Category Archives: Uncategorized

America’s unique advantage: religious faith?

On a recent shuttle van ride from the Los Angeles International Airport, I directed the African driver to pause before turning left into a blind intersection.  Instead, he barreled across without looking.  Not to worry, he said, I’m a professional … Continue reading

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Government jobs: of the productive, for the unproductive?

“An incarceration program is not an employment program,” announced New York Governor Andrew Cuomo earlier this year, in justification of his recently announced plan to close seven New York state prisons.   So true, and the argument made by the local … Continue reading

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Happy Independence Day!

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Making the invisible visible: cuts to government social programs

Here is a rule of thumb regarding government social programs: You usually learn about them only when their budgets are reduced.  At that point, you hear about draconian cuts to essential services that you didn’t even know existed.  It has … Continue reading

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The superficiality of ‘pop-libertarianism’

I’m sympathetic to a lot of the specific policy prescriptions of publications like Reason. Though I’m no philosophical libertarian, I converge with libertarians when it comes to attitudes on specific issues. But outside of think tanks like Cato a lot … Continue reading

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A star is born?

It will be interesting to see if Michele Bachmann’s media quasi-luster lasts. Liberals in particular seem to praise her as kooky but effective in getting her “malevolent message” out. There’s no contempt and condescension in the aversion. Yet.

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Magical Thinking Watch: God’s private messages

A conservative Republican Congressman from North Carolina’s military and Bible belt, Walter B. Jones, opposed the war in Iraq and is now calling for a pull-out from Afghanistan.  For such a courageous stance against party conformity, he should be congratulated.  … Continue reading

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The Place of Suffering

[Cross-posted to NRO’s The Corner.] Tangential to the exchange between Wesley Smith and Andrew Stuttaford on the death of Jack Kevorkian: Here is something I was reading last week. It’s from the 1991 book In Search of Human Nature by … Continue reading

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The solipsism of faith

Human engineering prowess has long sought to protect people from the sorts of natural disasters that have struck the nation’s midsection over the last several weeks.  Some survivors of these recent storms, however, see God’s hand–rather than successful building design … Continue reading

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Relic veneration in the modern world

The Vatican is warning against “miracle-performing sensationalism” and too enthusiastic a veneration of relics: Even the veneration of relics, [writes Wall Street Journal columnist Francis Rocca, the Vatican correspondent for Religion News Service,] mocked by the Protestant reformers and long … Continue reading

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