Author Archives: Andrew Stuttaford

On the Economics of the Pill

Posted on March 10, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Interesting report here in the New York Times: The recent controversy over contraception and health insurance has focused on who should pay for the pill. But there is a wealth of economic evidence about the value of the pill – … Continue reading →

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Shocking News

Posted on March 10, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Via the Washington Post, but even so this is not, perhaps, the most surprising news: The fragile gains Republicans had been making among female voters have been erased, a shift that has coincided with what has become a national shouting … Continue reading →

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Olympic Fun

Posted on March 6, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Cross-posted on the Corner. Well, here’s a shocker, the Saudi theocracy (and like-minded Brunei and Qatar) will not be sending any female athletes to the 2012 Olympics. As Time’s Nina Burleigh points out: It’s not because Saudi women athletes don’t … Continue reading →

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A Natural Phenomenon

Posted on March 4, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

I’ve no particular enthusiasm for the ‘New Atheists’ (they are far too religious for my tastes), but, in its combination of incoherence and hysteria, this attack on them by Bryan Appleyard (H/T Andrew Sullivan) takes some beating. Here’s an extract … Continue reading →

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Those in Glass Houses

Posted on March 4, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Britain’s coalition government intends to legalize same-sex marriage. That a high-ranking Roman Catholic priest is opposed to these plans is neither surprise nor drama, but Scotland’s Cardinal Keith O’Brien could, I think, have used better words than these to attack … Continue reading →

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London in the 21st Century

Posted on March 3, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, here’s Damian Thompson with a terrible story about superstition and murder in contemporary London: A 15-year-old boy is tortured to death for witchcraft. In London. In 2010. And the private reaction of police and social … Continue reading →

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Against Agape (Restaurants) and All That

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Writing in the Spectator, A.N. Wilson, a former atheist, responds to de Botton: De Botton has little chance of success — either in starting a chain of Agape restaurants, or in persuading bigots on either side of this argument. Meanwhile, … Continue reading →

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Agape at Agape

Posted on February 20, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Writing in the weekend’s Wall Street Journal, cuddly atheist Alain de Botton offers up a vision of hell with his proposal for a series of atheist “Agape” restaurants (God help us) at which secular folk could come to share in … Continue reading →

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Tests

Posted on February 19, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Via CBS: [Santorum] lambasted the president’s health care law requiring insurance policies to include free prenatal testing, “because free prenatal testing ends up in more abortions and therefore less care that has to be done because we cull the ranks … Continue reading →

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“Gone from the world of Christianity as I see it…”

Posted on February 18, 2012 by Andrew Stuttaford

Say what you will about Santorum, it’s difficult to argue that he is a man who succumbs to the vapid ecumenicism that dominates so much of the discourse we hear these days from the, uh, “faith community”. Here he is … Continue reading →

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