This started with a discussion on the Chemical Education Discussion List (CHEMED-L) about what the internet will do and is doing to traditional colleges (to see the discussion go to http://mailer.uwf.edu/listserv/wa.exe?S1=chemed-l and enter “Will the Internet Kill Traditional Colleges” in the search for string box).
It was pointed out by one individual that the Internet has […]

How things can change a mere 9 months:
What They Told Us: Reviewing Last Week’s Key Polls - Rasmussen Reports™
Few nations are as generous with their time and money as the United States, but right now Americans are a suspicious bunch.
Sixty-six percent (66%) of voters nationwide say they’re at least somewhat angry about the current policies […]

When I was young I remember my grandfather (when he was alive) and my grandmother telling me stories of how everyone in the United States sacrificed for the war effort during WW II– enduring regular and scheduled blackouts, saving tin, and making do with what had been rationed. They felt it important to sacrifice for […]

In the anthology God, Truth, and Witness, church historian Robert Wilkens argues that Constantinianism was not a program engineered from the halls of power, but rather it was a grass roots movement from the people of the Roman Empire. In making his case, he gives an account of the episcopacy of Ambrose of Milan, who […]

Jimmy Carter says those who oppose the president are racists. Nancy Pelosi says those who oppose the president are assassins.
CNN says they’re bad at math.
CNN Money has an article that initially appears to be about preparing for retirement. But it starts out trying to refute the notion that Social Security will soon be out of […]

There are many political catch-phrases that have become useless in modern politics– phrases like “the politics of fear,” “the politicizing of whatever,” “the culture of corruption.” But perhaps the most useless political phrase of all is the high-sounding but irrelevant phraseology of “speaking truth to power.”
Many years ago, philosopher Alasdair McIntyre wrote the wonderful book, […]

This was supposed to be a piece questioning the motives of those who marched in Washington last weekend. At best, they have a selective memory; at worst, they are representative of days past when the police set the dogs on the children in Birmingham, state troopers beat the marchers on the Edmund Pettis bridge outside […]

In the health care reform debate, we keep hearing that we must control costs. And then no one offers a method for actually getting and keeping costs down.
In all the states and foreign nations that have achieved universal coverage, not one has been able to keep health care costs under control, and most systems are […]

This Psalm has always been framed and displayed in our home to remind us of who is our shield, our refuge, and our hope.  God is our protector and provider.  He is our ever present help in time of trouble.  I think it is apropos to read Psalm 91 as we remember 9/11.  We […]

In the President’s big speech, I heard nothing that would really address health care costs. Our government has proven unable to contain costs with Medicare or Medicaid. Health systems in Massachusetts, Maine, and Washington, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, and Japan have all failed to contain health care costs.
But there is one place where the US […]

Britain and Canada aren’t the only countries with some kind of universal health care program. What else is out there?
The French health care system, lauded by many around the world, is based on a public insurance that is funded by employee and employer. “The working population has twenty percent of their gross salary deducted at […]

I supposed I could have entitled this "My, how things have changed" but I would much rather you thought about what follows and its implications for the present time.
The death of Ted Kennedy and the retrospective on PBS on the Kennedy brothers got me to drag out my beaten and falling apart copy of The […]

Today President Obama has a message for our school children. Many school systems will carry his message, others will not. I have no problem whatsoever with the President of the United States speaking with our children and I will explain why; but first, some prior thoughts.
First, the hoopla over the President speaking to the nation’s […]

In all the years that Congress has been debating some kind of health care reform, some of the states have tried their own hand at the matter. Let’s look at a few of them.
Massachusetts has made a high-profile attempt at universal coverage. It’s approach has been praised by both sides, but their experience has been […]

“Progressives” who seek changes in the law that would bring about major shifts in our culture have often failed to do that legislatively.  Instead they turn to the courts, and favor a dynamic interpretation of the Constitution.  The view of seeing the Constitution as “living and breathing” is certainly not new in jurisprudence, as James […]

Something happened at La Sierra University, a small Seventh-day Adventist church in California (see "Creating Controversy") that begs the question of how one holds onto their own personal beliefs when such beliefs contradict or are in conflict with institutional beliefs. In addition, how much academic freedom is to be allowed or granted when the teaching […]

President Obama will be speaking directly to our children and youth on September 8,  The U.S. Department of Education announced:
On September 8, 2009, history will be made. Will you be a part of it?
At 12:00 p.m., Eastern Time (ET), President Barack Obama will deliver a national address to the students of America. (Please note that […]

I am going to post something about the science education issue in California - see "Creating Controversy" - http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/09/01/evolution later in the day.  But right now, I have to "cool down" a bit.
As you may or may not know, I was a high school student in Missouri for one year before my family moved to […]