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January 07, 2013

Review: Alan Wallace on ‘Becoming Europe’

Alan Wallace, editorial writer at the Pittsburgh Tribune, reviewed Sam Gregg’s new book Becoming Europe. In his article, “Where America is, where it’s going,” Wallace notes that: Americans increasingly say their nation‘s becoming more like Europe; the Acton Institute‘s research director, [Sam Gregg] tackles that trend and its dangers, which he thinks are greater than many of them realize. Continue Reading...
January 07, 2013

Free Speech Still Not Free on College Campuses

Even though the crowds stop paying attention, most fads never completely disappear. Just like Beanie Babies, Furbies, grunge music never really went away, some other 1990s fads—like campus speech codes and absurd political correctness—still haunt us: From free speech codes and zones that quarantine unpopular speech to freshman orientation programs that force a left-wing world view on impressionable students to outright censorship and threats by Administrators to expel students and fire professors, Lukianoff’s new book, Unlearning Liberty, details dozens of blatant violations of the First Amendment and due process. Continue Reading...
January 07, 2013

Victory Against HHS Mandate in Missouri

Paul and Henry Griesedieck, owners of American Pulverizer Company of St. Louis and pro-life Christians, made a stand against the Health and Human Services Mandate and won, for now.  The HHS mandate requires employers and health insurers to provide employees with health insurance that includes coverage of contraceptives and abortifacient drugs which terminate early pregnancies. Continue Reading...
January 04, 2013

Pope Benedict slams capitalism?

A friend sent me a link to a Reuters story on Pope Benedict XVI’s New Year’s homily. The article carried this headline: “Pope hopes for 2013 of peace, slams unbridled capitalism.” Continue Reading...
January 04, 2013

There Are No Ideas Too Silly for Politicians

Remember last month when we discussed the “platinum coin option”? If you’ve forgotten already, it was the ridiculous idea that President Obama could have the U.S. Mint produce a pair of trillion-dollar platinum coins and deposit them with the Federal Reserve to pay off the national deficit. Continue Reading...
January 04, 2013

Combatting Textbook Tyranny

In addition to my post in late November about the textbook bubble (spurred by this post from AEI’s Mark Perry), the Atlantic‘s Jordan Weissmann joins the discussion, asking, “Why Are College Textbooks So Absurdly Expensive?” Continue Reading...
January 04, 2013

‘The Most Radical Form of Privatisation’

When Christians are tempted to despair over our seeming inability to make significant cultural changes in America, there is one word that should give us reason to be optimistic: homeschooling. As The Economist notes: Three decades ago home schooling was illegal in 30 states. Continue Reading...
January 04, 2013

Human Population and Material Prosperity

Following up a bit on last week’s discussions of population and prosperity, I thought this section (44) from Caritas in Veritate to be a good summary statement of the various dynamics at play: Morally responsible openness to life represents a rich social and economic resource. Continue Reading...