Stephen Law

I am glad to see I am not the only one to be disturbed by Gordon Brown's enthusiasm for the writing of Gertude Himmelfarb, right-wing neo-con and Victorian-style moralist, wife of Irving Kristol ("the Godfather of neo-conservativism") and mother of William Kristol (editor of Murdoch's neo-con magazine The Weekly Standard ) [for wikipedia entry on this Fox-News-style publication, go here ]. I devoted some of my book The War For Children's Minds to exposing the feebleness of Himmelfarb's thinking on the social need for traditional, authority-based religion (in my view, she's a light-weight: her books are heavy on quotes and historical references, which can disguise the flimsiness of her actual argument). I like Gordon Brown, as it happens, but his enthusiasm for Himmelfarb's reactionary writing is a bit worrying. A typical bit of Himmelfarb: [i]t is not only conservatives... who now deplore the breakdown of the family; liberals do as well. [Few today...