Running Commentary: The Contentious Magazine That Transformed the Jewish Left into the Neoconservative Right »

Benjamin Balint has written for the Wall Street Journal, the American Scholar, the Weekly Standard, Policy Review, Haaretz, the Forward, the Claremont Review of Books, and Commentary, where he served as an editor from 2001 to 2004. Originally from Seattle, he earned a master’s degree in philosophy at the University of Washington. Balint is currently a fellow at the Hudson Institute.

The story of the changing Jewish relationship with America—from World War II to the neo-conservatives—as reflected in the surprising evolution of an uncommonly influential magazine

Publishers Weekly

Former editor of Commentary, Balint introduces a guide of the magazine's evolution with a primary focus on Jewish history from WWI to the present, with parallel Commentary articles and writers providing crucial historical markers. The Holocaust gets extensive coverage, both through the eyes of its victims and of Commentary's editors and writers, complete with early critiques of the ignorance that created and fed the WWII machine. Balint ties the growth of the magazine to the influx of Jews to America following that war. As refuges built new communities, Commentary widened its focus from the Jewish religion, printing articles that expressed pride in Judaism and patriotism for America, making it acceptable for Jewish immigrants, who were ready to shed the past because of the extensive Nazi hatred, to embrace American culture while maintaining their Jewish identity and religion. Readers will appreciate this rare behind-the-scenes look into a prolific magazine that helped provide a positive outlet and shape a new community after an unthinkable atrocity.