Monthly Archives: June 2013

Erdogan’s “Interest-rate Lobby” and Other Stories

Posted on June 29, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Cross-posted on the Corner: So what have those scamps from Turkey’s “mildly Islamist” AK (the Economist) been talking about lately? Here (reported in Hurriyet) is President Abdullah Gül, an individual generally seen as more emollient than thuggish Prime Minister Erdogan: … Continue reading →

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Luke 6: 42

Posted on June 29, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

The Guardian (2008): The Roman Catholic Church is calling for the effective closure of secretive tax havens as a ‘necessary first step’ to restore the global economy to health. In a policy paper from the Holy See, Pope Benedict pins … Continue reading →

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Free Markets, No Thanks

Posted on June 23, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Barbara Ward (1914-81), a former foreign editor of the Economist and much more besides, plays an important part in Rupert Darwall’s The Age of Global Warming, a new book that is, among other things, a fascinating intellectual and political history … Continue reading →

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Of Monks and Monetary Union

Posted on June 23, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Cross-posted on the Corner: The New York Times ran this oddly revealing story a day or so back: [L]ate last year, the National Bank of Slovakia announced that the European Commission, the union’s executive arm, had ordered it to remove … Continue reading →

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Rick Perry’s “Merry Christmas”

Posted on June 16, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

MSN reports: AUSTIN, Texas — Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Thursday signed a law protecting Christmas and other holiday celebrations in Texas public schools from legal challenges — but also stressed that freedom of religion is not the same thing … Continue reading →

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Symbiosis

Posted on June 13, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Vladimir Putin’s attempt to blend social conservatism and Russian Orthodoxy into the mix that is (nominally: the reality is rather grubbier) the ideology of his regime continues. The Guardian has the details. First, we have an unpleasant piece of anti-homosexual … Continue reading →

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Awe Shucks

Posted on June 11, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

There’s quite a bit of vitriol splashed around in this new post by Sam Harris, and, as so often with his work, there’s also much that’s worth discussing at length, but for now let’s just note that the point that … Continue reading →

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Tyndale & More

Posted on June 6, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Here’s Melvyn Bragg writing in the Daily Telegraph on the topic of William Tyndale (and Thomas More): After almost 500 years, Tyndale continues to command our language and when we reach for the clinching phrase, we still reach out for … Continue reading →

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Science & Conspiracy

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

Daniel Pipes: The polio disease was on the verge of eradication when Ibrahim Datti Ahmed, president of the Supreme Council for Sharia in Nigeria and a physician, suggested at about this time in 2003 that the vaccination program in his … Continue reading →

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The Empty Church

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Andrew Stuttaford

The Welsh poet R.S. Thomas was an Anglophobic Anglican vicar with a hatred of modernity, but he can be forgiven a lot for the first four lines of his poem, The Empty Church, singled out in this recent article in … Continue reading →

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