Endlessly Relevant

I've already mentioned this book in a previous blog post, but this blogger's discussion of David G. Post's In Search of Jefferson's Moose is so interesting I feel compelled to point it out.  If this subject interests you in the least, it's well worth a look.

Although I love a good Jefferson quote as much as the next person, taking a sentence or two out of one of Jefferson's letters or other writings and casting it up for everybody to marvel at Jefferson's wit only allows a superficial appreciation of Jefferson's thoughts.  The thing that I find so intriguing about this book - others of its sort - is that it examines Jefferson's thoughts and writings in a very in-depth fashion, and finds them to be a useful addition to debates about modern issues.  The body of Jefferson's writings is incredibly vast, and, while there's certainly many things about which people might (and have) argued that he was wrong, wrongheaded, or worse, he was an astute thinker and an eloquent writer.  It's fascinating and exciting to see people using his writings to inform modern debates in a meaningful way.