According to Daniel Pardo, citizens of Venezuela have figured out the fine art of queuing (that’s “waiting in line” for Americans.) It’s a good thing, too, since things like milk, sugar, soap, toilet paper and other essentials are always in short supply in this socialist country. The government regulates the price of these goods. It doesn’t subsidise them – it tells the producer what they can charge. That might just about make sense in a buoyant economy but with inflation...

That’s one of the questions es to mind when reading Bill McGurn’s op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal. Many free-market advocates, including yours truly, have already expressed concern over what may appear in the papal encyclical due this summer. McGurn concurs but, like a good entrepreneur, also sees an opportunity: The fears are not without cause. There are many signs that do not augur well, from the muddled section on economics in the pope’s first encyclical [Actually, it was an...

Over the past hundred years few judges have been able to match the wit, wisdom, and intellectual rigor of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. During his thirty year career he has been an indefatigable champion of originalism (a principle of interpretation that views the Constitution’s meaning as fixed as of the time of enactment) and a vociferous critic of the slippery “living constitution” school of jurisprudence. When future historians assess his career Scalia will be viewed as one of the...

On Naharnet, a Lebanese news and information site, Acton Research Director Samuel Gregg and Director of Istituto Acton Kishore ment on Pope Francis’s ing environmental encyclical, which the news organization says is planned for release this summer. (Note: The article describes Acton as a “Catholic” think tank but it is, in fact, an ecumenical organization with broad participation from Catholics, Protestants, Orthodox Christians and those of other faith traditions.) Naharnet notes that “a papal encyclical is meant to provide spiritual...

Why are property rights important, even for those who own the least? Professor Tom W. Bell of Chapman University School of Law explains that property rights allow people to live together in peace, prosperity, and freedom. ...

Armenian Orphans, 1918. At the end of this week, on April 24, many will recall the Armenian Genocide by observing the “The Armenian Day of Remembrance.” This day remembers the more than one million Armenians who were slaughtered by the Ottoman government during and after World War I. Patriarch of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Catholicos Karekin II, describes the genocide: Centuries of honest plishments and creativity were swiftly plundered…Thousands of monasteries and churches were desecrated and destroyed. National institutions and...

In the latest issue of Themelios, Robert Covolo reviews Abraham Kuyper’s newly translated Scholarship alongside Richard Mouw’s Called to the Life of the Mind, examining mon traits that emerge from two perspectiveson scholarship fromthe “Kuyperian strain.” Outside of the differences in tone and audience that one might expect fromauthors separated by a century (and an ocean, for that matter), Covolo notices each author’s emphasis on scholarship as a distinct “sphere,” thus involvinga distinct calling. “It is hard not to recognize...

Both my parents grew up in Detroit, and my childhood was filled with great trips to visit family for holidays and in the summer. The downtown Hudson’s store was always a destination. One of my aunts worked there, and it was the place to shop. Our trips always included a stop for a Sander’s hot fudge ice cream puff as well. My sisters and I played endless games on the stoop of my grandmother’s home, and a few miles away,...

In an interview with the National Catholic Reporter, the director of Acton’s Rome office, Kishore Jayabalan, offered his thoughts on the ing papal encyclical on the environment. Jayabalan told the Reporter’s Brian Roewe that he did not deny that climate change exists, since it indeed changes all the time. Jayabalan’s concern is that the ing encyclical won’t be based on sound scientific research. To say that the science requires us to do X, Y and Z, I’m skeptical about that...

It is no secret that Thailand is rife with human trafficking. It is the world’s number one destination for sex travel. (Yes, that means people travel to Thailand solely for the purpose of having sex with men, women and children who are trafficked.) Thailand’s fishing industry is also dependent on human trafficking, often using young boys at sea for long periods of time, sometimes working them to death. Quartz is reporting today that the EU is considering a ban of...