The Permanent Things Are Here to Stay

James Piereson reviews a book that "argues that the conservative movement collapsed under the presidency of George W. Bush, and that Barack Obama’s victory in 2008 marked the beginning of a new liberal era in American politics" — Is conservatism dead?"Conservatism," says the reviewer, "is now a permanent and enduring aspect of American political life" and "its enduring appeal among Americans" is due to the fact that it "deploys the principles of tradition, reason, and orderly change in defense of liberal institutions—the Constitution, representative government, liberty and equal rights, the rule of law."

David Vincent reviews "a new book demonstrating the fallacy of the media's view that religion is in terminal decline" — Demise of religion exaggerated. The book notes that "outside a few developed nations, particularly in Europe, religious faith has not only been growing, but growing rapidly" and "challenges the assumption that many people in developed countries have been brought up with -- 'the more modern a country gets, the less religious it gets, the more secular it gets.'"