George Will

In today's episode we're joined by a writer who has come since his early days in journalism become one of the signature voices of American conservative opinion. For more than thirty years, George Will's views — framed in reference to works of 18th century philosophy and the action on the modern baseball diamond — appeared in a biweekly Newsweek column that became part of the reading life of millions. The recipient of a 1977 Pulitzer prize for political commentary, Will has like many of his peers made the leap from newsprint to small screen, but he's also the prolific author of books on politics and philosophy such as Statecraft as Soulcraft, and The Pursuit of Virtue and Other Tory Notions, but also multiple books on the sport he loves, most notably his bestseller Men at Work: the Craft of Baseball. But Will's new book The Conservative Sensibility is, he told us, something of his life's work, and he sat down a few weeks before the publication of The Conservative Sensibility to talk with us about what, exactly, he means by that imposing phrase.