and influence of these worldviews. He does this whether it’s the statesmanship of Abraham Lincoln or the racist concepts of Nikole Hannah-Jones of the 1619 project. He’s heady; he introduces topics requiring a look-up and consideration, but spending time with him sharpens perspective. His observations are astute, thought-provoking, and pragmatic.

The Persistence of the Ideological Lie guides the reader through epistemological analysis of ideology, how it’s playing out today, the tools and concepts used to force this ideology onto individuals, and the various defenses that warn or nobly fight against this ideological and totalitarian wave.

The Enemy of Reality

We live in an age of enforced uniformity, prosecuted in the name of preserving “our democracy” and keeping “disinformation” and “Far Right” lies at bay. 

The relativists, the postmodernists, the Leftists, the boomer Liberal aunt who protested at No Kings, have won institutions. It’s difficult to tell whether elected Democrats or an institution like the New York Times is obeying or commanding constituents—a Hobbesian feature of the Left. Who commands whom and who obeys whom, but one thing is for certain, the moralizing cause must be adhered to and followed by all because the grand goal is uniformity. Mahoney details what comprises and what’s behind those Instagram stories sharing memes telling us that —almost always a white liberal woman—Trump voters should have apologized before but can apologize now for whatever reason is going on in the world. Or in more recent events, how journalists demanded apologies from players on the United States Hockey team for talking to Donald Trump, demanding the playings to apologize for saying they were proud to be Americans after the win, and to apologize and reflect for laughing at a natural, good-natured girls-versus-boys joke Trump made. The latter here is a result of what Mahoney labels the “information oligarchy.” That one side, Liberals, which now run the majority of mainstream media and academia and so on, have certain narratives, certain information, which they deem morally pure and right. Even though much of it is baloney and ludicrous, Leftists demand that everyone must fall in line with these narratives.

The Left has a preferred name for this: those who resist the pressure of intellectual conformity, of stifling political correctness, are “enemies of democracy.” 

Today, at a more local and personal level, if a parent questions the curriculum, particularly something like the 1619 Project curriculums in schools, those parents are cast as political, racist, backwards, and stupid. Those parents are not falling in line. The most common example of this demanded uniformity is seen with the phenomenon of Trump Derangement Syndrome, aka TDS. Mahoney does a remarkable job of giving oomph to TDS, a term lobbied around by many but often without the philosophical depth Mahoney provides. Mahoney expands that behind TDS we find the Enemy of Reality. The Enemy of Reality has a distinct background of Marx, Robespierre, critical theorists, and so on—the Enemy of Reality demands that you buy narratives and lies wholesale and any criticism of it means you’re an enemy of democracy. For instance, for the majority of modern liberals, politicians to your neighbor, if Trump is for anything they are reflexively against it, whatever it is. They, in fact, become unglued. One can peruse social media and see someone in an unglued rage saying if any of their followers voted for Trump then to unfollow them immediately (this is also done by the person to display fealty to the Progressive cause). Or one can look at former “conservative” writers like Bill Kristol or David French. If Trump takes a position, French and Kristol immediately take the opposite position, even if they made a career of defending that position for decades, they’re now hardline against it. One not need look further than Kristol’s The Bulwark which is built on a fanatical mission to express Trump Derangement Syndrome. Regardless whether it’s your neighbor or Ilhan Omar, Trump Derangement Syndrome has played out by allowing outright lies of Trump to be expressed as truths with total impunity, such as Trump is a pedophile, Russian Collusion, or less so Trump, that America is the most racist country in the world.

If one zooms out, TDS represents a greater concern:

A moment of reflection suggests that a precondition for being politically correct today is to parrot one untruth after another, while immediately and often cruelly castigating those who refuse to deny their rational judgment and moral good sense. Political correctness can justly be called systematic and coercive mendacity at work. Whatever it is, it is hardly “scientific” or self-evident. 

A factor of this Enemy of Reality is our own reflectiveness. The West has a feature of reflectiveness, a feature of Aristotle’s Reflective Choice and Christianity’s concept of free will.1 Yet as is natural for certain dispositions, especially those who reject Judeo-Christian worldviews, that reflectiveness morphed past guilt for past mistakes and into pure nihilism and self-loathing.

Today, what comes first is Western self-loathing, the obscene conviction that the Western world, and it alone, is the source of colonialism, slavery, racism, injustice, totalitarianism, and economic exploitation.

Mahoney analyzes the infamous but widely accepted as truth inside institutions: Postcolonial Ideology. As quoted above, the postmodernist, or, in reality, the Marxist position has been digested into the masses as ideological clichés. For instance, countries in Africa are failing because of American imperialism or colonialism, not because of their instability, culture, and corruptness. All that’s put forth from these clichés is how awful America is on a global scale. It’s repeated ad nauseam and taken as fact. Another example, that Cuba’s issues are a result of American embargo, as Mahoney points out, and not its communist government. Most ignore that before Castro, in 1959, Cuba was the fourth most prosperous country in the Americas and enjoyed a thriving middle class.2

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The Background of The Enemy: The Influences, The Voices, Where Did it Come From 

How and why did the Progressive posture come to wield such force and influence in our world? How did it become the worldview of such a large population? And why does it hold such a grip over institutions, even institutions at its core opposed to it such as Christian institutions?

Common answers to this are steeped in recency bias. Most look to the Covid shutdowns of 2020 and the summer BLM riots. Nearly overnight companies, people, and so on suddenly and intensely expressed the views of Progressive Ideology. What was two years prior never considered a “right” such as trans rights was now a “right” required to save democracy and to end the genocide against trans people. Just as it was believed that cops were killing thousands of blacks each year, a lie still postulated with impunity.

But it’s not recent; it goes back a long way. 2020 put woke despotism into the spotlight, but it was not an overnight success as Mahoney carefully details. One such step in woke despotism becoming mainstream resulted from constant wins with language, what’s also called The Language Game by Mahoney, and others such as David Mamet. This is also known as political correctness. A simple history: consider the journey to “the unhoused.” What was once vagrant, bum, and hobo became judgmental and triggering to some. It then became homeless, and then homeless became triggering and now it is “unhoused.” The “unhoused” are claimed to be victims of capitalism and some are suffering a mental health crisis due to “global warming.” (A cliche taken as fact by many living in the Denver area).

A clear example of the Language Game which comprises both Mahoney’s Enemy of Reality and a Culture of Repudiation are the forms now standard at hospitals. Where it’s no longer “man or woman” but chosen identity and beyond. For example, at a pediatrics office in Denver, here are the forms for a newborn provided by the massive company Athena:

That form is for newborns and up to two years old. Note how no other option exists; you must adhere to it and if you deny it or at least reasonably want a basic “male/female” form it means you’re being political and, likely, “an enemy of democracy.” The goal of the language game is to have everyone fall into line.

The fevered politics of purity and perfection are in every respect an enemy of the good, of mutual respect, and of shared liberty under the rule of law. If we don’t recognize this elementary truth, and soon, we shall surely lose our civilizational soul and perhaps our freedoms, too.

Mahoney argues that we must reject wholesale, in our daily lives and on a bigger scale, the Language Games and Culture of Repudiation which have permeated institutions, and our daily lives; he argues that we must create a parallel polis which is something those inside the Soviet Union did to work towards liberty. A great example of this, as Mahoney argues, is the Barney Initiative by Hillsdale College. It’s a charter school featuring a classical curriculum. One could argue that TPUSA tried this at the Super Bowl halftime, the debate whether it was worth it or not could go on for days, but it is still an attempt, and an admirable one. We see more and more parents doing homeschooling, we see people flocking to red states, we see a rise in the interest in traditional Catholicism among young men. If some of these catch on like how the Barney Initiative has (and Christian Classical Education), then it gives life to counter the politics of purity and perfection of the Left.

The parallel polis fights:

Ideological Manichaeism, the temptation of ideologues and revolutionaries everywhere to localize evil and see its embodiment in suspect groups, whose elimination (or even “cancellation”) will lead the world forward to revolutionary bliss. We witnessed this mechanism at work in the totalitarian regimes and ideologies that gave rise to death camps, gulags, and killing fields. We see the same impulse at work in the coercive virtue signaling that is the specialty of the woke.

Two common claims stemming from the fear that we’re totally lost today, especially from right-leaning people, are that we’re either like German culture post World War I which led to the Third Reich or we’re like the degenerate periods of the Roman Empire. Historical ignorance and a lack of perspective inform both claims; our modern day rhymes more with the ideologues of the French Revolution from 1789–1793, particularly the fanaticism of Maximilien Robespierre. We see the same demands of Progressive purity, fealty to the Progressive posture, and the same terror towards those who disobey. One need not look further than the riots against ICE along with the mayors and governors pushing neo-Confederacy policies to diminish ICE and resist the Trump administration, those celebrating the death of Charlie Kirk, or the nurses who go on TikTok and push for poisoning or giving terrible care to MAGA supporters.

Dostoyevski/Burke Warnings and Pathways Out

This moralistic fanaticism, this moral inversion, is, as Mahoney calls it, toxic nihilism. The ideal of communism was proven bust by the Soviet Union. And that totalitarian state, that communist ideal, was toppled in 1989 to the jubilation of millions. But the lessons of that regime, the lessons we were supposed to carry forward are all but forgotten by many. The claim goes, real socialism was never tried. And that in the experiment of real socialism, people still see the ideal. That somehow from the failed experiment of it the ideal still exists, and as Pierre Manent argues, how are we to know what life is like if everyone conforms to this ideal, which was tried before?

And we see this moral fanaticism, this moral inversion, this toxic nihilism everywhere. It’s in school boards, it’s in local HOAs, it’s inescapable in certain areas, particularly blue states. Is there a way out?

Mahoney argues that there is. His answers come from the warnings of Edmund Burke and from Fyodor Dostoyevski. From Burke, looking at the fanaticism of our modern day, and rejecting it wholesale when we encounter it. Rejection not in the manner of the “Right Retreat” but in the manner of courage and moderation. Courage here could be as simple as refusing to fill out nonsensical forms to speaking up at school boards. Moderation is understanding that a parallel polis is required not an outright revolution. Build and fan the flames of those working to bring light. With Dostoyevski, it’s finding the moral compass again, it’s finding the moral order of Judeo-Christian values, particularly Christian with Dostoyevski, and to have that guide us. That our way out is at the individual level and at the metaphysical level, and Mahoney makes a compelling case.

The work is penetrating, concerning, and heady. Penetrating in the manner of how Mahoney can summarize with exhaustive depth. You get the whole picture and the steps forward. The heady element: Mahoney is an intellectual, he’s well-read, and his choice of words, his dropping of various philosophers and concepts, will require most readers to look things up. Which makes for good, deliberate reading if you’re willing to engage with the work—which is worth engaging.

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A Grounding of Worldview

This work resonated with me. 2020 was a cornerstone year for me metaphysically. I came home to values and it hit fast and hard. Since then, I’ve looked around the corners of my worldviews, opinions, convictions, and spirituality. I wanted answers, and the search opened up a lot to me, got me in front of various thinkers and concepts, and gave me further convictions. This work contributed to my worldview, contributed to my political nature, contributed to a return home to my Catholic faith.

But the bigger resonation is various personal experiences affected by the concepts Mahoney analyzes, affected by toxic nihilism, affected by a culture of repudiation, affected by displays of Progressive moral rectitude, and affected by those who demanded intellectual conformity to the Progressive posture. For instance, when my wife and I began dating in 2022, my wearing my conservatism on my sleeve cost her her social circles. She was on a journey herself to her conservative and Catholic values but kept it to herself. Whereas her friends looked up my social media, and many told her, quite explicitly, how awful I was, and that she needed to leave me immediately because I supported Trump. They told her, without having met me, that I was racist, sexist, physically abusive, would oppress her creativity, and a downright awful human being. A psychiatrist in this group demanded she leave me, saying women must stay away from Republicans, Conservatives, as we’re toxic, violent, racist, and low IQ. Her staying with me, they one by one kicked her out of the social circle. One of these friends, recently, stood in line at a coffee shop for over three hours to get a “fuck ICE” cappuccino.

I’ve gotten nasty looks from eavesdroppers when I mentioned I voted for Trump or something conservative—a group of women in one place got up and left and went to another table, huffing and puffing along the way. Progressivism marinates Denver. Go into a local coffee shop and one is confronted instantly with the ideological fanaticism and its rules.

Mahoney gave me further understanding on why this is, and further depth to my courage and conviction to reject it wholesale when I encounter it. And how to reject it from a place of depth, not reflexiveness. Mahoney also helped me understand the disposition and the nature of the women who ejected my wife from their social circles, and of the skinny-armed men still donning a mask in 2026 while driving their cars.

Who Would Like It

Mahoney is heady. A dictionary and some lookups on Grok to understand various elements will be necessary for most readers. But he’s worth reading, he’s worth spending time with. He also will send curious readers down rabbit holes of books to read; I added a few to my Amazon lists.

Man has a political nature. I argue that it’s worth it for anyone to spend time to grasp their worldview and why they hold the positions, form the opinions, and have connections with certain people and ideas. That’s why Mahoney is a must-read for serious thinkers on the Right. He takes the red meat and dissects it to the grass the cow grazed on and in the method it was led to graze by the rancher and why the rancher does what he does. He also does this on the other side; he likely has read more of the basis of the worldview of Progressives and Democrats than the Democrats in Congress and Senate combined. Which gifts Mahoney, a man of intellectual gifts, penetrating insight and gifts readers an excellent analysis of either side. Which makes him worth the time. The book is short, but spending time with it, looking up what you don’t know, rereading a few passages here and there, makes him worth it.

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The bookclub is about to begin.

For anyone new, my official bookclub is launching. The first topic: Machiavelli. It’s open to all paying members and it’s required to read either of the works.

This week I’m preparing.

I just went through Ritchie Robertson’s The Enlightenment. Robertson is an Enlightenment scholar, and while no specific chapter is devoted to Machiavelli, I looked through to see the Machiavelli influence on some Enlightenment thinkers, and found some good tidbits. Mainly, some good tidbits relating to Edward Gibbon and the Roman Empire. He also reminded me of the claim that The Prince was satire. A unique claim, nothing too much of a rabbit hole, but certainly a little bit of conspiracy tinged food for thought.

I also ordered Anti-Machiavel by King Frederick of Prussia. Frederick wrote why Machiavelli was wrong based on his experience. Which is interesting since Frederick, from the little I know of him, was what some consider a Machiavellian leader, since he was a Realpolitik player. Yet, as Pierre Manent shows, one can assert, whether it’s power or dominance or will, in a manner that is not Machiavellian, even if it’s an aggressive assertion. More food for thought.

This week I will likely also dig into the Manent books I ordered, not fully, but just to get some topics and mark some chapters of The Prince to take note of.

Start Date

Again, it’s not required to read to join in. You can ask questions, engage, and watch some of the videos.

But for those of you reading, let’s peg Monday, March 23rd as the start date.

No law says you must start on that day. You can begin sooner, you can begin after, you can begin well after if you’d like. But we’ll mark that day as the day to begin.

This week I plan to record a video on handling introductions and translator notes of a book of this sort through the new Substack Studio feature. Classic books, among others, almost always have an introduction written by either a scholar on the topic or a notable figure. Introductions matter. They can set the tone, provide clarity, give context, and guide or misguide. As to the latter, man is a political animal, and a person’s worldview does seep into works or lenses. Sometimes it’s not as explicit, and some authors and writers are great at leaving most of it out, but it will come out in some manner. That can set a tone so it’s important for our own critical thinking to provide context to the context being provided to you.

Plus, a big plus, modern publishing industries, especially a big player like Penguin, in my experience (being somewhat a Penguin Classics maximalist myself) attempt to hijack thinkers, authors, stories into the Left umbrella. And some of this hijackins is to the point of comedy, like Amartya Sen’s introduction to Adam Smith’s Theory of Moral Sentiments, where Sen makes a case that Smith was actually arguing for modern monetary theory and Socialism styled economic theory. That absurdity is so absurd it’s comedic.

Also another reason I do this, the best class I took in college was for history majors, and you had to have high grades to get in, I got in and am still proud as it was selective. Much of the class discussed the various styles of historical writing, how to theme a museum, how to present those plaques you see at a historical marker, and how to spot the worldviews or leanings and why it mattered. It didn’t make me a savant of knowing worldviews, but I recognized the importance to understand the lens of a writer or historian to get a handle on how they’re presenting it, whether it has an agenda, whether it’s counterfactual, so on and so forth. It was an invaluable class.

Enough rambling, I’ll save it for the video. And I’ll do a video on the introduction for The Prince once I get into it.

Again the edition I’m reading: The Prince ISBN: 978-0-140-44915-0

This bookclub is open to all paying members. I recognize some of the peeps joining, and know personally of another, in other words, a great handful have raised theirs hands to join in. Each will bring a lot to the table and it should make for good discussion.

Monday, March 23rd we begin.

Expect a video on the introduction to arrive in the next few days, possibly tomorrow. The video is exclusive to paid members.

If you’d like to join along for the ride and are not a paid member, upgrade your membership.

If you’re joining along, are a paid member, are reading either or both, or are not reading but planning to engage somewhat, go ahead into the chat, let me know you’re in and in what capacity, do that HERE.

I figure around a week until I read the first page of The Prince by Machiavelli. I’m coming up on the end of Natural Law and Human Rights by Pierre Manent. When finished, I plan to spend a few days with 1 John for my neighborhood’s men’s Bible study group. But I figure around a week until I officially dive into The Prince. 

What is beginning if you’re brand new?

My official book club is about to launch.

A few have raised their hand.

I recognize and know personally some of heavy hitters joining, which is going to make it a lot of fun.

Amazon delivered a pile of Pierre Manent books curated to help understand Machiavelli. I stumbled onto Manent recently via Daniel J. Mahoney, and knew I had to read his books, and serendipity struck, Manent’s works feature a substantive analysis of Machiavelli. Manent’s analysis of Machiavelli will benefit this book club immensely. I’m still looking through my bookshelf to see what else I can find to help unpack one of the most iconic, famous, and infamous figures of the modern West.

According to Jacques Barzun, the time period of Machiavelli and Luther birthed the modern West as we know it today. To get particular, Erasmus and Luther are the two who Barzun posits as birthing the modern West, and more so Luther. That it was Luther Barzun wrangles with, as Erasmus was the far greater mind, far greater writer, but it was what Luther offered to people that made him popular. I agree with Barzun, Erasmus is a far more potent, compelling, and far more intellectually powerful than Luther.

Pierre Manent, however, posits that Luther and Machiavelli combined birthed the modern West, along with a significant addition via Thomas Hobbes later. Manent recognizes the good in both Luther and Machiavelli, but he aptly details the consequences of their ideas. Manent particularly points out Machiavelli more so than Luther, and how Thomas Hobbes took Machiavelli’s ideas and made them more appetizing.

Machiavellians exist on both sides politically and inside of various worldviews. Machiavelli’s ideas imbue more than politics, they’re ingrained in art, personalities, business, dating, and we even find him abused and bastardized in a cynical manner in business and self-development.

Machiavelli matters. Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power is the Temu Machiavelli; Greene is a self-help author, a fun one; Machiavelli is the real deal. He’s had significant influence, impact, and continues to have significant influence and impact as his ideas have become almost second nature for some. He didn’t alter human nature, but he did, as Manent says in a trippy, eye-opening manner, contribute to the horizontal plane, a modern phenomena, of how humans make decisions. In short, the vertical plane is our intuition, inherited common sense, and the basic drives and motives from our agency. This is human nature, we share this in common with all humans. The basic human motives are: the pleasant, the useful, and the noble (or just). Our disposition, education (of all sorts not just school), and patterns dictate how our motives manifest. The motives expands into institutions and so on. The horizontal plane, however, is the more theoretical framework from where we, in a sense, obey to make a choice. A simple one, choosing actions and building an identity around opposing Donald Trump at all costs. The horizontal plane is the complex human added theories more unnatural to human nature, but people act from it, the vertical is included, but the horizontal is the person who buys “gender neutral” clothes for their baby. Trippy stuff, but Machiavelli is firmly on the horizontal plane in a distinct way.

This is why it’s important to read him and understand him. Gurus make Machiavelli into a life hack. That you can read him to 10x your passive income, seduce women, and have immense power, but instead of reading him, just buy this e-course. Pearl-clutching academics make Machiavelli into a monster (albeit many of them live in a Machiavelli influenced bubble, ironically).

Where is the truth?

Is it all bad?

Is it all good?

Personally, I’m curious to read Machiavelli since he arose out of the ashes of the Roman Empire’s western fall. That makes me curious as to what his perspective is, why he arose and was such a force, and what was the ghosts of that empire like.

I’m not a Machiavelli expert. But I will be learning it alongside you, and getting observations and wisdoms from some big hitter thinkers like Pierre Manent.

You don’t need to be reading either of the works to join along. You can think of it as a kind of MasterClass if you’re not reading along. This book club is open to ALL paying members. But I do hope to get a handful of brave souls to join in reading either or both of these iconic works.

The book club will feature access to the exclusive videos, chats, and you can ask questions.

If you haven’t signed up yet do so now.

We’re soon about to start.

If you are reading either of the works go ahead and say hi and tell us which of the books you plan to read in the chat thread Machiavelli seen HERE. If you plan to be an observer and not read, feel free to say hello in the chat if you wish — all paying members are welcome. Say hi HERE.

Now the book club is about to begin.

The first topic: Machiavelli.

We’re starting off first with Machiavelli’s iconic The Prince, then going into the no less iconic but lesser read The Discourses. These works and the concepts Machiavelli introduced in each forever altered our world. Politics, faith, art, psychology, worldviews, philosophy, and more feel the effect of Machiavelli.

How It’s Going to Work (You Don’t Need to Be Reading Either of the Books)

This book club is open to ALL paying members. You do not have to be reading either of the works to join the discussion. That’s unusual for a book club since it usually requires readers, but right now, with my current paid audience members, I want to get a discussion going. For those of you not reading it, if you join, you can see it as a Machiavelli masterclass, or even how to engage with a classic work. I’m also keenly aware that most people are interested in reading The Prince and not The Discourses, which is another factor why I’m opening it up to all paying members.

I hope people join me in reading either of the works, if you read two along with me, congrats. But if you choose one, thank you.

Here’s how I’m going to structure this.

Substack Chat

Here I will pop in randomly with observations, musings, questions, and maybe pictures of certain passages. My goal is to also engage with others, field questions, field other observations from those joining me with reading, and field general Machiavelli discussion.

I’ll create a specific Machiavelli thread, anything Machiavelli is a go. If you’re a member already, you can find the thread HERE.

Read-Along Videos

With my new YouTube, I’m doing read-along videos. I will read a passage or two and either riff, break it down, work through it, so on and so forth.

BUT for this book club, my Machiavelli read-along videos are exclusive to members. I will pop on video, read a passage, and break it down. Also, I will take some readings from other thinkers like Pierre Manent, Jacques Barzun, and Leo Strauss. From either my observations or these thinkers I will inject considerations and questions.

Q&A Videos

On Substack, I will also do some livestream videos where I will take questions and answer them, and if any brave souls wish to join, I will answer live questions.

Why Machiavelli

Machiavelli’s theories, philosophy, concepts, and ideas unquestionably altered the modern West. Each day we face the legacy of his ideas. The most notable influence Machiavelli had, which has perhaps, depending how you look at it, created a tear in our society, is how he countered, questioned, and discarded wholesale, The Gap.

The Gap?

It’s the between what we humans do and what we should do. It’s more than morals, while it is a moral and ethical outlook, it effects theories, stories, ideologies, so on and so forth. The what we do is how humans act. Machiavelli focused on how we act and believed the concepts of what we should do, our morals from faith, reason, and so forth, are foolish because humans, in his view, never did that and were incapable of doing that.

As Pierre Manent argues, Machiavelli’s theories alongside Luther’s theories which were published at around the same time, spawned a greater notion to supplant the Natural Law. Natural Law being, in a far too quick summary, the morals and codes we inherit, that are in a sense unspoken or concrete abstracts. Such as, we know from intuition that if we see a boy walking his puppy that going up and stomping on the puppy’s head is evil even if we can’t empirically claim why, it’s a when you see it you know it. And that if we see someone do that horrific act we know they’re a savage, something internally is broken inside of them. These laws expand into politics, to what we wear at a nice restaurant, and endless other aspects of our lives. We also have an innate idea of what we should do when we act that isn’t always steeped from theory. Just as we don’t need theory to act to help the boy and his puppy from a deranged monster, we don’t need theory to explain why certain pieces of art move us. But Machiavelli discards the ‘should’ wholesale, that has had consequences, arguably both good and bad.

I’m curious of the morality or immorality of Machiavelli. I don’t see him as wholly evil, his concepts have some merit but are they too jaded and cynical? And while some of his ideas could be granted the label “pragmatic” at what point, like his idea of wielding fear as a tool of control, do we realize it’s theory that sounds real but is divorced from reality?

I’m curious not solely for the political and social effect of Machiavelli, but on personal levels. If you or I encounter someone Machiavellian or ourselves act Machiavellian, what does this mean? I’m curious of the psychology and the nature of someone Machiavellian or when we act Machiavellian.

Note, I’m ordering Pierre Manent works to help me discuss Machiavelli. That I’ll cover in the read alongs, but a big reason, as of this writing I’m reading his Natural Law and Human Rights and it’s flooring me. He’s one of those authors and thinkers that when you read him your perspective and understanding of the world gains clarity. I’m also looking through current books I own to see what is said on Machiavelli. Currently I have a decent group to help these discussions: Jacques Barzun, Leo Strauss, James Burnham, Russell Kirk, and hopefully some others. These thinkers and authors will help us understand Machiavelli, surface questions for discussion, and give vetted observations.

A Snobby Note

I have a lot of copywriters on my list. I have a lot of internet marketers on my list. Many of you have been with me for a long time and I’m thankful.

Yet it must be said.

This book club, the topic of Machiavelli, is not for self-development purposes, or the purposes of bettering your sales, secret persuasion techniques, life hacking, or how to seduce women.

I’m longer out of copywriting now than I was in it. I’ve opened up about my car business past and I have way more experience with that, I’m way more of a car guy than a copy guy, and what I’m doing currently has nothing to do with copywriting. I have nothing against copywriters. I’m close personal friends with many copywriters and the world of copy is a zany place that I still respect. But nothing about this book club is astroturfed — no three secret Machiavellian hacks for better headlines or becoming the next Alex Hormozi.

To emphasize this point, here are a few questions and observations I plan to bring up in the book club:

• The combined effect of Martin Luther and Machiavelli in our world.

• The fall of the Roman Empire in the West gave rise to polycentrism led by Christianity, which made ideas flourish, such as Machiavelli’s — but given the boon of ideas why did Machiavelli’s ideas take root as a counter to what was happening?

• Natural Law versus Human Rights: what does Machiavelli get wrong and why is it so consequential?

This is not to scare anyone. I’m not a Machiavelli scholar. But if you come in expecting to crank your copywriting headlines or your persuasion skills, you’re in the wrong place. You can find that astroturfed guff at Alex and Books. Here, this book club, we’re engaging with the book from a place of curiosity, enjoyment, and substance.

When It Starts

I’m going to start it when I finish Natural Law and Human Rights by Pierre Manent. I’m a little over halfway in that book, but it’s slow going given the depth of the book and having a three month old daughter.

My best guess, right now, two weeks or less.

If you’re going to read along with me, do not worry about your reading speed. I’m going pretty slow as of late. I’m not going to assign chapters to be read by a certain date. This book club is at your own pace. And some of you will not be reading but will be watching and asking questions.

If you’re going to join along, here are the versions I’m reading:

• The Prince: ISBN: 978-0-140-44915-0

• The Discourses: ISBN: 978-0-140-44428-5

Both are Penguin Classics editions and both can be had at Amazon. I read introductions and talk about introductions as those can set a tone for what we read, and introductions can at times need context or even disagreement.

Again, I’m beginning with The Prince.

I will post more updates the closer I get.

What To Do

If you wish to join this book club reading or not, first, you must be a paid member. Go to the chat in Substack, there I have a thread in the chat called Machiavelli. If you plan to read along, reply “I’m in and will read The Prince.” If you plan to read The Discourses instead, announce that, if both books, announce that. If you’re planning to not read along but will join in on the conversation, simply reply, “I’m in.” And of course, any paid member at any time during my reading of Machiavelli can ask a question or join in.

This book club is the first of many and your participation will help shape future book clubs.

If you want in and you’re not a paid member then upgrade your membership.

I’ve long announced my YouTube page but the promise of it became like George R.R. Martin teasing the White Walkers and winter.

But alas it has arrived.

I did not spend a whole lot of time producing it. I riffed it. I riffed it to keep it authentic. I’m sure and know it wanders and I probably repeat myself with some of the first time nerves. But I loved the process. I riffed it because I want to keep it authentic, and to get it going. Had I scripted it I would have obsessed over it. The videos will get better, but for the first one, watching a bit, and seeing some feedback already, it’s not bad.

I plan on doing them frequently, I will likely record the next one this week and upload it. All of the tech is new to me, how to edit and all that, but it’s up, it’s here, and more to come.

The topic and where you can watch it: The 3 Best Books on the Roman Empire

Or you can click the picture below.

More to come.

Are we in a decline like the Roman Empire?

Was it because of the Christians?

Did inflation cause the fall?

Did the degenerate culture cause the fall?

I heard it was the greatest culture, claims of its degeneracy are overblown, and the fall was because of something in the water lowering testosterone, is that true?

Ideological validation via the causality of the Roman Empire’s fall is the desire of someone asking those questions. One-size-fits-all theories are abound regarding the Roman Empire. People swing the Roman Empire around as a means for their ideological perspective. They abuse the history of the empire to warn of our fall. People rehash positions — many long debunked — of why the Empire fell, or argue of its sterling virtues and how some factor like lowered testosterone ruined it, or argue of its extreme lechery as a reason for its fall. Crypto bros, cultural moralizers, alt-right Nietzschean vitalists, Marxist Materialists, combative secularists, preachy Christians, among others, all abuse the Roman Empire for their ideological moralizing.

Finding clarity amongst the racket is challenging. Barry Strauss’s Ten Caesars does provide clarity, succinctness, and nuance to the massive and complex Roman Empire. Barry Strauss is a Hoover Fellow and famed historian of the Roman Empire. His other works include The War That Made the Roman Empire and Jews vs. Rome (read review here). Strauss accomplishes a remarkable feat by making the Roman Empire, from politics, war, to culture, accessible while remaining substantive in the Ten Caesars. The book comprises ten biographical vignettes. Each vignette goes far beyond the biography of the emperors analyzed; Strauss details political norms, social norms, and the cultural norms of each emperor’s era. We learn why and how the Roman Empire evolved, regressed, progressed or stagnated. Strauss introduces us to the power players of the Roman Empire, the power brokers who gave rise to emperors, and those who held enormous power and influence behind the scenes. Many power brokers of the Roman Empire were women, the mothers, wives, sisters, of emperors. Strauss gives us both a window and clarification onto the Roman Empire. He clarifies modern misconceptions and long debunked theses still taken as truth today, such as specific theses of famous figures like Edward Gibbon.

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Modern Day Suetonius But Far Better And Far More Accurate

The ten vignettes are ordered chronologically. The entire timeline reveals how the empire evolved, regressed, and stagnated. With each vignette we get a clear, and sometimes myth busting, sometimes sobering, look into the empire’s culture, social dynamics, and politics. Strauss covers:

1. Augustus

2. Tiberius

3. Nero

4. Vespasian

5. Trajan

6. Hadrian

7. Marcus Aurelius

8. Septimius Severus

9. Diocletian

10. Constantine

In each we learn the rise of each emperor, how they came to be emperor, and who or what led to their ascendancy. That who or what provides concrete looks at the culture of the Roman Empire. We see the schizophrenic and perplexing marriage dynamics of the time. For instance, some women were married to their uncle, either related or not related other than by marriage, and vice versa, some nephews were wedded to their aunts, some stepsons, or stepdaughters, married to their stepfather or stepmothers. The custom was to marry for political or social station. Yet, as Strauss shows, certain women were sought after, and some emperors were fortunate to have arranged marriages with them because these women injected political force into the ruling legacy. These women were intelligent, cunning, Machiavellian, and resourceful. They could play the game of Roman politics and Roman statecraft and play it masterfully.

Strauss expounds the political styles of each emperor, and the dynamics of the period the emperor ascended and ruled, in other words the context and realities of their rule, what led to it, and what resulted after. The context and realities, under Strauss’s wise guidance, paint the reality of Roman culture giving a window upon each period.

Clarification

Modern theories, claims, and “takes” surround the Roman Empire, especially on a platform like X. The most common style: a neurotic focus on modern culture steered through the lens of a personal ideology and the required elimination or correction of particular ills in our modern culture to obtain the ideology’s promised societal utopia, and brandishing theories apropos to the Roman Empire, glibly or conspiratorially, as a form of argument to validate their personal ideology. In other words, cast the blame for the fall on a single cause, and that single cause being a personal gripe with modern society, bonus points for moralizing or outright repudiation of modern society. For instance, bikinis caused the fall of the Roman Empire, and since we have bikinis now, therefore the fall is near. Or that when the Roman Empire went Christian it instantly, with magic trick speed, imploded.1 The theories are unreflective and silly. If bikinis—or something else as silly—caused the fall of the Roman Empire, how could that Empire achieve complete power and domination for so long harboring the innate capacity of a sophomoric weakness that could wreck it all?

The popular “it was the Christians!” theory is directly or secondhand inspired by arguably one of the most iconic works in the Western canon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon. A work abused by those who have never read it, much less even added it to their Amazon books-to-buy shopping list, and the trite “Read Gibbon” retort commonly found on social media betrays the abuser.

The comparison theories stem from gripes with modern culture. Strauss clears the air on the popular salacious rumors of Roman Empire cultural degeneracy, which also clears the air on the culture. Indeed, the Roman Empire’s culture did feature excess, vanity, and lechery. Yet, in some aspects not to the extent claimed today, nor was it some Hallmark version of the Victorian Era hoisted upon the Roman Empire as some pseudo-Roman Empire revisionists wish to portray. Whether certain emperors indulged to the point claimed in ancient sources requires nuance and the eye of an expert like Strauss. Generally, certain historical sources written from political or social agendas would either embroider salacious rumors about an emperor to diminish him or to make that past emperor appalling and the current emperor the savior. The sex lives of famous Roman women were a popular salacious rumor to leverage in the Roman Empire, as they are today. The reality is, yes, lechery was a feature of the Roman Empire, for both men and women. With couples, marriage dynamics, as stated, were schizophrenic, baffling, and ennui inducing. Misogyny was rife in the Roman Empire, and powerful women faced the brunt of the salacious rumors. Those conflating today’s promiscuity (which is not as rampant as claimed by certain groups) to the Roman Empire’s promiscuity make the mistake of viewing the Roman Empire through the relationship and dating norms of the modern West. The feasible comparison is not so much a comparison, rather it’s a reflection on human nature: a culture of transgression feeds personal and cultural apathy. We humans are always capable of transgression, it’s innate to us and the transgression is not always a result from the influence of the current thing in popular culture. Strauss clarifies the mistaken conflations and carefully guides us to the likely realities.

Such as this from Suetonius on Tiberius:

Following his retirement to Capri, he set up a brothel where he could devote himself in private to sexual activities, and in these he would watch troops of girls recruited from far and wide, male prostitutes in the full bloom of adulthood, and children whose particular talent was for fucking and getting fucked at the same time (’sphincters’, he called them) all joining together in an orgy of threesomes: a spectacle sufficiently obscene to excite his flagging libido. … He set up shrines to Venus in woods and groves across Capri, where young boys dressed as Pan and girls dress as nymphs would solicit sex outside caves and grottoes: because of this people openly made play with the island’s name, calling it ‘Goat Park’.

Strauss clarifies:

The historian Suetonius is full of juicy stories about Tiberius’s sexual misdeeds on the island. The “old goat,” as people are said to have called him, supposedly went after women as well as children of both sexes. His debaucheries are said to have included orgies, threesomes, pedophilia, and the murder of someone who refused him. He supposedly trained little boys to chase him when he was swimming and to get between his legs and lick and nibble him — he called them his “minnows.” Reports like this may have contributed to Tiberius’s low public standing in Rome, but Roman history is full of salacious rumors, and we should be skeptical. In reality, stargazing and fortune-telling are probably as risqué as Tiberius got on the island.

Turning to the Christian theory, Strauss shatters the theory that when the empire went Christian it fell:

Gibbon suggested long ago that Christianity played a big role in the fall of Rome because it sapped the fighting spirit of its people. This is nonsense. The eastern half of the Roman empire was more passionately Christian than the west, and it did not fall in 476. In fact, it remained as an empire for another 150 years, until the Islamic conquest of most of it. Afterward, it survived as a regional power for another 800 years, finally coming to an end only in 1453, nearly 1000 years after the fall of the West. Nor did Christianity stop European states from fighting one another and conquering much of the world for the better part of two millennia. 

Still, an argument laments the loss of Rome and the West, and that argument implies that Christians caused the fall and loss of Rome. The argument is nostalgic lamenting over a loss of their personal fantasy of Rome. A basic, economic truth is that society, and all it encompasses, flows towards dynamic areas. An oversimplified saying of this: money goes where money is welcomed. But it’s not just money, it’s social and cultural dynamism that allures. New York City attracts people from all over the world to experience the various and variegated possibilities on offer. The business, culture, arts, fashions, all attract people to New York City, and New York City is often at the leading edge of those elements. The same can be said of Los Angeles. And in today’s era, cities like Miami (or heck, the state of Florida) are now luring people with its dynamism. The eastern part of the Roman Empire was the most cultured and the most dynamic. From Caesar onward, each emperor had eyes on the east. The Western part of the empire was more or less a cultural backwater that had to be dealt with. Rome was the only great city as dynamism in Germany, France, or England was nonexistent. The east heavily influenced the Roman Empire, Greece and past Greek cultures had a heavy sway over Rome, exemplified by the wide influence of Stoicism in the Roman Empire.

As Walter Scheidel articulates in his superb Escape from Rome:

It is therefore misleading to identify “Western Christianity” as an ultimate cause of Europe’s fragmentation: its path was secondary to outcomes in state formation. While Christianity undoubtedly contributed to post Roman polycentrism, it was above all the antecedent weakening of centralized Roman political authority that allowed and, indeed, encouraged it to do so. 

Well before Christianity held any sway or even made a blip in the Roman Empire, eyes were on the East. Dynamism in the West sprang from the fall of Rome in the west and Christianity’s influence over European polycentrism.

So no, Christians did not cause the fall of the Roman Empire. Christians begat a much greater legacy: dynamism of the modern West, the science, culture, values, economics, everything that made the modern West the greatest culture in human history.

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Edward Gibbon

Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is a critical work in the Western canon. It’s included amongst the Great Books for good reason. Gibbon’s prose is otherworldly and the work is a masterpiece of historical writing. Gibbon is still iconic. If you go on social media, X or Substack, it looks like everyone has read Gibbon. Yet if one reads Gibbon it’s fast apparent the people on social media have not read Gibbon.

Gibbon’s theses still dominate the modern discourse surrounding the Roman Empire. Strauss mentions Gibbon a total of four times in this work. Gibbon does not dominate Ten Caesars, yet is mentioned with gravity. Strauss does not denigrate Gibbon or Gibbon’s work. It’s clear Strauss regards the work as a masterpiece, rightly so. Yet Strauss sheds light on Gibbon’s flaws. A key flaw most people are unaware of is that for a number of generations now some of Gibbon’s positions and claims have been debunked empirically. Strauss bluntly points out the driving flaw of Gibbon.

Gibbon was a snob, writing in the age of Enlightenment, with little sympathy for upstarts and outsiders.

Gibbon’s snobbery was targeted at Christians. Gibbon claimed Christianity weakened the will of Roman men, as if it were the OnlyFans of the day, isolating men in their bedrooms. Gibbon made fabulist claims of droves of men and women going into Christian monasteries to live a comfortable life, checking out of the Roman Empire, which emptied the empire of its strong citizens. Records show this claim as pure nonsense. For the claim to have been true, the monasteries would have been the size of cities, no such monastery existed at that size, and the amount of monasteries was minuscule. Again, Gibbon does give us a rigorous history but he has his flaws. And archaeological evidence and firsthand resources kept emerging and still emerge long after Gibbon’s death that prove his Christianity caused the fall thesis as false.

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What Caused the Decline and Fall?

Today people take something going on in our culture, see a similarity in the Roman Empire, even if it’s a stretch, and peg it as the reason for the fall. As mentioned, degeneracy is the common blame. Absolutely, a culture rife with ennui, nihilism, cynicism, and obsession with the objectification spectrum of sex, is not good. It points to issues in the culture from boredom to stagnation, but most simply, it points to cultural decadence. Often tied to these issues, or upstream of them, is a lowering of decorum. And despite manosphere moralizations of women wearing something risqué at the airport, we need to zoom out from the one attractive woman dressing provocatively, and look at the majority of the population. A lowering of decorum is clear when behavior and dress is considered, and it isn’t always risqué dress. Returning to the airport, consider grown men walking around in pajamas, people who cut their toenails on the plane, the more common fat women wearing the same tight yoga pants of that attractive woman complained about by the manosphere, which highlight her aesthetic defects as she jiggles around the airport. This lowering of decorum is a loss of understanding, care, respect, and tact for standards. But something like widespread lechery does not cause a civilization to fall, it might be indicative of a culture in trouble, but it’s not the cause of the fall, in fact it barely has any role in a fall. Culture is downstream of politics. It’s downstream of institutions. Certainly the Roman Empire’s culture had issues and a rotting culture at various periods. The rotting culture didn’t help the Empire, but the Empire ebbed and flowed, it looked gone at times but Diocletian and Constantine brought it back from the brink and made it robust.

So What Caused The Fall?

Strauss answers:

The Roman Empire in the West fell because of bad leadership as well as poorly deployed military resources, internal division, strong enemies, unfavorable geography, and a decline of resources. The empire would have other great leaders before the West fell, but most of them would be in the East.

That’s Strauss’s summary in the epilogue of the Ten Caesars. The context is all over the book. Those reasons are not as sexy as blaming bikinis or the Christians or lead in the water lowering testosterone or cryptocurrency bros’ claims. Most people lack knowledge on deployed military resources, or what is the context behind the decline of resources, or topics like economic inelasticity. When that discussion happens eyes glaze over. It’s much easier for someone who dislikes modern sensibilities, or rather, the trend of women’s current bikini fashion to include thongs, to decry it and wield the Roman Empire as their argument versus enumerating and dissecting the decline of resources effect on an inelastic economy. And for the concept of modern enemies, it’s easier to go conspiratorial like Nick Fuentes and blame the Jews or marriage, instead of going into the intricacies of foreign policy and foreign statecraft. Which is why the impatient, the unprincipled, the unserious, and the dummies will stew over topics like Jews, Christians, and bikinis as the catalyst for the fall.

Who Would Like It & Why Read It

Strauss is a compelling writer. He’s accessible and rigorous. His other works, The War That Made The Roman Empire and Jews vs. Rome complement Ten Caesars well. One can read them all with this, yet Ten Caesars stands alone. It delivers an encompassing look and understanding of the Roman Empire.

If you have any interest in the Roman Empire, then this is a superb work. Whether you want to just read one book on it, or kick off reading a few books on it, you will not go wrong starting with Ten Caesars.

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Human nature ended up the key theme for me in 2025, either serendipitously or the influence of the books that kicked off the year, then bolstered by David Mamet, and cemented with the birth of my daughter. All that drove the themes and picks this year, which highlighted the human condition.

The Books I Read in 2025 (In order, top to bottom)

1. The Iliad, Homer (Richmond Lattimore translation)

2. Civilization: The West and the Rest, Niall Ferguson

3. From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present, 500 Years of Cultural Life, Jacques Barzun

4. Hunger, Knut Hamsun

5. Till We Have Faces, C. S. Lewis

6. The Secret Agent, Joseph Conrad

7. The Collapse of Parenting: How We Hurt Our Kids When We Treat Them Like Grown-Ups, Leonard Sax, PhD

8. Girls on the Edge: Why So Many Girls Are Anxious, Wired, and Obsessed—and What Parents Can Do, Leonard Sax, PhD

9. Why Gender Matters: What Parents and Teachers Need to Know about the Emerging Science of Sex Differences, Leonard Sax, PhD

10. Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets Every Father Should Know, Meg Meeker, M.D.

11. Praise of Folly, Erasmus

12. Utopia, Thomas More

13. Jaws, Peter Benchley

14. The Disenlightenment: Politics, Horror, and Entertainment, David Mamet

15. The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny, Victor Davis Hanson

16. Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch, David Mamet

17. Everywhere an Oink Oink: An Embittered, Dyspeptic, and Accurate Report of Forty Years in Hollywood, David Mamet

18. The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture, David Mamet

19. Red Harvest, Dashiell Hammett

20. The Dain Curse, Dashiell Hammett

21. The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett

22. Jews vs. Rome: Two Centuries of Rebellion Against the World’s Mightiest Empire, Barry Strauss

23. The Lives of the Caesars, Suetonius (Tom Holland translation)

24. The Happiest Baby on the Block: The New Way to Calm Crying and Help Your Newborn Baby Sleep Longer, Harvey Karp, MD

25. Raising Mentally Strong Kids: How to Combine the Power of Neuroscience with Love and Logic® to Grow Confident, Kind, Responsible, and Resilient Children and Young Adults, Daniel G. Amen, MD, and Charles Fay, PhD

26. Ten Caesars: Roman Emperors from Augustus to Constantine, Barry Strauss

Not included are a number of parenting books and a handful of books regarding vaccines for kids.

And the winner is . . .

The Best Book of 2025: Praise of Folly, Erasmus

First of all, what can be sweeter or more precious than life itself? And to whom is it generally agreed life owes its beginning if not to me? For it certainly isn’t the spear of “mighty fathered” Pallas or the shield of “cloud-gathering” Jupiter which fathers and propagates the human race. Even the father of the gods and king of men who makes the whole of Olympus tremble when he bows his head has to lay aside that triple-forked thunderbolt of his and that grim Titanic visage with which he can terrify all the gods whenever he chooses, and humble himself, put on a different mask, like an actor, if he ever wants to do what he always is doing, that is, “to make a child.” And the Stoics, as we know, claim to be most like the gods. But give me a man who is a Stoic three or four or if you like six hundred times over, and he too, even if he keeps his beard as a mark of wisdom, though he shares it with a goat, will have to swallow his pride, smooth out his frown, shake off his rigid principles, and be fond and foolish for a while. In fact, if the philosopher ever wants to be a father it’s me he has to call on— yes, me.

Praise of Folly, Erasmus

At times satirical, at times ironic, and at times explicit, Praise of Folly is a paramount work in the Western canon. Jacques Barzun declares Erasmus more impactful than Martin Luther and that Erasmus wielded the far more powerful mind. In Praise of Folly, the wisdom on the human condition is profound, the arguments sharp, and, often, irrefutable.

Erasmus intended this work as a letter to his friend Thomas More. The work requires footnotes because as happens with friends, we can change tone and meaning two or three times in a sentence. Think of an insider text thread with a friend, full of banter, full of inside jokes, that turns into seriousness. Fortunately, Erasmus left a large body of work which elucidates his positions in Praise of Folly.

The story is told through the mouthpiece of the god Folly. Folly is dressed as a jester, and his “followers” are:

• Flattery

• Forgetfulness

• Idleness

• Pleasure

• Madness

• Sensuality

• Revelry

• Sound Sleep

He uses these “followers” to attack human pretensions, display innate foibles, and lambaste preachy pastors, preachers, priests, philosophers, and anyone who moralizes, especially those using Christianity to rebuke others. And the genius of the work castigates those on the opposite spectrum, those who choose to wallow in decadence and reject Christian morality.

Erasmus is pragmatic; he grasps the nature of reality. The quoted passage reflects the arguments Erasmus makes throughout the work. That passage calls out the moralizers against sex. That those who preach the most against sex as a vice forget that their existence depended upon the lustful folly of their parents. But Erasmus goes deeper. He’s showing that sex is part of human nature. Comprised in that nature exists man and woman’s sexual and sensual expression, and those expressions comprise spectrums. The nature of those spectrums is designed to attract or signal to a partner, then with folly help ignite the spark of the eros, the eros containing the cerebral, emotional, and physical elements of our sexual expression, which opens up the vast pastels of that expression from romantic to primal lust. All that makes sex and sexual expression enjoyable and desirable, which helps beget children so man can be fruitful and multiply, and more so, stokes the expressions to fuel a bond in a relationship. Because, as Erasmus points out wittily, the burdens of child labor, man’s capability to impregnate multiple women without much burden on a physical level, and then how hard it is to raise a child, the capacity and depth of those expressions help keep the bond between man and woman. Despite all the preaching and moralizing the eros keeps mankind alive.

Erasmus shows that contradiction is a feature of mankind, and that contradiction is a feature of faith. He reveals the contradictions in the Bible, and how people, often with an agenda, skate past or rationalize the contradiction, or tailor it to their ends.

Another piece of powerful wisdom: the real world practicalities of prudence. A common concept is that the best kind of prudence is grave purity, to always shelter oneself from any form of pleasure, vice, and so on. Erasmus’s argument is that of taking down a modern academic who preaches on prudence yet has never lived a life beyond the halls of academia—as in, they never took risks. Whereas, as Erasmus argues, someone who has gone out and taken risk and learned from bad choices and good choices, is capable of pragmatic wisdom versus someone who lives solely in words and theory. For instance, a sheltered nun moralizing to teenagers why premarital sex is an unforgivable sin, and taking drugs is the behavior of the devil, yet has never been in or near a situation to say no to what she lectures to teenagers about. Whereas someone else who has lived some life, they know what it is like to say no or to say yes, they know the regret, they know the pleasure and the downsides of the vice, and they know the consequence. They may have never done the drugs, but they’ve been in a situation or near it to grasp the temptation, the strength to say no under pressure, and can articulate why they did. Or if the night went lustfully, that at the time it was fun and felt like the right decision, but later, regret, reflection, or the night ending up lackluster, or some other reason, the person wishes they could take back that decision. In sum, they have perspective and can articulate this perspective in a manner relatable to someone. This is a powerful lesson on prudence. Erasmus isn’t saying to live a few years hedonistically; rather, he’s revealing pragmatics. The person who lives in the real world has the ability to articulate situations, decisions, and perspective, whereas the person living inside of theory does not. They have an opportunity to put Christian morality to work. Even if the living-in-theory person is correct, and person who lived life says the same thing, how each delivers the message tells us who has the wisdom and who has never faced a chance to gain that wisdom. It’s a beautiful truth.

The depth of the human condition is where Erasmus shines with his wisdom on Christianity. That Christianity, and God, can help us navigate ourselves and our world. That we are imperfect and full of contradictions, as is the Bible. But the contradictions of the Bible, of Christianity, to Erasmus reveal the divine. And the Bible, Christian faith, gives us the compass to live well and handle the unknowable — to avoid being chained by the darker parts of our vices, to not moralize, to have humility, and even strength to face the world. For instance, his parts on youthful ambition, and why it’s good. That the pride a cocksure twenty-one-year old has is the essence of what makes society better. That ambition can bring us the art of da Vinci, the convenience of Amazon bestowed to our lives, something as simple as roads, experiencing the youthful vibrance of a dynamic city, or how Jesus went out to gain more followers—he had an ambition. So always decrying any form of pride as always bad is misguided, that, instead youthful ambition is good. That purpose and harvesting dignity in work, whether being a great mother or great builder, is worthwhile ambition.

Praise of Folly is an enjoyable read and heavy on wisdom. Its lessons on human nature, its lessons on why we need God, are otherworldly.

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Fiction

Best Fiction (excluding Praise of Folly): The Iliad, Homer

Lessons on masculinity sum up the Iliad. Homer and his Iliad (and his Odyssey) have long been emasculated by academia since postmodernism seeped into the classics departments starting around the 1960s. Achilles has been claimed to be trans, gay, or a white supremacist. Achilles is none of these things.

The Iliad is robust on masculine wisdom. It is the oldest work of the Western canon, and it teaches us the four virtues of masculinity:

1. Courage

2. Wisdom

3. Skill

4. Physical strength

The definition of masculinity today is getting vaguer and vaguer and further bastardized. But the Iliad conveys true masculine virtues and extolls those virtues.

How Homer paints the virtues, each virtue interacts with the other; they’re not categorical and separated. For instance, take the baseline of physical strength. For a man to get it he needs to get some kind of movement. Let’s say he goes to a barbell gym. That choice to go the first time, whether he’s fifteen or fifty-five, takes courage. That knowing to go derives from wisdom, whether taught to him or observed under his own volition. Then, at that gym, to keep showing up takes courage as well as wisdom, knowing it’s a lifelong process and not a quick fix. As he does this he gains skill. He might get a coach. To do so he either might ask his dad or he might have the means. That takes courage to ask for help. As his strength increases his skill increases, and that offers wisdom. To get stronger he needs to lift heavier weights. And at times, he will be unsure, nervous, or anxious if he can lift heavier weight. To get under that bar takes more courage and from that experience comes wisdom.

Now, while physical strength may not fuel intellectual wisdom per se, the notion to learn, to advocate for your wisdom, all requires the same virtues. It takes courage to tackle Dostoevsky the first time, and wisdom and skill come from seeking to know more.

Now those examples fuel the disposition, the character of the man, and they apply to his living life. For instance, asking a girl out. The first time, it takes a ton of courage. As life goes on, a man will gain wisdom and skill from reading a girl, flirting, asking out, date dynamics, and so on. The physical strength part, he knows it’s a selling feature; it’s a signal of his discipline, lifestyle, and his standards. And in time he goes from “I hope she says yes” to vetting women for a woman who complements his values, to then having the courage to take a risk and bet it all on one. All that requires the masculine virtues, and the process of it shapes and strengthens the virtues. The strength part? As implied, it triggers ancient provide-and-protect signals in women. It triggers signals for physical intimacy which include the potential of robust offspring—in sum, it’s an age-old human nature reality.

The examples can go on. From work, to purpose, to the seasons of life, the masculine virtues are always with a man.

The modern world sells men that a rite of passage works like a Hollywood-style montage. That you spend some weekend acting like a Spartan warrior and that graduates you into “manhood” and that we’ve lost this ceremony. But Homer shows us rites of passage into manhood come from working on having the masculine virtues imbued into your being. For instance, playing sports as a kid, a championship season or a season of zero wins, all rites of passage. The first time you ask a girl out, the first time you get rejected, all rites of passage. Rites of passage arrive with a man’s maturation, from his living and taking risks and trying new things. It can be solo; it can be amongst teammates or colleagues. It’s often a slow process, not the going out into the woods and acting like a Spartan. It’s much less commercial than we’re sold. It’s our own journey. It’s both physical and metaphysical. And it’s not as glamorous, and sometimes no one is there to validate it; it’s just ourselves. It’s not performative or a big thing; it just is.

Another powerful lesson on masculinity from The Iliad is how Homer excoriates the cad. The cad being the standard bro on the dating apps who merely wants to Netflix and Chill. He may tease a relationship, but that tease is simply to sleep with more women. On a platform like X, certain corners of the manosphere, seduction corners, and the red pill, they preach to men to have sex with as many women as you can in order to be more valuable, then settle down with some nineteen-year-old illiterate virgin when you’re forty.1 And then the contradictory messages of if she sleeps with other men, she’s damaged goods, yet if she doesn’t sleep with you on the first date, you’re cooked. All of this theorizing is at one end projection of psychosexual fantasies and at the other end is profoundly sophomoric, nihilistic, and vicarious. It’s all proffered by weak, damaged men scared of risk and accountability. The kind of men Homer exposes. Homer shows the wisdom of a man who is choosy, not some prude, but choosy, and that cad behavior is the sign of a weak man.

Masculine wisdom abounds in The Iliad. It is a masculine novel. One every man should read, multiple times over the course of his life.

Hunger, Knut Hamsun

The novel that kicked off the twentieth century. Knut Hamsun was tired of the novels of his era believing they lacked psychological reality. He created a character, a nameless, manic vagrant. Through this character Hamsun shows us a truth of human psychology: we’re all irrational. Yet that irrationality is not always a bad thing like rationalists proclaim.

The novel reads manic. And true to real life, the character does not “change” or evolve in his arc. People do not “change” as claimed. People can do any of the following: evolve, mature, regress, or stagnate — but disposition is the same. And at various times in our life we might be maturing but for the period it all looks the same. With Hamsun’s character, the manic vagrant, we witness his wallowing in his mania, and through it, we learn of man’s irrationality. We see both the good, bad, and the it-is-what-it-is side of it all. A truly brilliant novel and fun to read.

The Secret Agent, Joseph Conrad

A common saying is that art can’t be political, that literature sucks if it is loaded with a political message. On the whole, that is true. Progressive Enlightenment—aka “woke” ideals—are infused into Hollywood stories. A trans character is the lead, but given the principles of Progressive Enlightenment, you’re not allowed to make the trans character flawed. Only white males can have flaws, and the flaws are predictable tropes. The same can be said of the Progressive dross shoved down your throats at most indie bookstores. The novels by Ta-Nehisi Coates, for instance, or Madeline Miller who loves to make all of Homer’s characters gay and all of the women sexually unsatisfied. It’s all on the nose, it’s all predictable and boring.

But Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent is an exception to the rule. He gave the Western canon a classic in political fiction. Conrad surveyed the bombings done in the name of revolution of his era and wondered how someone could easily kill others as a means for their ends and not feel bad for it. That rumination spawned this classic. The characters of The Secret Agent reveal truths of political worldviews. Some accuse the other side of not believing what they claim, but in reality, this is a trope. People do believe it and they believe they’re right, and many see their way as morally pure in any circumstance, even if it involves killing or the celebration of someone on the other side of the aisle dying.

A modern example of this are the leftists celebrating the death of Charlie Kirk. The death was abhorrent, gruesome, and evil. Yet a large population of those with a liberal worldview hail the death as a positive. Many tropish explanations exist around why a person celebrates the death of Kirk, such as, “Surely they can’t believe it’s good to celebrate the death of him, they must be doing it to sound edgy.” But they do believe it; they do believe his murder was right. That’s the reality. Why? Conrad asks and answers this question in The Secret Agent. It’s a wonderful work, rich on politics, and should be read by every conservative.

Till We Have Faces, C. S. Lewis

Till We Have Faces is C. S. Lewis’s vision of the myth Cupid and Psyche. Lewis looks into themes of self-love, love, jealousy, suffering, and belief in God. A psychological novel showing man’s natural impulse to wrangle with God and faith, and how that wrangle manifests in ourselves and others. The question of believing derives from that unknown, the edges of the world that cannot be explained. For instance, when you go to cross a crosswalk and the cars stop, at any moment those cars can kill you. Anyone, including yourself, would see the atrocity if the driver of that car does kill you. If he does it on purpose, we see the evil. If it’s a mistake, we lament the senseless loss of life. That edge of why the drivers stop and why if they didn’t we’d lament is edge where God exists. This is just one of many things Lewis reveals to us in Till We Have Faces.

Utopia, Thomas More

A key book of the Western canon. I’ll be blunt, it didn’t resonate with me. But the further removed I am from it the more I think on it. It grows on me, and I understand more of it. Utopia was More’s answer to Praise of Folly. Yet with More, it’s harder to tell if he’s satirical at first. Which is why the book, and its meaning, has been argued over now for centuries. More tells of a society so rigid with its rules that it’s clearly nonsensical. But when you ruminate on the themes, it’s a takedown of the rigid black-and-white theories people cook up whether it’s on society, women, men, religion, economics, and so on. We get a sense why those rigid theories will not work, and why marginal changes and inherited changes work better. It’s a famous Catholic piece, yet I haven’t reached an articulate position on what Utopia offers on faith, other than hard-line rigidity is a failure.

Red Harvest; The Dain Curse; The Maltese Falcon, Dashiell Hammett

Hammett poured a foundation for the hard-boiled detective novel. His story beats, such as double-crossing, Gordian knot of whodunnit, dames throwing themselves at the main character, and so on, are now key elements in the mystery canon. I’m a massive Raymond Chandler fan. Hammett influenced Chandler, and Chandler took the mystery novel to sonic heights. Where I struggled with Hammett was in The Maltese Falcon. In it the main character, Sam Spade, lacks impulse control around women. He sleeps with his partner’s wife; he sleeps with a woman on the case; any woman coming his way he sleeps with. I like tragic hero masculine figures because they’re authentic. And many men, and women, have their foibles. But how Spade can’t refuse, whereas Chandler’s famous character, Marlowe, has a gravity of choosiness which injects a ton of masculinity into his character, I struggled with. Even a more playboy-style character like Jack Reacher still chooses. He, like Marlowe, is sensitive in the definition of reading others combined with introspection. I had a hard time trusting Spade. Regardless, Hammett is fun and worthwhile.

Jaws, Peter Benchley

It sucked. The movie takes nearly nothing from the book, thank God, except for the opening scene of the bibulous college kids fooling around, and the gal getting killed by the shark when she goes for a swim. The story lines in the book are bizarre, like the weird mafia plot line that goes nowhere. All of the main characters are unlikable. The affair between Ellen Brody and Matt Hooper is cynical ennui. How the setting is on Long Island, or near it, is odd — it doesn’t feel like an island. Steven Spielberg and his writers extracted the idea from that book and shaped a classic story. They reworked all the characters to make them relatable, likable, and memorable. The book is a stinker, my only letdown read of 2025.

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Nonfiction

Best Nonfiction: David Mamet

My summer was the summer of Mamet. I read three of his works:

• The Disenlightenment: Politics, Horror, and Entertainment

• Recessional: The Death of Free Speech and the Cost of a Free Lunch

• Everywhere an Oink Oink: An Embittered, Dyspeptic, and Accurate Report of Forty Years in Hollywood

For me, the curation nearly made it as the best book of the year. Reading Praise of Folly and then later David Mamet was serendipitous. Mamet further detailed truths of human nature and demonstrated the worldview of liberals and conservatives. And as an aside, he served wisdom on art, storytelling, and character. His elucidation on choice, how we understand someone and ourselves through our choices, our decisions and actions, and that when we make those decisions we’re convinced we’re always doing the right thing, that struck a chord. It’s simple, yet it injected deep meaning and colors to personal perspectives. How I saw myself and others was clearer. He inspired countless ruminating walks in the Boise foothills before I moved back to Colorado.

Personal perspectives aside, Mamet packs a ton into each work I read. Politics, art, worldview, faith (Mamet also influenced a deepening of my Christian faith), religion, Hollywood, and more—Mamet paints a vivid picture. He’s a blast to read, at one end philosophical and at the other salty and witty.

From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present, 500 Years of Cultural Life, Jacques Barzun

An ambling, ruminating, beautiful walk through the Western cultural life and its influences from 1500 till 2000. Barzun goes through the modern Great Books, starting with both Erasmus and Martin Luther, going up until today. He looks at the ideas which influenced the culture of the eras he covers. And with culture he covers everything from religion, sex, art, fashion, and cultural mores. Mores meaning the essence, the fashions, the fashionable intellectual concepts, and social experiments. It’s an expansive work, covering Erasmus, sexual mores of the Victorian era, when absurdity or relativism took over, and so on and so forth. Barzun’s prose is beautiful and shows his rumination. He pours out in a somewhat French style, where it seems like a ramble, but then he comes to a strong argument, principle, or rhetorical device. It’s a monster work, 877 pages. Yet it’s an exhaustive masterpiece of the modern West and a guide through the modern portion of the Great Books.

The Soul of Battle: From Ancient Times to the Present Day, How Three Great Liberators Vanquished Tyranny, Victor Davis Hanson

At one end psychological, another end revelatory on the nature of war, and at another eye-opening of human nature when a near-fanatical leader with a deep purpose and a democratic army outright emasculates the enemy through unconventional means. The book is in three parts: Hanson analyzes Epaminondas, William Tecumseh Sherman, and George Patton. The theme is an unlikely army, those who volunteered, marched and led by a near-fanatical leader who was often overlooked or disliked by more intellectual types, and how they not only defeated but emasculated the enemies. What makes each figure and the story intriguing is how each exposed the bluster of famous “warrior societies” as spineless. Sparta and Spartan warriors are still revered as a mighty warrior culture today, yet Epaminondas and his army had the men on the run and the women left to defend themselves, exposing the spinelessness. The Confederacy saw the Union as weak-willed and from a degenerate society, yet Sherman exposed southern aristocratic class as effete with his band of men. The Confederate women lambasted Sherman, yet the men were nowhere to be found, and if they did come to battle, Sherman’s fast-acting soldiers squashed them instantly. The last, the iconic George Patton, a well-read yet salty mind, learned quickly he had to expose and destroy the Nazi ideology. Patton was interesting since he was not “sober and judicious”; the sober and judicious types like Eisenhower held him back, which cost more lives in the end. But when Patton marched, he, like Epaminondas and Sherman, emasculated the Nazis. Also interesting, these three men, arguably wielding the most powerful soldiers at their helm, yet weeks after they were finished, all soldiers returned home to their normal lives. It’s this reality where Hanson shows the force capable in a democracy and those driven by a cause and led by a purposeful leader.

Jews vs. Rome; Ten Caesars, Barry Strauss

Barry Strauss has a rare talent. He writes history that’s accessible yet packed with depth and substance. Jews vs. Rome is a timely book regarding current affairs in Israel. Strauss covers how decisions of an emperor over two thousand years along with the Jewish response to that decision still reverberate today. Strauss offers clarity on a complex and confusing situation and insightful analysis of the Roman Empire.

Ten Caesars I read as a complement to Suetonius’s Lives of the Caesars. I wish I had read Ten Caesars first. It’s one of the best windows onto the Roman Empire. The ten biographical vignettes paint the culture, political mores, and social elements of the Roman Empire. Strauss also debunks popular theories and theses of how the Roman Empire fell, such as it was the Christians or it was the degeneracy. Ten Caesars delivers clarity. Strauss also tells of the power-broker women during the Roman Empire and how certain women played a key role in the empire’s politics. If there is one book to read to understand the Roman Empire and know why it fell, this is the one. Superb.

The Lives of the Caesars, Suetonius

The pick for the test launch of my book club. A handful of readers stuck through it till the end. Many had a tough time with it, not the book per se, as Tom Holland gifts readers a great translation, but they had a tough time with the nihilism, degeneracy, ennui, and cynicism. Each vignette never seems to get better, which makes for tough reading. Lives of the Caesars was written during the reign of Hadrian by one of Hadrian’s insiders, Suetonius. It’s twelve biographical vignettes. While it does contain what is likely some salacious rumors and accusations, it does show modern readers the kind of degeneracy and political chaos of the time. It’s a tough read on the human element, but it’s an important read to gain understanding of why indifference to human life, which social media (screens, apps, and internet too) seem to be causing. We value life today, but online, objectification is the norm combined with the vicariousness of the online world. This makes for a bizarre twist of treating ourselves or others as a brand and using cynical methods to attain those ends. We see similarities of it in Suetonius, which is a sobering reality.

Civilization: The West and the Rest, Niall Ferguson

I must admit, starting in mid- to late 2024 my sleep was taking a big hit from sleep apnea. I struggled reading. The most affected reads were Jacques Barzun (the first half) and this one by Ferguson. It all instantly turned around when I got my CPAP. I’m bummed that poor sleep sapped my reading of Civilization. Niall Ferguson is among my favorite writers and favorite historians. I will venture my best summary. Civilization analyzes why Western civilization, particularly Western democracies, became the world standard. He boils it down to six “killer applications”:

1. Competition

2. Science

3. Property rights

4. Medicine

5. The consumer society

6. The work ethic

The combination of these applications, and how they germinated and then evolved, all gave rise to the Western world as we know it. What I remember best, the cultural and political will combined with institutions complementing their growth was the secret sauce. It gave rise to what we enjoy today, the most affluent leisurely culture in history.

The Happiest Baby on the Block: The New Way to Calm Crying and Help Your Newborn Baby Sleep Longer, Harvey Karp, M.D.

Parenting advice is not my lane. I was not going to include this book until I saw goober influencer Nat Eliason hail the “cry it out” method for newborns on X and, according to Nat, that the galaxy-sized amount of evidence saying “cry it out” is detrimental is in fact wrong. What struck me most was the horrific advice in his replies, those defending him, and those calling out those who don’t use the “cry it out” method as weak, and that attending to the baby when it cries because it’s hardwired into humans is making an appeal to tradition fallacy. As a new dad, The Happiest Baby has been a godsend. It makes great sense; it’s intuitive; it’s empirical; and, like my theme, it grasps the nature of humans. It tells of the rudimentary language of babies which is no different now than it was 10,000 years ago, despite what the sciolist Eliason claims. If you’re a dad-to-be soon, or just are now, Happiest Baby is fantastic. It’s working for me and my wife; I can calm my daughter in an instant, and the methods are working at helping my daughter become a great sleeper. I know every baby is different, but the methods in the book work, and it helped me understand newborns.

Raising Mentally Strong Kids: How to Combine the Power of Neuroscience with Love and Logic® to Grow Confident, Kind, Responsible, and Resilient Children and Young Adults, Daniel G. Amen, M.D., and Charles Fay, PhD

My wife and I welcomed our daughter into the world on December 5, 2025. When we found out we were pregnant, I had a list of parenting books that were must-reads, all recommended by people I respect and who I observed had great kids. The kids were conscientious, well-behaved, happy, and confident. The Love and Logic® method has long been recommended to me and my wife, and we each came across it serendipitously: a good friend of mine was raised with its principles, and a friend of my wife raised her twin daughters with it. My good friend, writer and esteemed psychologist, Dr. Shawn Smith, also recommended Love and Logic®. The more I looked into it, the more my wife looked into it, we decided its principles are what we’re using as our North Star to raise our daughter.

Raising Mentally Strong Kids is from the Love and Logic® school. This book was cowritten by neuroscientist Daniel Amen and Love and Logic® head Charles Fay. Amen offers empirical backing to the Love and Logic principles. When I first looked at Love and Logic® it made crystal-clear sense to me, not on a common-sense level, but on an intuitive level. The basic principle is a loving and firm style of parenting, that of a consultant. You provide boundaries and standards for your kids, yet you also let them take risks, make mistakes, and offer guidance in the form of letting them make choices to help them sort through life. My dad did a lot of this style of parenting. For instance, if I was upset at something, he would say, “That’s too bad. It must stink, huh? Well you’re my kid; you’ll figure it out. Any idea what you’re gonna do?” Little did my dad know he was fathering me with principles which neuroscience backs up. This book is for parents, yet it’s a captivating look into brain psychology and human wiring.

The Collapse of Parenting; Girls on the Edge; Why Gender Matters, Leonard Sax, PhD

The Collapse of Parenting could be enjoyed by anyone, not just parents. Sax illuminates the rising anxiety, the transgender nonsense, and the rising depression among Gen Z and the younger millennials. But he goes back far on parenting to give us a broad look. He, like Love and Logic®, recommends authoritative parenting (loving and firm) and shows why authoritarian, helicopter, and passive parenting are detrimental. Authoritative parenting: kids need structure, standards, accountability, and a balance with free play. He is adamant against screens and gives eye-opening evidence on the danger of screens, in sum they’re abhorrent for children and teens. Combined with either helicopter parenting (or sometimes therapeutic parenting) or authoritarian parenting, screens are a recipe for disaster. Sax’s book reveals a lot of what’s going on in our modern culture. For instance, why did many young voters in New York City go for socialist Zohran Mamdani? Many were raised in a therapeutic helicopter parent or daycare environment, combined with a phone-based childhood instead of what we used to have for thousands of years, a play-based childhood, and the results are catastrophic. Sax at times can get sweeping with his style, yet he’s passionate and right. He, I say, offers the big picture while Love and Logic® gives the granular steps.

Why Gender Matters and Girls on the Edge went more into the specifics on human wiring. Sax shows us that despite what leftists claim, girls and boys are wired differently. That girls’ psychology is different than boys’ psychology, coinciding with the biological differences. Why Gender Matters covers this reality in detail. Girls on the Edge focuses on girls and a lot of the how-to of how to raise a resilient girl with a strong sense of self. A huge key: keep her off social media and iPhones, Androids, or what have you. What I also appreciated is how a father needs to chat with his daughter with honesty. For instance, the “talk” isn’t a one-time thing, nor is it a “don’t let boys touch you” as that only sets her up for failure. With anything, you need to as a father (and mother) articulate why, articulate your positions, principles, in a clear manner. And the big thing is, regardless of what she does, she needs to know she is loved. That if a mistake happens, you might be upset, but she knows she is loved. Sax is a much-needed voice countering the racket of terrible parenting advice out there.

Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets Every Father Should Know, Meg Meeker, MD

Not as principled or empirical as Sax or Love and Logic®, and at times a bit moralizing. Yet the core message: love your daughter, show up for her, and be involved in her life. When I attended my uncle’s funeral in Florida, my cousin, his daughter, got up and gave a touching eulogy. Her core theme: he showed up. My cousin is a testimonial of good parenting and solid fathering. Most assign qualities like “smart” and “successful” as a way of saying someone is a good person. But those, while well-intentioned, are shallow physical descriptions. My cousin is both of those things, but most important, the good fathering showed up in the metaphysical, she’s conscientious, has a strong sense of self, she’s resilient, and is a great mother of three boys and a great wife; her values are clear, on her sleeve, and she lives them. As she gave her touching eulogy of how her dad showed up and was always there, Meeker’s book surfaced in my mind. Meeker says that the most important man in a woman’s life is her father. That at the end of a daughter’s life, she will think of her father. That resonated. Despite some of the moralizing, the overall message to show up for your daughter, to have standards, to even be a little crazy and interview her suitors, stood out to me.

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Reflecting on 2025

Goals like reading seventy-five books I reject. I find those goals cynical, signaling, and arbitrary. It’s hitting a number to hit a number in order to get some kind of validation. I want to read each book well. That’s my reading compass, and the compass with my site.

Inspired by a Ted Gioia piece I worked on engaging more in the marginalia, and it paid off. I tried his essay part, but it took too long between books. When I got my CPAP and my apnea sorted, it felt like my reading boosted.

My aim with subscribers and paid members is to inspire better reading. Better reading comes from enjoyment, a willingness to engage which comes from asking questions and articulating impressions in the margins, and a willingness to reflect a little. Reading to seek “insight” or “lessons” to better yourself, while well-intentioned, dulls comprehension. It dulls it by killing enjoyment, and it dulls it by leading the reader to commit a motivational exegesis of the book. In other words, coming in with preconceived notions of what lessons to seek, the lessons adhering to self-development clichés, then forcing sentences to fit the preconceived lessons to feel as if you’re gaining insight or to tell yourself you’re reading correctly. This is done as a result of mirroring other “successful people reading for insight.” It’s done to associate oneself with someone successful and by doing so hoping to raise one’s own prestige. There’s a name for it, and it’s a natural human impulse: prestige bias.

That I mention because as I continue my journey into a one-man review of books, I still get copywriters and people from internet marketing asking for the pop self-help and biz development styled tips, tricks, and methods. I still piss off hustletards when I relay my dislike of Atomic Habits. Not that the advice in it is bad, but the advice is nothing new, and I found the prose like all self-development prose: stilted, boring, and insufferable. My lane is not find the best lessons from a book for B2B sales or how to extract secret wisdom from a book to become an ubermensch. Both of those concepts are fantasies. My goal is better reading.

I moved to Substack in 2025, and it was the right move. I’m still figuring it out, but I enjoy it over here; it gave clarity to my one-man review of books angle.

What’s Ahead for 2026

My book club will be properly launched. The first big official topic: Niccolò Machiavelli. I’m going to read both The Prince and The Discourses. And I will likely follow it up with the famous work of political theory: The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom by James Burnham. More on that later.

The book club will venture into classics, topics, themes, authors, and modern works. I like clusters; many authors or themes will be done in clusters. But this coming year I’m eyeing for the book club:

• Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville

• The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Joseph Campbell

• Defenders of the West; Sword and Scimitar; The Two Swords of Christ, Raymond Ibrahim (trilogy of his work)

• Andrew Roberts, which biography I’m unsure, but I’m eyeing him

• Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevsky

• The Children of Men, P. D. James

• Scoop, Evelyn Waugh

It’s not set in stone. I read a lot by feel. But those are the ones I’m eyeing. And with America’s 250th anniversary, some American-themed books might take precedence:

• A Patriot’s History of the United States, Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen (with the complementary reader book)

• A History of the American People, Paul Johnson

• The Good Country, Jon K. Lauck

• The Last King of America, Andrew Roberts

• Ethnic America, Thomas Sowell

I did do some livestreams on Substack. My first was, well, terrible, but I loved it. I’ve been teasing video now for a long time. I was directionless at first when I had the videographer here last year. I didn’t like what I cut. But after doing the livestreams and being on Substack I have direction. My YouTube page will go up this year. And I will do more livestreams with my subscribers.

I’m also going to release some articles, inspired by what I read, that touch upon modern culture. Since I want to grow and reach deep thinkers, and since I’m unapologetically conservative/right-wing, I’m hoping to be a one-man review of books for conservatives, as there are not many sources out there. I don’t speak much on politics, but it does come out. And on the right, there is a rich intellectual history. I’m not an intellectual, yet I hope to be a conduit into some great reads for my right-wing brethren.

I will also have a new series for paid members, Letters to my Daughter. These will be personal memoir type pieces. They will entail my reflections, observations, and perspectives of life, and are intended to be read by my daughter when she’s an adult.

And since I’m working on growing on Substack, a large majority of my culture articles will be free, and the bookclub will be for the paid members.

I wish you a great 2026 and a great year of reading in 2026. If you’d like to be a part of the book club, then upgrade your membership. The more involvement the more I will open up to discuss whatever I’m reading.

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