Politically Incorrect Before It Was Cool  In my recent emails to you, I have relayed a two-prong battle that the NR enterprise is currently waging against political correctness and restrictions on free speech. One battle is in the courts as National Review fights back against the Michal Mann lawsuit. According to First Amendment jurisprudence as it has existed for decades, the Mann suit should get tossed out forthwith . . . but not without significant legal costs for NR. The other battle is for the hearts and minds of college students on campuses across America. The Left knows that it is easy for facts, logic, and the law to give way to political fervor. It seems that not a week goes by without some lunacy in the name of political correctness being reported from a college campus, often highlighting the intentional suppression of free speech. That is why the Institute launched NRI On Campus and deploys NR talent like NRI Fellow David French to valiantly fight in the battle of ideas on campuses. Despite our challenges, I am encouraged. Donald Trump's victory in November represented a stinging rebuke to the idea that we must limit our expression to suit the dictates of the media and the rest of the perpetual outrage machine. But fighting PC takes more than one election; it requires the constant effort of independent-minded writers and thinkers puncturing its pretensions, fearlessly speaking the truth, and demonstrating what reasoned argument, intellectual integrity, and wit truly are and why they are so important. This is precisely the project of National Review, and of the National Review Institute, the 501(c)(3) nonprofit that owns the magazine and it is why I hope that you will consider supporting National Review Institute or NR, or both. In fact, National Review has been fighting PC for six decades. We were politically incorrect before political incorrectness was cool. Our attitude has always been if something needs saying, we say it . . . regardless of the consequences. * When the Washington establishment all agreed that so-called comprehensive immigration reform was just and righteous altogether, NR opposed this fundamentally wrong-headed legislation hammer and tongs. * When transgenderism became the new rage, NR spoke the truth about the immutability of gender and the stupidity of the bathroom wars, and caught hell for it. * When Black Lives Matter became the hot new thing, NR defended the police with all our might and exposed the lies and folly of a movement that we said would end up costing more black lives. * During the eight-year-long assault on religious liberty that the country has endured, NR has relentlessly defended the nuns, bakers, and religious employers who have been targeted by government for the offense of exercising their conscience rights as they see fit. * On life, NR has been a consistent and powerful journalistic voice for the unborn across the decades. We are making it a mission now to push back against the Left's constant hysteria as the Trump administration begins, thankfully, to curtail the country's abortion regime. * And when it comes to the judiciary, NR has a longstanding record of supporting constitutionalist jurists like Judge Gorsuch and calling out and fighting overreaching judges of the sort who inhabit the lawless, not to say absurd, 9th Circuit. As always, our true North will be the Constitution, limited government, individual rights, the national interest, a common culture, and the ideals that always have made and always will make this country great. Thank you for standing with us as we stand up for our shared principles -- the principles that make our country great. I hope that you will contribute today. Gratefully, Rich Lowry
Editor in Chief, National Review P.S. All contributions to National Review Institute are tax-deductible. | 
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