Category: News and Events

Erika Andersen reviewed the “The Call of the Entrepreneur” for Human Events in a piece titled, “Entrepreneurship Preserves Life as We Know It.” The Call premiered last week to DC audiences at the E Street Cinema, as part of the Renaissance Film Festival.

In her article Andersen noted the international interest in the film:

Though it initially seems like the tale of the American dream, “The Call of the Entrepreneur” is an international story and is now being translated into Spanish and other languages. In fact, the film experienced its largest premier audience in Nairobi, Kenya with over 450 attendees.

Andersen also easily recognizes the importance of calling, or vocation, in business and in free markets:

The stories restore faith in entrepreneurs’ ability to build lives, strengthen nations and economies as well as fulfill God-given destinies. The film denounces the myth that capitalists are self serving, arguing rather that they are almost wholly devoted to others.

Human Events is one of the oldest modern conservative publications, and the one that President Ronald Reagan called his “favorite newspaper.”

You are probably aware by now that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has published a memoir. The interview-avoiding judge has lately been giving, as Kathryn Jean Lopez puts it, “a lifetime of interviews.”

Given the controversy surrounding his public life since his nomination to the Court, not much remains to be said about him, good or bad, that has not already been said. Suffice it to say that I draw attention to him now because: 1) My own view is that he is one the most interesting figures in 20th-century American history; 2) His record as a strict constructionist is a model of jurisprudence; 3) He once graced Acton’s annual dinner as the keynote speaker (you can still buy the CD); 4) He was spotted later at a D.C. area gym, wearing the Acton T-shirt that was presented to him at the dinner (or so goes the story much-repeated in the offices of the Institute).

Here’s a long interview with Thomas by Jan Crawford Greenburg of ABC. Here’s the Lopez interview on NRO.

An interesting article in the Los Angeles Times detailing how badly wrong Robert Mugabe’s supporters in the West have been from the very beginning (requires “free” registration; may I suggest BugMeNot?):

From the beginning of his political career, Mugabe was not just a Marxist but one who repeatedly made clear his intention to run Zimbabwe as an authoritarian, one-party state. Characteristic of this historical revisionism is former Newsweek southern Africa correspondent Joshua Hammer, writing recently in the liberal Washington Monthly that “more than a quarter-century after leading his guerrilla army to victory over the racist regime of Ian Smith in white-minority-ruled Rhodesia, President Robert Mugabe has morphed into a caricature of the African Big Man.”

But Mugabe did not “morph” into “a caricature of the African Big Man.” He has been one since he took power in 1980 — and he displayed unmistakable authoritarian traits well before that. Those who were watching at the time should have known what kind of man Mugabe was, and the fact that so many today persist in the contention that Mugabe was a once-benign ruler speaks much about liberal illusions of African nationalism.

It turns out that useful idiots still exist, and sadly, probably always will.

The Acton Institute is a sponsor of this year’s Godblogcon, a conference that “will equip you with a working knowledge of new media technologies and its impact on society, empowering your ministry to employ quickly and easily new media technologies to engage culture for the cause of Christ.” GodblogCon 2007 will be in Las Vegas on November 8-9.

Blogging luminaries like Joe Carter, La Shawn Barber, and Al Mohler will be speaking, and the conference will also be a part of the larger Blog World & New Media Expo, which will feature folks like the Instapundit and Hugh Hewitt. Hewitt gave a talk about new media at last year’s meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society.

I’ll be representing the PowerBlog at the conference, and if you are a reader of this blog and will also be attending, drop me a note in the comment box on this post. I’ll also be scouting talent for next year’s Acton University, which fills up quickly, so if you’re a blogger and are interested in coming to Grand Rapids to learn more about theology and economics, talk to me.

Andrew Roth of the Club for Growth provided a short assessment On The Call of the Entrepreneur. The Call will be the opening film at the American Film Renaissance Festival in Washington D.C. on September 26th.

Roth declared:

I was given a sneak peek of “The Call…” earlier this month. It’s a fun, feel-good movie that provides real life examples of how entrepreneurs have succeeded personally, and how they’ve made the world a better place. The show also cuts into commentary from free market leaders who help clarify the entrepreneur’s vital and indispensable role in our economy.

The Club for Growth, located in Washington D.C., “Works to promote public policies that promote economic growth primarily through legislative involvement, issue advocacy, research, training and educational activity.”

The first day at LTTG-07 here at Vineyard Church, Boise Idaho was full of great fellowship, worship, workshops and discussions among evangelical and secular environmental leaders. Day Two is just getting underway.

For you folks new to LTTG, this is the second annual gathering of Christian leadership from across the United States (and beyond?) to honor the Creator and diligently seek ways to be better stewards of creation. The idea for the conference was hatched by VB’s pastor Tri Robinson. My post from last year’s conference is here, including audio links from a couple of the sessions.

Will be updating this post at the end of the day so check back. Here’s a copy of the schedule on-line if you want to follow along. I’ll be embedding audio links at my home blog as soon as the crack Vineyard team records and posts them online. And PLEASE – wherever you are reading this – PRAY for all of us here this week that God will be glorified in everything that goes on here.

LOTS MORE – READ ON…..

[UPDATE: Fixed the formatting now...]

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The US State Department issued its annual religious freedom report late last week (HT).

And earlier this month, Paul Marshall of the Hudson Institute discussed the forthcoming book, Religious Freedom in the World 2007. He had this to say about economic and religious freedom:

If you take the worst 30 countries in terms of economic freedom, every one scored low with religious freedom. The top 30 countries all scored high. Why is that? We see two connections. First, wealth could help religious freedom. But we also believe that religious freedom helps general health, well-being, and wealth broadly understood. To the degree that people are not free to organize and manage their lives, you cut down on the possibility of independent economic activity. People are simply used to not doing things unless they’re told to do them.

China remains one of the most interesting case studies in terms of how necessary the correlation is between religious and economic (and political) freedom.

In what is shaping up to appear like court imposed taxation, Microsoft lost its appeal in a major anti-trust case at Europe’s second highest court yesterday. The European Union’s Court of First Instance backed the European Commission’s 2004 decision to fine Microsoft and order the software giant to change its Windows operating system to make it more compatible with rival systems. The 2004 verdict imposed a record fine on Microsoft in the amount of $497 million.

The long feud appears, by some at least, to be a case of over regulation by the EU, and a propping up of their own sagging technological market at the expense of consumers. It is, at the very least, a classic example of not trusting the free market to correct any perceived problems or inefficiencies with Microsoft operating systems.

Are iTunes and Apple next?

Here’s a roundup to our running coverage of the Microsoft issue, including Alberto Mingardi’s commentary, titled, Letter from Turin: The EU’s Immoral Case Against Microsoft. In his piece Mingardi said, “What these companies don’t want is for Microsoft to ‘prevent’ them from succeeding in the European market. What competitors really fear is Microsoft’s ability to satisfy consumers better than they do, at a cheaper price.” .

Full Acton Commentary by Alberto Mingardi

Jordan Ballor also weighed in on the PowerBlog:

EU Conflicts of Interest

Open Source, Closed Markets

Also for a valuable look back at Microsoft’s anti-trust past battles in the United States:

Microsoft’s Innovation, Service, and Foresight Result in Consumer Trust and Government Antitrust Action, by Joseph Klesney

Free-Market Morals and the Microsoft Case, by Jason Miller

Microsoft: A ‘Monopoly’ for the Consumer, by Robert Crowner

“Is American higher education doing its duty to prepare the next generation to keep America free?” Apparently not, according to researchers at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Public Policy (UConnDPP), in a study commissioned by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s (ISI) National Civic Literacy Program.

In a survey of 14,000 freshman and seniors at 50 colleges and universities across the country, every school scored poorly. Also, college seniors, sadly, scored little better than freshman. The average senior score was a failing 53.2%; the average freshman score was 51.7%. In fact, no school scored higher than a D+. The top ten school are listed below:

1. Harvard University 69.56%
2. Grove City College (PA) 67.26
3. Washington & Lee University (VA) 66.98
4. Yale University 65.85
5. Brown University 65.64
6. University of Virginia 65.28
7. Wheaton College (IL) 64.98
8. University of Pennsylvania 63.49
9. Duke University 63.41
10. Bowdoin College (ME) 62.86

A link to the rankings of the fifty schools in the survey are found here. My alma mater, Ole Miss, scored 36th, and Calvin College in Grand Rapids, MI ranked 21st.

Some shocking or not so shocking analysis is quoted below, directly taken from the American Civic Literacy Website. You can also examine the entire website for a treasure trove of facts, findings, and analysis.

Students were asked 60 multiple-choice questions to measure their knowledge in four subject areas: America’s history, government, international relations, and market economy. The disappointing results were published in the fall of 2006 in The Coming Crisis in Citizenship: Higher Education’s Failure to Teach America’s History and Institutions.

The website declares, “This report is not designed to tear down American higher education, but to hold it accountable.” After taking the quiz myself, I scored a 93.33 %, which is 56 out of 60. You can take the quiz here, and see how you measure up against American college students.

In an appropriate quote also taken from the Intercollegiate Studies Institute website, John Quincy Adams, then a state senator, praised the pilgrims of Plymouth Rock:

Among the sentiments of most powerful operation upon the human heart, and most highly honorable to the human character, are those of veneration for our forefathers and of love for our posterity. They form the connecting links between the selfish and the social passions,” he said. “Respect for his ancestors excites in the breast of man, interest in their history, attachment to their characters, concern for their errors, involuntary pride in their virtues. Love for his posterity spurs him to exertion for their support, stimulates him to virtue for their example and fills him with the tenderest solicitude for their welfare.

It’s perhaps serendipitous that I’m beginning to read Gertrude Himmelfarb’s The De-Moralization of Society: From Victorian Virtues to Modern Values on the same day that the first Values Voter Debate is going to be held in Ft. Lauderdale, FL.

You might think of the so-called V2 debate as an answer to Jim Wallis’ Presidential Forum on Faith, Values, and Poverty, which featured leading Democratic presidential candidates (although Wallis’ promotional materials promised a similar event including Republican candidates, such a forum has yet to materialize. The V2 organizers also say that all Democratic candidates have refused a similar event).

It would be easy to focus on the many differences between the two events, not least of which is the fact that the high-profile Democratic contenders were eager to attend the CNN-sponsored Sojourners event, while the leading GOP candidates are not participating in the V2 debate.

But instead let’s focus on what is similar, and it’s the only word that’s shared in the two titles: “Values.” Here’s what Himmelfarb says about the shift from the language of virtues to values,

“Values” brought with it the assumptions that all moral ideas are subjective and relative, that they are mere customs and conventions, that they have a purely instrumental, utilitarian purpose, and that they are peculiar to specific individuals and societies. (And, in the current intellectual climate, to specific classes, races, and sexes.)

So long as morality was couched in the language of “virtue,” it had a firm, resolute character…. But for a particular people at a particular time, the word “virtue” carried with it a sense of gravity and authority, as “values” does not.

Himmelfarb traces the genesis of “values” language into the modern context through influence of Nietzsche and Max Weber. The rest of the book explores the consequences of this shift, and I look forward to reading it.

We might quibble with Himmelfarb about particular details, but I think it’s pretty indisputable that there has been a shift in moral claims. She writes,

It was not until the present century that morality became so thoroughly relativized and subjectified that virtues ceased to be “virtues” and became “values.” This transmutation is the great philosophical revolution of modernity, no less momentous than the earlier revolt of the “Moderns” against the “Ancients”–modern science and learning against classical philosophy.

Now whether or not such moral relativism is an entirely novel phenomenon in human history, or merely whether this is its first major and successful foray into Western civilization, I think Himmelfarb’s basic point stands.

It will be interesting to see how political debates like the one tonight and over the course of the next year bear out her distinction between “values” and “virtues.” I suspect that we’ll see far more of the former than the latter.