Recent Viewpoints

Kerby Anderson Today is the National Day of Prayer. It is a vital part of our American heritage. The first call to prayer happened before the American Revolution. In 1775, the Continental Congress called on the colonists to pray for wisdom as they considered how they would respond to the King of England. Perhaps one of the most powerful calls to prayer came from President Abraham Lincoln during the Civil War. In 1863, he issued a proclamation for a day…

Kerby Anderson What impact will robots and artificial intelligence have on jobs? In previous commentaries, I have discussed some of these questions and concerns. If you don’t want to be replaced by a robot, we are told, choose a service job, like cutting hair or serving food. A recent article about fast-food robots dismantles that advice. Ryan Mills begins with a story of a restaurant providing high-quality, affordable Mediterranean dishes at a food truck park in San Francisco. It was…

Kerby Anderson Jonathan Haidt has been on the Point of View radio talk show to discuss his previous book, The Coddling of the American Mind. He has now compiled his research in his new book: The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness. He begins his book by having us imagine that a visionary billionaire wants to establish the first permanent human settlement on Mars and chose your ten-year-old daughter for the…

Kerby Anderson George Barna has written a book to help parents discipline their children into spiritual champions. Raising children is a privilege, but also a daunting assignment. Parents have a God-given responsibility to guide their children, but it is often difficult to understand how to do that effectively and biblically. One significant problem is the stark reality that so many Christian parents do not have a biblical worldview, as determined by the decades of surveys conducted by George Barna. As…

Penna Dexter A rule has been added to the federal register that will make it nearly impossible for an incoming president to fire certain federal employees. The Office of Personnel Management issued the new rule which will shield employees appointed by the executive branch from being terminated for opposing the policies and agenda of a president. The rule is to go into effect next month. It concerns employment protections in place for career civil servants that do not apply to…

Kerby Anderson Summer is months away but there is already news of an energy shortage on the Texas power grid. Most people would not think Texas would have an energy scare. But officials asked power generators to postpone scheduled maintenance “to help alleviate potential tight conditions.” Usually the grid has excess power-generation capacity in the Spring, especially given that the temperatures are in the 80s. One reason for the shortage is population growth, but others have to do with the…

Kerby Anderson Jean Twenge begins her essay by suggesting a thought experiment. “Imagine that a company began mass-producing a new toy. This was not a toy for little kids; instead, it appealed most to adolescents. The toy became wildly popular, first with teens and eventually with younger children as well. The toy was so engaging that some teens stayed up until 2 a.m. just to play with it. Before long, teens spent so much time using the toy that they…

Kerby Anderson Most left-leaning economists cannot understand why American consumers are complaining when many economic indicators are positive. One of those individuals is Paul Krugman, a Nobel-prize-winning columnist for the New York Times. He argued in a previous column that inflation was not a problem and used his recent trip to the grocery store to prove it. “Now, I go grocery shopping myself, and am occasionally startled by the total at the cash register—although that’s usually because I wasn’t factoring…

Kerby Anderson Over the last few months, the word “unsustainable” has been frequently used. The GAO (Government Accountability Office) proclaimed: “The federal government is on an unsustainable long-term fiscal path that poses serious economic, national security, and social challenges if not addressed.” The Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, said in his 60 Minutes interview: “The U.S. federal government is on an unsustainable fiscal path. And that just means that the debt is growing faster than the economy. So,…

Kerby Anderson Today is Earth Day. I was a participant in the first Earth Day as a high school student and remember one equation. It was I=PAT. The environmental impact (I) was equal to the population (P) multiplied by affluence (A) multiplied by technology (T). In other words, as a country grew in population and affluence and technology, the worse the pollution and environmental impact. The obvious conclusion was that the best way to protect the planet would be to…

Penna Dexter Here’s the story of a young woman who became acutely aware of the relationship between social media and teen mental illness and is doing something important about it. The Wall Street Journal and other media outlets describe her as a digital-wellness advocate.  Larissa May, age 29, is Founder and Executive Director of a nonprofit called Half the Story. The organization’s founding concept is: “Social media is only half the story. We only share one part of ourselves on…