While we await Pope Benedict’s first social encyclical, it has been interesting to note what he has been saying on globalization and other socio-economic issues affecting the world today. None of these amounts to a magisterial statement but there are nonetheless clues to his social thought.

Read more on A Papal Challenge to Globalization…

Is this supposed to be capitalism?

Geoff Colvin writes that a motivating factor in the recent crash in corporate profits, as well as the sharp decline in home values, was the phenomenon that “people began to believe that the more they borrowed, the better off they would be. Their thinking went like this: With the cost of capital so low and asset prices rising steadily, risk was evaporating.”

Read more on Is This Capitalism?…

Sometime Acton publications contributor and adjunct scholar Thomas Sieger Derr posts on the First Things blog under the title, “The End of the Global Warming Scare?” Derr identifies a trend that has not been ignored on this blog: increasingly vocal and widespread skepticism toward at least the most dire predictions emanating from the climate change disaster crowd. I would add to Derr’s observations that consternation over oil prices is likely to encourage reluctance to implement any costly programs that have only debatably positive environmental results (e.g., Kyoto). Instead, folks will be more supportive of sensible moves that fuel the economy and cause little environmental harm (e.g., Arctic drilling), meanwhile making similarly sensible efforts to increase efficiency (car pooling is surging), which is always good for both economy and environment.

Read more on Warming Wailing Waning…

Here’s the key assumption in Michael Gerson’s piece from last week, “The Libertarian Jesus”:

Private compassion cannot replace Medicaid or provide AIDS drugs to millions of people in Africa for the rest of their lives. In these cases, a role for government is necessary and compassionate — the expression of conservative commitments to the general welfare and the value of every human life.

Private compassion certainly could do this, and much more. Private giving generally dwarfs government programs in both real dollars and effectiveness.

Read more on Assumptions about the ‘Libertarian’ Jesus…