Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Public Policy

February 18, 2013

Conscious Capitalism and the Higher Purpose of Business

In 1978, John Mackey was 25-year-old college dropout who believed that democratic socialism was a more “just” economic system than democratic capitalism. But his views soon changed after he and his girlfriend borrowed $45,000 from family and friends to open a small vegetarian grocery store in Austin, Texas. Continue Reading...
February 14, 2013

Karate Chopping Lil’ Wayne

It is arguable that celebrated rapper Lil’ Wayne has completely lost his mind. In his newly released, grossly pathetic song “Karate Chop” the rapper spits in the face of the family of civil rights martyr Emmett Till by juxtaposing a reference to sexual conquest with the brutal race-driven murder of the teenager in 1955. Continue Reading...
February 13, 2013

The Minimum Wage Workforce Myth

During his recent State of the Union address, President Obama argued for increasing the federal minimum wage: Even with the tax relief we put in place, a family with two kids that earns the minimum wage still lives below the poverty line. Continue Reading...
February 13, 2013

Rationing by Rudeness

In “The Moral Meanings of Markets,” in the latest issue of the Journal of Markets & Morality, Ryan Langrill and Virgil Henry Storr argue that markets ought to be understood and defended not simply as amoral, or merely moral, but as robustly moral spaces. Continue Reading...
February 08, 2013

How a Democratic Education Reformer Became a Supporter of School Vouchers

Michelle Rhee isn’t afraid of controversy. In 2007 she took the job of chancellor of Washington, D.C. public schools, one of the worst districts in the country. Given a free hand by the city’s mayor, she instituted a number of reforms that, while modest and sensible (accountability, standardized testing), were considered “radical” by many residents of D.C. Continue Reading...
February 08, 2013

Northern Ireland: Coming to America?

After decades of bloody turmoil between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland, on March 26, 2007, Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams, sitting side-by-side at Stormont confirmed that power-sharing will return to Northern Ireland on May 8th of that same year. Continue Reading...