Psychiatrist and author Theodore Dalrymple has published a brilliant essay in the National Review highlighting the importance of the rule of law. He takes as a case study the looting in the wake of Hurricane Katrina: “New Orleans shows us in the starkest possible way the reality of the thin blue line that protects us from barbarism and mob rule,” writes Dalrymple. The essay questions whether such barbarism is inherent in human nature in crisis or if there are elements...

The Acton Institute’s Catholic High School Honor Roll has released its annual list of the Top 50 Catholic High Schools in the United States. About half are repeat winners and half are new honorees. See the Honor Roll web site for more information. ...

I’ve finally had a chance to respond to this piece on Tech Central Station, “The State of Nature in New Orleans: What Hobbes Didn’t Know” (Tech Central Station no longer active). In this article, TCS contributing editor Lee Harris takes George Will to task for his citation of Hobbes, to the extent that, as Harris writes, “my point of disagreement is with Hobbes’ famous and often quoted characterization of man’s original state of nature as one in which human life...

Check out this piece by Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, an Acton senior fellow, in which she argues “that marriage is the cornerstone of civil society. And the images of Katrina demonstrate this, if we are willing to see.” ...

The Wall Street Journal editorializes today that President Bush has a chance to encourage a more free-market oriented approach to rebuilding the gulf coast: Instead of channeling more cash through the same failed bureaucracies, he should declare the entire Gulf Coast region an enterprise zone, with low tax rates for new investments and waivers for any regulatory obstacles to rebuilding. The Journal goes on to note that this event may be an ideal time for Bush to put a new...

Deal W. Hudson of the Morley Institute reports on an address by a Vatican official. The story is also reported here: Vatican Official Explains What Makes a School Catholic His name is one you should know. Archbishop J. Michael Miller is the Secretary of the Congregation for Catholic Education in the Vatican. That means he helps oversee Catholic education from kindergarten to college and graduate school throughout the world. I met with the self-effacing Archbishop over breakfast before his lecture...

In Tuesday’s Wall Street Journal, Brendon Miniter notes that many of those stranded in New Orleans after the levee breaches were literally caught in a trap set by government “assistance”: We still only have anecdotal evidence to go on, and we can be hopeful as the death toll remains far below the thousands originally predicted. But it’s reasonable to surmise that Sen. Kennedy is correct about those who wanted to leave: Most people who could arrange for their own transportation...

Andy Crouch was kind enough to respond to my article on climate change (which itself was penned in reply to Crouch’s original piece), and I’ve included a response of my own. His words are in the large blocks of italics below: While I’m disappointed that you don’t even try to engage the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, by far the most extensive and diligent effort I’m aware of to evaluate the science of global warming, In my...

Check out this editorial from the current issue of Christianity Today, “Neighbor Love Inc.” The editorial focuses on the importance of work and labor in the Christian life: “Business for the Christian is a form of neighbor-love, a way to fulfill the second Great Commandment.” The entrepreneurial calling is one that should be affirmed within a biblical framework by Christian leaders. CT recognizes that “the church has spent enormous energies on guiding our sexuality, but done little at the congregational...

Samuel Gregg writes on a recent BBC Radio listeners poll that ranked Karl Marx as the greatest philosopher in history. Gregg reflects on the evils and atrocities that mitted by the political heirs of Marx’ philosophy menting that the materialist view of Communism removes any possibility of fulfilling the two mandments; loving God and loving our neighbors. Above all, Gregg wonders how people have forgotten what Marx stands for: “Why is Marxism’s red flag not treated with the same contempt...