Are human rights prosecutions inexorably on the rise? It all depends on how you count them.

Alexander Del Mar's view on the origins of money were revolutionary for the 19^th century. Why have so few people heard of him?

If you expect the worst from people, they'll often oblige.

What So Proudly We Hail is more than just a memorial to a bygone American era; it's a handbook for recovering endangered civic virtues.

Millionaire Wall Streeters, media mavens and corporate titans make for unlikely populists.

Ross Douthat has a thoughtful piece in the NY Times today on the failure — so far — of the populist wing of the Republican Party to find candidates and policies that can compete at the presidential level.  He’s certainly right that figures like Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, Ron Paul and Herman Cain […]

The ink is hardly dry on Germany’s assent to the last bailout package, but Greece is already signalling that more money is needed — and fast.  The new and improved deficit targets set by the IMF and the European Union won’t be met, not this year and not next.  From Reuters: (Reuters) – Greece will […]

Greens are often and even usually wrong about some important policy issues but they are right about one big thing: we’ve got only one planet to live on and we ought to cherish and conserve it.  As a reminder of the fragile and precious creation that shelters and nurtures us, this 1-minute NASA time-lapse video […]

A full eleven days after Andrew Sullivan warned readers again about the “Christianist” menace, the unstoppable Christian hordes seem to have, well, stopped.The latest evidence that the teeming throngs of zealous Puritans aren’t going to establish a Cromwellian commonwealth that crushes freedom and empowers dour church elders to monitor the private lives of Americans comes […]

American public education has hit a new low: concerned parents are being arrested for stealing free public education through zoning fraud. From the WSJ: In the last year, parents in Connecticut, Kentucky and Missouri have all been arrested—and await sentencing—for enrolling their children in better public schools outside of their districts. These arrests represent two […]