Recent Viewpoints

Penna Dexter I recently returned from a trip to Greece. One cannot go far in that country without being confronted with evidence of the rise and fall of great civilizations. We spent a day in and around Corinth, a wealthy ancient Greek city, destroyed by the Romans in 156 BC. The Romans killed all the men in Corinth and enslaved the women — and the children. The victorious Roman army sacked the city, utterly destroying it. In 146-144 BC, Julius…

Kerby Anderson Nuclear war may be unthinkable, but we need to think about it, so it doesn’t occur. Recently at a China-Russia summit, General Secretary Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin proclaimed, “There can be no winners in a nuclear war, and it should never be fought.” While we can take comfort in their statement, we also need to realize these two leaders have threatened the use of nuclear arms in the past. In his latest book, The End…

Kerby Anderson The world keeps getting increasingly more dangerous. Robert Clark provides several examples. There is the “war in Ukraine; China’s increasingly bellicose actions in the South China Sea and its little-talked-about nuclear proliferation; and Iranian aggression that threatens the existence of Israel, the lives of U.S. forces and their allies in the Middle East, and the security of global shipping lanes.” All of that is enough for any of us to avert our eyes and focus on something else….

Kerby Anderson When school is out, that is a time when administrators should establish needed policies before schools and colleges reconvene. High on the list is to develop policies concerning student walkouts. In a recent article, Stanley Kurtz reminds us how the country has been swept up in successive waves of disorder and lawlessness on campuses. These range from protests about racism to protests about the election of Donald Trump to high school walkouts about guns to recent pro-Hamas demonstrations….

Kerby Anderson Whenever I am out speaking and take questions, there is one question I can assume will be asked. Aren’t you concerned about the possibility we will soon have a central bank digital currency? Financial leaders in other countries are calling for the implementation of these CBDCs, and concerned Americans wonder if they are coming to this country. My first response is to mention that I have written about CBDCs, which is usually followed by an encouragement to do…

Kerby Anderson Kids aren’t growing up. But you already knew that. We now have more evidence for why this is a significant problem. In the past, I have quoted from the book, The Coddling of the American Mind by co-author Jonathan Haidt, who I interviewed on our radio program. He argues that young people are fragile and have been protected by a culture that promotes safety at all costs. In a new book, Abigail Shrier takes a different look at…

Penna Dexter Population policy received heavy scrutiny recently at the annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Population and Development. Julia-Elena Cazan reported on the meeting which was held at UN headquarters in New York.  She wrote: “Governments voiced concerns that low fertility rates are threatening their societies with anemic economic growth, labor shortages, fiscal insolvency, and other social problems. But the UN population establishment insists it’s not a problem. Ms. Cazan says population bureaucrats, when confronted with these…

Kerby Anderson A few decades ago, Americans were increasingly concerned about privacy. Back then, we did several radio programs on the topic but now many of our privacy concerns have faded. Mark Zuckerberg put this in perspective. He said when he got to his dorm room at Harvard, the question many students asked was, “why would I want to put any information on the Internet at all? Why would I want to have a website?” He then went on to…

Kerby Anderson You have probably heard the phrase, “History Does Not Repeat Itself, But It Rhymes.” That observation is true, especially in economics. Investor Ray Dalio learned that lesson at a young age. In 1971, he was clerking on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. When President Nixon announced that paper currency could no longer be turned in for gold, he expected pandemonium on the floor as stocks took a dive. Instead, the stock market jumped 4 percent…

Kerby Anderson Why do we write down our laws? I recently read an article providing a practical reason for writing down the laws of a nation, but I would also like to add one historical reason for why we write down our laws. This country is supposed to be a nation of laws and not men. We haven’t always lived up to the vision, but that is what we are to aspire to achieve. When you write down a law,…

Kerby Anderson Victor Davis Hanson recently wrote about the “Leftist Mind,” and that got my attention since I have recently written a booklet on the “The Liberal Mind.” My goal was to describe the foundational assumptions of a liberal mindset. Hanson instead reminded us of how leftists supported the Electoral College and every decision from the Supreme Court until recently. A decade ago, Democrats loved the Electoral College. The “blue wall” states made the election and reelection of Barack Obama…