Literary giant Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn died at almost 90 years of age today. His son Yermolai said the cause was a heart ailment. Solzehitsyn was a Russian writer who defied the Communist regime and wrote of its horrors. He first gained acclaim in 1962 for his acclaimed book novel about a prison camp inmate, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. He later wrote The Gulag Archipelago: 1918-1956 a monumental account of the Soviet labor camp system where, according to Mr. Solzhenitsyn’s estimation, some 60 million people entered during the 20th century. American diplomat George F. Kennan called the book “the greatest and most powerful single indictment of a political regime ever to be leveled in modern times.”
The New York Times posts a seven-page article commemorating Solzhenitsyn’s life and work. Rick Brookhiser adds a tribute. John Piper shares his thanksgiving for Mr. Solzhenitsyn.

For the sake of full-disclosure: I agree with Dick Morris and Eileen McGann that McCain’s recent negative Obama ads (Celebrity, The One) are silly. Though perhaps a bit humorous, they reduce the dignity of John McCain (twenty-five plus years of public service in the House and the Senate, former POW who refused early release on principle, enduring torture). Furthermore, they do not deliver the knock-out punch which McCain absolutely must deliver. It is not that I disapprove of negative ads in general; I simply believe they should be based on substantive differences on important issues (energy independence, taxes, etc.) or a comparison of voting records. And with a candidate who supports raising capital gains tax rates “for purposes of fairness” (even though an estimated 100,000,000 Americans own stocks and would be affected, and even when reminded that, historically, such measures tend to reduce tax revenue), who called Iran “a tiny nation that couldn’t hurt the US much”, who wants to eviscerate Bush’s popular domestic security initiatives and repeal both the partial birth abortion ban as well as the Defense of Marriage Act (passed by an overwhelming majority of Congress and signed into law by President Clinton), there is so much to talk about.
That said, I do think Obama has a strain of hubris and that some of his soaring, eloquent rhetoric is inflated. His astonishing array of flip-flops immediately after winning the primary, coupled with his denial that they were flip-flops (“I’ve always said that…”) were downright insulting. McCain, of course, switched his view on off-shore drilling but (a) admitted he had changed his position and (b) gave reasons for it. I find that human, not insulting.
It will be interesting to see how Obama explains his reversal on off-shore drilling in the days to come.
Update: Peter Wehner offers a positive perspective on McCain’s “The One” ad.