April 15, 2001 -- On April 22, millions will dutifully engage in the now-familiar rituals and incantations of America’s fastest-growing religion. In public places, they will gather to listen to sermons…about the sins of human selfishness, about redemption through self-abasement, about the duty to exercise stewardship of the earth. In schools, they will indoctrinate their children in the gospel according to John…John Muir, that is.
return to orbit. A "space tourist," originally scheduled to visit Mir earlier this year, has been included with a Russian crew that will join residing astronauts at the International Space Station in late April. This transfer from Mir to the ISS represents a misguided attempt to transfer the responsibilities of a private contract to the other members of the international space program. California investment executive Dennis Tito made news last year by paying MirCorp and RKK Energia (Mir's operating company) roughly $20 million for the privilege of accompanying two Russian astronauts to Mir, at a time when the aging space station's future was still uncertain. Tito's high-profile purchase was the kickoff to MirCorp's strategy to transform Mir into a commercial venture open to wealthy travelers and for-profit scientific research.
October 6, 2004 -- When Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft in 1975, they shot for the stars and succeeded. More recently, Allen shot for the stars again. The two successful launches of his SpaceShipOne won the $10 million Ansari X Prize competition for private, manned space flights. This feat may ultimately do for private space ventures what Charles Lindbergh's crossing the Atlantic did for commercial aviation. The success of these enterprises obviously depended on such factors as genius, guts, and foresight. It also depended on the less obvious absenceof something—government regulation.
March 22, 2002 -- Amtrak’s financial hemorrhaging is so severe that it may be insolvent by summer. The railroad’s auditor, KPMG LLP, is holding back from declaring it a “going concern.” Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) has flatly declared, “Amtrak isn’t broken, it’s bankrupt,” and he’s right. The Amtrak Reform Council has found Amtrak incapable of surviving without continuing taxpayer subsidies and, following a 1997 law, sent a plan to Congress recommending Amtrak be reorganized. That finding triggered a requirement that Amtrak simultaneously submit a liquidation plan to Congress, which would choose among the plans or create a hybrid plan.
July 4, 2007 -- On July 4, 1776, America's Founders declared the country's independence from Britain, largely as a revolt against excessive and unfair taxation. So in our nation, which is much more overtaxed than it was over two centuries ago, it would be fitting if, in recognition of our Founding principles, federal, state and, local governments made July Fourth a totally tax-free day. Many cities already suspend sales taxes for a few days a year on items such as clothing and school supplies, usually to garner the favor of overtaxed parents struggling to raise kids and to give mom and pop an incentive to frequent overtaxed downtown enterprises struggling to make profits. So wouldn't this be appropriate for all of us, who struggle every day to be allowed to keep our money, on that day on which we celebrate our freedom?
March 6, 2002 -- Because I live in Warsaw, I get most of my TV news from the BBC. Recently I have watched, dumbfounded and amused, the outpouring of concern for the comfort of the al-Qaeda prisoners kept at Guantanamo Bay. They were transported shackled with bags over their heads! They sleep in open cages! Four of them have British passports! Have they all had their Miranda warnings? The fact that they are undoubtedly living in less discomfort than they freely chose to undergo in the field doesn’t seem to register. I often think that the most common error in reasoning is a kind of category error, the placing of an issue in a category in which it doesn’t belong. The classic example is the “no right to shout fire in a crowded theater” issue, often cited in a free-speech context when it clearly belongs in an implied-contract context.
December 4, 2001 -- In the coming months, ethicists will be variously defending or condemning human cloning and embryonic stem cell research. They will debate the potential benefits of the technology and discuss the social consequences of the advancing science. But in the end, the ethical question will turn on the issue of when a human life begins—i.e., the life of a distinct, individual human being, a person. There is no simple answer, because the different dimensions of a person's identity emerge at different points in a continuous and complex process of development. Genetic identity is present in the fertilized egg. Cognitive identity emerges later when the fetus acquires the neural basis for conceptual thought. Biological identity as a distinct organism begins to emerge at the point of viability, and is fully present at birth. The person's moral identity as a being capable of voluntary choice on the basis of knowing right from wrong, and his spiritual identity as a self-consciously differentiated personality, are both later developments of childhood and adolescence.
April 22, 2002 -- President Bush has declared the fourth week of April to be National Volunteer Week. This is a follow-up to his call for al
April 3, 2001 -- Last week, Congress began holding hearings on human cloning. Given the highly charged debate that human cloning is likely
June 12, 2002 -- In my Harvard University apartment, overlooking the serene Charles River, I grieve for the Israelis who were murdered last
February 2, 2004 -- Given the fact that the title of director Denys Arcand's previous film was The Decline of the American Empire, that his
September 10, 2004 -- On September 9, Frank Quattrone, a prominent investment banker formerly with Credit Suisse First Boston, was sentenced
October 18, 2001 -- “Manifest Destiny” is the term originally created by John L. O’Sullivan in the 1840s to describe America's westward...
October 18, 2001 -- The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences was awarded on October 10 to three economists whose work might have
October 16, 2001 -- As Congress prepares to pass a new security bill and America faces a terrible and insidious threat, there is no more
The U.S. Supreme Court is allowing a local government to kick 87-year-old Wilhelmina Dery out of the house in which she was born, along with
"Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately
Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments. Man's profound need of art lies in the fact
Let’s imagine a woman who is getting pressure from some obnoxious sleazeball stud to cheat on her husband and commit adultery. She’s tempted
December 17, 2004 -- Christmas is a season of beautiful lights, parties, gifts, food, family, friends, songs, and sentiments. Among the
April 15, 2001 -- On April 22, millions will dutifully engage in the now-familiar rituals and incantations of America’s fastest-growing religion. In public places, they will gather to listen to sermons…about the sins of human selfishness, about redemption through self-abasement, about the duty to exercise stewardship of the earth. In schools, they will indoctrinate their children in the gospel according to John…John Muir, that is.
return to orbit. A "space tourist," originally scheduled to visit Mir earlier this year, has been included with a Russian crew that will join residing astronauts at the International Space Station in late April. This transfer from Mir to the ISS represents a misguided attempt to transfer the responsibilities of a private contract to the other members of the international space program. California investment executive Dennis Tito made news last year by paying MirCorp and RKK Energia (Mir's operating company) roughly $20 million for the privilege of accompanying two Russian astronauts to Mir, at a time when the aging space station's future was still uncertain. Tito's high-profile purchase was the kickoff to MirCorp's strategy to transform Mir into a commercial venture open to wealthy travelers and for-profit scientific research.
October 6, 2004 -- When Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft in 1975, they shot for the stars and succeeded. More recently, Allen shot for the stars again. The two successful launches of his SpaceShipOne won the $10 million Ansari X Prize competition for private, manned space flights. This feat may ultimately do for private space ventures what Charles Lindbergh's crossing the Atlantic did for commercial aviation. The success of these enterprises obviously depended on such factors as genius, guts, and foresight. It also depended on the less obvious absenceof something—government regulation.
March 22, 2002 -- Amtrak’s financial hemorrhaging is so severe that it may be insolvent by summer. The railroad’s auditor, KPMG LLP, is holding back from declaring it a “going concern.” Rep. John Mica (R-Fla.) has flatly declared, “Amtrak isn’t broken, it’s bankrupt,” and he’s right. The Amtrak Reform Council has found Amtrak incapable of surviving without continuing taxpayer subsidies and, following a 1997 law, sent a plan to Congress recommending Amtrak be reorganized. That finding triggered a requirement that Amtrak simultaneously submit a liquidation plan to Congress, which would choose among the plans or create a hybrid plan.
July 4, 2007 -- On July 4, 1776, America's Founders declared the country's independence from Britain, largely as a revolt against excessive and unfair taxation. So in our nation, which is much more overtaxed than it was over two centuries ago, it would be fitting if, in recognition of our Founding principles, federal, state and, local governments made July Fourth a totally tax-free day. Many cities already suspend sales taxes for a few days a year on items such as clothing and school supplies, usually to garner the favor of overtaxed parents struggling to raise kids and to give mom and pop an incentive to frequent overtaxed downtown enterprises struggling to make profits. So wouldn't this be appropriate for all of us, who struggle every day to be allowed to keep our money, on that day on which we celebrate our freedom?
March 6, 2002 -- Because I live in Warsaw, I get most of my TV news from the BBC. Recently I have watched, dumbfounded and amused, the outpouring of concern for the comfort of the al-Qaeda prisoners kept at Guantanamo Bay. They were transported shackled with bags over their heads! They sleep in open cages! Four of them have British passports! Have they all had their Miranda warnings? The fact that they are undoubtedly living in less discomfort than they freely chose to undergo in the field doesn’t seem to register. I often think that the most common error in reasoning is a kind of category error, the placing of an issue in a category in which it doesn’t belong. The classic example is the “no right to shout fire in a crowded theater” issue, often cited in a free-speech context when it clearly belongs in an implied-contract context.
December 4, 2001 -- In the coming months, ethicists will be variously defending or condemning human cloning and embryonic stem cell research. They will debate the potential benefits of the technology and discuss the social consequences of the advancing science. But in the end, the ethical question will turn on the issue of when a human life begins—i.e., the life of a distinct, individual human being, a person. There is no simple answer, because the different dimensions of a person's identity emerge at different points in a continuous and complex process of development. Genetic identity is present in the fertilized egg. Cognitive identity emerges later when the fetus acquires the neural basis for conceptual thought. Biological identity as a distinct organism begins to emerge at the point of viability, and is fully present at birth. The person's moral identity as a being capable of voluntary choice on the basis of knowing right from wrong, and his spiritual identity as a self-consciously differentiated personality, are both later developments of childhood and adolescence.
April 22, 2002 -- President Bush has declared the fourth week of April to be National Volunteer Week. This is a follow-up to his call for al
April 3, 2001 -- Last week, Congress began holding hearings on human cloning. Given the highly charged debate that human cloning is likely
June 12, 2002 -- In my Harvard University apartment, overlooking the serene Charles River, I grieve for the Israelis who were murdered last
February 2, 2004 -- Given the fact that the title of director Denys Arcand's previous film was The Decline of the American Empire, that his
September 10, 2004 -- On September 9, Frank Quattrone, a prominent investment banker formerly with Credit Suisse First Boston, was sentenced
October 18, 2001 -- “Manifest Destiny” is the term originally created by John L. O’Sullivan in the 1840s to describe America's westward...
October 18, 2001 -- The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences was awarded on October 10 to three economists whose work might have
October 16, 2001 -- As Congress prepares to pass a new security bill and America faces a terrible and insidious threat, there is no more
The U.S. Supreme Court is allowing a local government to kick 87-year-old Wilhelmina Dery out of the house in which she was born, along with
"Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately
Art is a selective re-creation of reality according to an artist's metaphysical value judgments. Man's profound need of art lies in the fact
Let’s imagine a woman who is getting pressure from some obnoxious sleazeball stud to cheat on her husband and commit adultery. She’s tempted
December 17, 2004 -- Christmas is a season of beautiful lights, parties, gifts, food, family, friends, songs, and sentiments. Among the