The Return of the Spectator

I just found out about this American Prowler, which looks like an alumni association of the old American Spectator, the bandwagon and brainchild of R. Emmett Tyrrell’s. I used to like TAS way back when it was a large format thing on cheap paper based out of beautiful Bloomington, Indiana. Then it moved to DC and lost its unique look, got too big for its britches, tried a little too hard to get Clinton’s scalp and then — went away. Tyrrell’s book the Conservative Crackup was well written, with nice vignettes of the Conservative old-timers he’d met, like Claire Booth Luce, William Casey and Luigi Barzini. The book was prescient in that it accurately predicted a period of time in the wilderness for conservatism, which did happen. It also depicted, between the lines, how he left the good-hearted and wise people in the heartland, got seduced by the trappings of DC, and allowed his marriage to break up. But this relatively new website is pretty decent, and it is great to see this gang back under one bigtop.