Ross Douthat

For the first year of the second Trump presidency, Vice President JD Vance served primarily as the White House's designated tough guy. Rather than a softener of Trumpian harshness, he was charged with being (or chose to be) tougher than the president himself, whether that meant publicly pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy or defending the Minneapolis immigration crackdown or making a symbolic flight to Greenland, the frozen object of the president's desire.

For the first year of the second Trump presidency, Vice President JD Vance served primarily as the White House's designated tough guy.

By For the first year of the second Trump presidency, Vice President JD Vance served primarily as the White House's designated tough guy.

Early in the Cold War, even as the United States and the Soviet Union engaged in a relentless nuclear arms race, they treated nuclear technology as a tool of soft power and diplomacy -- something to share and export, a seal on alliances and a token of friendship.

It’s the film that launched a million hot takes. Christopher Nolan’s film is perfectly calibrated for the contemporary culture war.

Christopher Nolan's “The Odyssey” is the blockbuster that launched a million takes. The interpretations crowd my social media feed like Agamemnon's assembled ships at Aulis.

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Where does the side of the angels really lie?

I wrote my first movie review for National Review as an intern in the summer of 2001.