• John Tinnell, “Tweeting @ Thoreau

• Theodore Kupfer, “No, George Ciccariello-Maher Doesn’t Believe in Academic Freedom

• Q&A with Alan Jacobs, “How American Politics Became So Exhausting

• Heather Mac Donald, “Standing on the Shoulders of Diversocrats

• John Gray, “Forgetfulness: the Dangers of a Modern Culture That Wages War on its Own Past

I thought this was too stereotypical to be true. A young British out-and-proud Stalinist who writes for numerous lefty media outlets turns out to be a boorish, borderline rapist who furthermore brags about being a rich kid living in his parents’ mansion? It seemed like too much of a desperately contrived plot twist. Until he owned up to it. (Just goes to show the truth of the old saying…)

• What to make of the absurd Ta-Nehisi Coates phenomenon? Oliver Traldi, and Loury & McWhorter.

• Kyle Smith, “Mob Rule In the Book World