thoughts in and out of season
More evidence that the modern bureaucratic state simply fails to understand family relations—how they work, what they mean, why they matter:
Trading favorable coverage for access is commonplace among journalists who cover politicians. John Burns, a New York Times reporter and apparently a principled man, complains that in Saddam Hussain’s Iraq that routine variety of corruption turned into something pretty horrible: “There Is Corruption in Our Business”. Cozy relationships are only one of the ways … More ...
The Pentagon inspector general reported recently that nearly 20 percent of female Air Force Academy cadets said they had been sexually assaulted since arriving at the academy. Because of related scandals, the Air Force has transferred the academy’s leadership and is looking into what has been going on.
It’s hard to determine particulars from the … More ...
The imperialism of the new sexual righteousness: European Parliament Says Athos Monks Must End 1000-Year Male-Only Tradition, and Dutch abortion ship invades Poland. Mount Athos has been the center of Orthodox monasticism for more than a thousand years, and part of their discipline has always been the exclusion of women. The European Parliament … More ...
A man was arrested in North Carolina for successfully passing a $200 bill. The bill included a picture of George Bush and slogans like “We like ice cream” and “The USA deserves a tax cut.” The cashier apparently thought that was good enough for $150 worth of groceries and $50 change.
It’s not clear … More ...
If the notion that there’s something amiss with homosexuality is just an ignorant prejudice based on nothing, why is it so durable and widespread? Could there be something wrong with the fundamental analysis? In India they seem to think so, but they’re not quite sure why: Centre says being gay will remain a crime, its … More ...
What is liberalism, where does it come from, and is it all bad and of a piece or can you mix and match? I’ve argued that liberalism is One Big Thing growing out of the decision to base political order not on substantive ultimate goods (like God) but on subjective human preferences. History is complex, … More ...
An atheist group is protesting the retention at the site of the World Trade Center of a steel beam in the symmetrical shape of a cross that had been found in the wreckage. They are considering bringing suit on the grounds that “[m]any people who died on September 11 weren’t Christian … This is a … More ...
An annotated reading list on Islam from the Claremont Institute that seems intelligent: Reading Up on Islam. In line with general practice, the discussion takes Western liberalism as fundamental and wonders how to fit Islam into it. To my mind that’s a disadvantage, because I don’t consider Western liberalism in any form as a … More ...
The times in which we live: