Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Public Policy

September 22, 2006

The Green Old Party

A਋it of green conservative politics for your Friday – You’ll see why in a minute. First, read this blog post by the Sierra Club on Linc Chafee (Republican, RI), and then this: Meet Wayne Gilchrest, Republican member of the House of Representatives, First Congressional District of Maryland, former house painter, teacher, Vietnam veteran — and past, present and future canoeist who has yet to find himself up that well-known proverbial creek without a paddle, though he must think at times the current and wind is against his flimsy craft. Continue Reading...
September 22, 2006

Conference on Christianity and the Environment

Courtesy of today’s ZondervanTo The Point comes this announcement, replete with extensive related links: The MacLaurin Institute is sponsoring a conference at the University of Minnesota through tomorrow exploring what it means for people to demonstrate a Christian perspective as they live their lives at the interfaces of three “worlds” — natural, engineered, and human. Continue Reading...
September 22, 2006

Tithe and Tithe Again

In a way, the Center for Social Innovation at Stanford recognizes a fact that Ron Sider has written on and I have thought about for a long time. In “A New Take on Tithing,” Claude Rosenberg & Tim Stone write: Too often, individuals make decisions about how much money to donate to charitable causes on an ad hoc basis. Continue Reading...
September 21, 2006

China, Christianity, and the Rule of Law

Earlier this month Forum 18 published an article that examined whether the establishment of a law regarding religion at a national level would be a positive step toward ending the sometimes arbitrary and uneven treatment of religious freedom issues throughout the country. Continue Reading...
September 20, 2006

The Fleecing of America

NBC Nightly News has long had a special feature titled, “The Fleecing of America,” which investigates various instances wasteful spending by government officials. To get a visual clue about the massive size and diversity of the federal budget, check out “Death and Taxes”, the 2007 edition, “a representational graph of the federal discretionary budget. Continue Reading...
September 19, 2006

The Evolution of Marketing

Last week, marketing guru Seth Godin quoted the 17th-century Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracián y Morales: Know how to sell your wares, Intrinsic quality isn’t enough. Not everyone bites at substance or looks for inner value. Continue Reading...
September 19, 2006

DDT Breakthrough at the WHO

Africans are hailing a major shift in policy at the World Health Organization: A recommendation for the limited, indoor use of DDT to control malaria. The fight against the disease, which is a leading cause of death in the developing world, has been hobbled by a long running campaign by environmentalists to ban the insecticide, a campaign that resulted in millions of needless deaths. Continue Reading...
September 19, 2006

Prohibition, Blue Laws, and the Primum Usus Legis

A paper recently published at the National Bureau of Economic Research calls into question some conventional economic wisdom about the effects of certain kinds of legislation. In “The Church vs the Mall: What Happens When Religion Faces Increased Secular Competition?”, Continue Reading...
September 15, 2006

Pascal and Climate Change

In today’s Times of London, taking a cue from Blaise Pascal (at least he thinks), Gerard Baker argues, “Unless the sceptics are really, really certain that we’re all going to be OK, we must act now.” Continue Reading...