Month: November 2018
“economics of meaning”
Shadi Hamid has a very interesting essay in American Affairs Journal about the possibilities of left populism and the “economics of meaning”: It might be tempting to say that Left populists simply need a “hero”; the Left, unlike the Right,...
what Amazon got out of the HQ2 search
Amazon got more than just some tax breaks in its HQ2 search: But arguably even more concerning than deepening regional inequality and the possibility of Bezos becoming the landlord of the nation’s capital is the fact that few cities will...
migration and American identity
Luma Simms has two very interesting pieces interacting with Reihan Salam’s new book Melting Pot or Civil War? One is at Public Discourse and the other is at Law and Liberty: From the first piece: Immigration, work migration, the flight...
video killed the #1 burger joint in the country
This is a really sad story that I think is ultimately about power, technology, and the way in which media shapes our understanding of ourselves and the world around us: In my office, I have a coffee mug from Stanich’s...
zeal, wisdom, and John Allen Chau
Last week, an American missionary named John Allen Chau was killed as he tried to approach the inhabitants of North Sentinel Island. Both his own words and those of the mission organization that sent him confirm that he intended to share...
Asia Bibi should get asylum anywhere she wants
I am glad to see this call from Providence magazine to grant Asia Bibi asylum… anywhere. (More on her story here.) The obvious shouldn’t need saying, but it is clear that there are many Muslims in the UK, whether new immigrant or...
tomb raider?
This essay is as fascinating and fun as everyone says it is: The Nazareth inscription is a block of marble, about two feet tall, a foot wide, and two inches deep. The first of its 22 lines of text, carved...
wokeness and gnosticism
I enjoyed this essay from Anthony Barr on the question of “wokeness” and gnosticism: I want to suggest that “woke” is a redeemable term. If we think of wokeness as loving attentiveness to reality, a commitment to seeing the world...
the paranoid style in American Christianity
We’re doomed! Doomed, I tell you: Take this seriously. We are like people on a beach, watching a tsunami build on the horizon. You know how tsunamis work, right? There’s an earthquake far out at sea, and the shock wave...
“The FDA’s Mango-Flavored Trolley Problem”
Don’t you just love that headline? These competing concerns leave the FDA trying to thread a particularly tricky needle: How do they get these products into the hands of the people who need them, while keeping them away from people...