In its February 2013 edition, First Things magazine reports on the results of a three-year investigation conducted by the University of Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. The study breaks down family cultures into four categories: the Faithful, the Engaged Progressives, the Detached, and the American Dreamers. The latter two categories pretty much accept […]
Archives for 2013
The Elusive “Skills Gap”
The recent release of the March employment data reflecting the pitiful growth in net new jobs for the month of 88,000, while almost half a million more Americans left the labor force during the month, sent the experts scurrying once again to explain why, four years after the technical end of the so-called great recession, […]
The Plight of the Essential Nation
The current thinking among many foreign policy experts, including those with particular expertise in Iranian relations, seems to be that the new foreign policy alignment in the Obama administration–State, Defense, CIA–combined with the instincts of the President and Vice President, will have the most pro-engagement bias since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. This comes into […]
Here We Go Again III — Minimum Wage
I have often said that there are many complicated issues in public policy, but the concept of a minimum wage is not one of them. It is a “feel good” impulse that makes no sense for any of its intended purposes and, in fact, is harmful to those it is designed to help, the young […]
Here We Go Again II – Gun Control
First, it is pretty clear to me that nothing since the event that has been proposed to add to our control of guns in this country would have prevented the Sandy Hook tragedy. And the proponents of additional controls are missing a critical point, as recently noted in an essay by constitutional attorneys David Rifkin […]
Here We Go Again I – Immigration Reform
I reviewed my archives and found that over the life of the Pilgrim I have written more on immigration than any subject, and I will readily admit that I don’t have much to add. But I will restate some basics and add a couple of thoughts: I am not a “restrictionist” as that term has […]
The Education Battleground Takes Shape in Austin
With the regular Texas legislative session about one-third complete, the battle lines in public education are coming into sharper focus on the four major issues identified last year by our organization, the Texas Institute for Education Reform (TIER). What is at stake is no less than the future direction of standards and accountability based reform […]
Recent Books
The Genesis of Science: How the Christian Middle Ages Launched the Scientific Revolution, by James Hannam We’ve been led to think of the Middle Ages as a period of “darkness”, intellectual stagnation, superstition, and ignorance. Forget it. This is utter myth primarily fabricated by the so-called Renaissance Scholars in what in many cases was a […]
The Undermining of History Standards in Texas Higher Ed
(Note: A version of this essay was previously posted to www.seethruedu.com, an initiative of the Texas Public Policy Foundation focused on higher education reform. I am pleased to be a contributor to this site and I invite Pilgrim readers to visit the site for enlightened commentary on higher education issues from a number of knowledgeable […]
The Unraveling of the Social Contract
In December, the Michigan legislature passed and its Governor signed a right to work law. If there was ever a turning point in the demise of the post World War II social contract, this is certainly it. Of all places, the citadel of union strength and solidarity and the home of the United Automobile Workers […]
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