In this blog, I have but one question, regarding the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which has just been made available for one’s reading pleasure.  Here is my question.  For an agreement that is touted as a free trade compact, why do we need a 5, 500 page document (parts of which I have read)?  If we […]

The public university in America and most private universities and colleges are “dead.”  By dead I mean that by and large they no longer stand for free inquiry and reasoned discussion and debate.  They are being co-opted by various interest groups claiming offenses against them, sometimes by merely being a minority among a white majority.  […]

Is Donald Trump conservative? What about Paul Ryan? What is the “conservative” position on drug legalization? Immigration? Military intervention? Social Security? Do you have to be religious to be conservative? There is, upon reflection, only one argument winding its way through the right side of the political spectrum this year: what does it mean to […]

One of the more contentious topics that can be raised among Christian university faculty is that of the integration of faith with one’s particular discipline or area of knowledge.   The reasons are not too difficult to discern.  Mainly, most faculty at such institutions today (as opposed to a generation ago) have obtained their terminal degrees […]

The New York Times reports today that the federal government is in conflict with a school district in Palatine, IL over the district’s treatment of a transgendered student: “Federal Education authorities, staking out their firmest position yet on an increasingly contentious issue, found Monday that an Illinois school district violated anti-discrimination laws when it did […]

In my last post I put forth a proposal for what a new president might do to reduce regulations in the bloated “administrative state.”  I will now add more fuel to the fire by suggesting what actions the new president might take to eliminate whole agencies.  Yes, I did say entire Federal agencies.  I won’t […]

“Steve Austin, astronaut. A man barely alive.  Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world’s first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better…stronger…faster.” So began the narration to one of my favorite boyhood television shows in the mid-1970s.  The […]

As we watched the Democratic and Republican Party presidential debates, I have heard some, but not nearly enough, discussion of the problems of the “regulatory state,” that is, that “Fourth Branch” of government affectionately called bureaucracy.  Since this is a national election, I will confine my comments to the Federal agencies such as EPA, FCC, […]

I am reminded of a story, possibly apocryphal,  from the Constitutional Convention.  One of our Founders proposed an element to the Constitution that would prevent the young republic from ever having a standing army larger than 5,000 men. This suggestion has to be understood within the context of the recent past where American colonists believed […]

As goes Ohio, so goes the nation. On Tuesday November 3, Ohioans will go (hopefully flock in droves) to the polls to vote either for or against ballot initiative Issue 3. Issue 3 is a proposed constitutional amendment calling for the legalization of marijuana for medicinal and recreational use. There are many reasons why you might want […]