The politics of left and right are rooted in two very different accounts of human nature. Conservatives adopt a tragic view of existence, while it is axiomatic for progressives that we are born intrinsically good and corrupted by society. David Starkey, writing in The Critic, argues that the principle of humankind’s inherent goodness is unsupported by the empirical facts.

Toppling a Communist Empire for $2.7 Million
Though widely thought of as focused on waterboarding terrorists or poisoning foreign potentates, it was by smuggling paper that the CIA achieved its most monumental triumph. R.M. Gerecht in a book review for The Washington Free Beacon charts how the late Cold War-era operation to flood Poland with Western books, magazines, printing supplies and audio recordings fatally weakened the country’s Communist dictatorship, setting the stage for the downfall of the entire Soviet empire. Total cost: US$2.7 million.


