Letters to a Young Conservative

George Packer, in The Nation, shockingly pans TDR alum Dinesh D’Souza’s new book Letters to a Young Conservative. One particularly choice quote: “one can imagine an intelligent conservative like David Brooks begging liberals to find their voices so that conservatism doesn’t stiffen like the liberalism to which D’Souza and his pals at Dartmouth delivered a few swift kicks on the eve of the Reagan revolution.”

The Nation really seems to have missed the point on this one. The book doesn’t seem to have been meant as to meet the sort of standard Packer argues it misses. Something like Lionel Trilling’s The Liberal Imagination isn’t a fair point of comparison but of a different genre altogether. The mismatch is obvious and just makes The Nation look silly and the review utterly uncredible.