Religion & Liberty Online Archives

Public Policy

March 13, 2015

Apple Watch: Forbidden Fruit?

Over at Think Christian today I examine some of the moral implications surrounding the announced release of the new Apple Watch. In the background of my thinking was a TEDxPuget Sound talk by Simon Sinek that focuses on identifying the “why” of organizations. Continue Reading...
March 11, 2015

Easy Cases Make Bad Law

Earlier this week the University of Oklahoma chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon was caught on video engaging in a racist chant. The video shows several men wearing tuxedos and riding on a charter bus singing that black students, which the men refer to with a racial slur, could never join their fraternity. Continue Reading...
February 27, 2015

Net Neutrality News & Roundup

Yesterday the FCC reclassified Internet Service Providers (ISPs) as a telecommunications service under Title II of the Communications Act, with additional provisions from Title III and Section 706 of the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Continue Reading...
February 20, 2015

Does Innovation Triumph Over Regulation?

Do government regulations squelch marketplace innovation? A new study from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Nathan Goldschlag and George Mason University’s Alex Tabarrok says, “Not really.” According to Ryan Young at the Competitive Enterprise Institute: …the underlying institutions of social cooperation, market exchange, and dynamism are strong enough that federal regulation has, according to Goldschlag and Tabarrok’s analysis, so far been unable to squelch them. Continue Reading...
February 17, 2015

New Report: Orthodox Monastic Communities in the United States

The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America has published a new report on Orthodox Monastic Communities in the United States (here). The report contains a lot of great information (“great” for nerds like me, anyway), including a whole section entitled, “‘Monastic Economy:’ Ownership of Property and Sources of Income in US Orthodox Monasteries.” Continue Reading...
February 17, 2015

African Bishop: ‘Our Values Are Not For Sale’

Bishop Emmanuel Badejo of Oyo, Nigeria and newly appointed Chairman of Communications for the African bishops, has some strong words for the West. Bishop Badejo believes help for Nigeria in fighting Boko Haram has been withheld because of Nigerians refusal to accept population control tactics from the Western world. Continue Reading...
February 12, 2015

U.S. Scientists: Maybe Climate Engineering Isn’t Such a Smart Idea

For at least forty years, scientists and policy makers have considered addressing climate related issues by means of climate engineering, or as it more commonly referred to, geoengineering. A prime example is found in a story published in Newsweek that proposed (albeit with reservations) to use geoengineering to fix a climatic “problem”: Climatologists are pessimistic that political leaders will take any positive action to compensate for the climatic change, or even to allay its effects. Continue Reading...