I was recently sickened to hear of the threat of complete destruction of the ancient ruins of Palmyra at the hands of the Islamic State. That threat is very real and has been publicized. However, over much of the past century and up to today, a much greater threat has successfully destroyed perhaps thousands of times more irreplaceable cultural treasures than ISIS ever will. And even when some architectural treasures have been protected, Modernists have ruined the neighborhood atmospheres by inserting their horrid ugly boxes into nearly every historic area they can find. Here is one of the more recent examples. In New York, the Drake Hotel (left) was built in 1926 and demolished in 2007 to make way for 432 Park Avenue (right). (Even in the picture on the left, you can see that the Drake's neighbors have long since been replaced by uninspiring Modernism.) In a shocking display of audacity, the stark 432 Park Avenue was even made taller than the Empire State Building. A major ...