Paul’s post reminds me of how Charles Murray almost convinced me to become a libertarian. When I first read his What It Means To Be A Libertarian nearly fifteen years ago I was compelled by the thrust of his argument. “Freedom is first of all our birthright,” Murray claimed. . . . . Continue Reading »
You can read it here . Participating in this roundtable are yours truly, J. Brian Benestad, Father Joseph Fessio, S.J., Richard Garnett, Thomas S. Hibbs, Paul Kengor, George Neumayr, Tracey Rowland, Father James V. Schall, and Rev. Robert A. Sirico. . . . . Continue Reading »
The American Jewish Committee’s latest press notes include the following item:July 3, 2009 - New York - AJC condemned the Spanish newspaper El Pais for publishing a blatantly anti-Semitic cartoon accusing Jews of using their financial power to enable Israel to “violate...all human and . . . . Continue Reading »
From the Wall Street Journal : Massachusetts sued the federal government Wednesday, seeking to overturn a key part of the U.S. law that defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman. The lawsuit, brought by the first state to legalize gay marriage, said the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act . . . . Continue Reading »
There was an interesting exchange on the American Enterprise Institute’s Enterprise blog, sparked by this Charles Murray post about the concept of duty. Murray was writing in response to Mark Sanford’s scandalous behavior, and this prodded Danielle Pletka to ask why we should care . . . . Continue Reading »
Well, that was June. This is July.Read-aloud for the 5- and 6-year-olds: Mary Norton’s The Borrowers, in a volume with all the stories.The 11-year-old: Is currently rereading, for the zillionth time, the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy, in a cheesy-looking (photos from the films on the . . . . Continue Reading »
And no, not false dignity . Rather, the kind of dignity where, as the founder of this magazine once put it, one “neither refuses to live nor fears to die”: Gravely ill with heart disease, tethered to an oxygen tank, her feet swollen and her appetite gone, Sister Dorothy Quinn, 87, . . . . Continue Reading »
I have been saying for years that the great stem cell debate isn’t really about leftover embryos due to be destroyed anyway. That was just the pretext, an opening gambit intended to desensitize people to the idea that nascent human life can be treated as nothing more than a corn . . . . Continue Reading »
The title of Chapter 4, paragraphs 43 through 52, promises that the text will take up the topic of the environment. But the chapter opens with an attack on the idea of rights as divorced from duties: “An overemphasis on rights leads to a disregard for duties.” Pieces of several arguments . . . . Continue Reading »
Today marks six months since the death of our friend, editor, and founder Richard John Neuhaus, who remains ever close in our thoughts and work at First Things . Take a moment to visit to our memorial page —where you can find notable obituaries, web videos of Fr. Neuhaus, and a . . . . Continue Reading »
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