“Culture” on The Daily Caller

Barney Frank recently compared the GOP presidential candidates to “Wizard of Oz” characters. It got me thinking about how the education establishment might accommodate the analogy. (more)

Conservatives are up in arms that a film celebrating the Navy Seals who killed Osama bin Laden will hit theaters less than a month before the 2012 presidential election. (more)

At Thursday night’s Republican presidential debate in Ames, Iowa, both candidates and moderators steered strangely clear of one of the most important questions facing leaders of any political party. (more)

Now is a time to give voice to the hard, embarrassing truths. One of the hardest and most embarrassing to confess is that the democratization of higher education has been a failure. (more)

It’s time to abolish country music. Just ban it outright. It has become a toxin in American culture, retarding the cerebellum of the body politic. (more)

I can name a lot of liberal pop-culture blogs and magazines. My favorite is probably Slate. I don’t have a favorite conservative pop-culture blog or magazine, though. Perhaps that’s because so few conservative pop-culture blogs and magazines exist. In fact, one of the most obvious differences between the universe of liberal commentary and the universe of conservative commentary is that cultural analysis pervades the former but is almost absent from the latter. (more)

In his encyclical Fides et Ratio (“Faith and Reason”), John Paul II made the following observation: “Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to contemplation of the truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth — in a word, to know Himself — so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves.” (more)

Marc Jacobs is a brand filled with grunge and glam, and now, allegedly, a sexually exploitative employee. (more)

Yesterday, I caught an early viewing of Atlas Shrugged: Part 1, the film adaptation of Ayn Rand’s famous novel. I went in with deep reservations, but I came away impressed. (more)

Where was the love at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference? (more)

Cue “Auld Lang Syne,” but it looks like these old acquaintances won’t soon be forgot. (more)

Almost 25 years ago, a catastrophe befell American conservatism. University of Chicago professor Allan Bloom wrote about rock and roll. (more)

What kind of a person allegedly urinates in a convenience store freezer, ruining $508 worth of cookies, bagels, and other baked goods? (more)

Leonardo Da Vinci’s 500-year-old Renaissance masterpiece has long been steeped in mystery, and even today the true identity of the woman with the alluring smile still far from certain. (more)

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth. And He created man. And God gave man free will, a sense of morality, initiative, ambition, and other characteristics essential to survival in a barren world. These characteristics allowed man not just to survive, but to flourish. And flourish he did, not just as individuals but for the “greater good.” Man cared not just for himself but he provided for his family and, when possible, for the less-able. (more)

American culture is complex, but most can agree that America is a culture of self-reliance and self-determination. These ingrained values are closely linked to past political movements. From the Women’s Suffrage Movement to the Civil Rights Movement, their origins can be traced to a clash between the political system and Americans’ most deeply held values. (more)

Entertainment Weekly has ranked the top 15 entertainers of the year in their latest issue, on stands now. (more)

(AFP) – More than 1,000 North Koreans have been jailed for secretly watching South Korean TV shows and films as the communist regime battles an inflow of foreign culture, a Seoul-based defector group said Monday. (more)

Dog bites that send humans to the hospital are on the upswing, according to new data. The number of people admitted to the hospital because of dog bites grew by 86% from 1993 to 2008 — 5,100 cases in 1993 and 9,500 in 2008. (more)

With moviegoers still hung over from the glut of Thanksgiving movies, only one new picture will try to whet appetites this weekend. (more)