A Thinking Reed

  • Springtime for militarism

    John McCain has some admirable qualities and has taken some good stances in defiance of his party, but Justin Raimondo performs a salutary service in reminding us that McCain’s record on foreign policy has been not only consistently pro-war, but that he has consistently taken the maximally hawkish view on any given conflict (e.g. he…

  • Barth, Yoder, and the problem of war

    I assume that most readers of this blog also read Marvin’s site regularly, but in case you don’t, you should really check out his current series on Karl Barth and war: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 With more to come, including a “Yoderian” response to Barth’s position. See here for…

  • MLK and non-violence

    Given how Martin Luther King Jr. has become a kind of American plaster saint that politicians of all stripes routinely genuflect toward, it’s easy to forget how radical his message was: As I have walked among the desperate, rejected, and angry young men, I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve…

  • The surge a success?

    Andrew Bacevich is skeptical.

  • Friday metal – “alternative” metal edition

    Before there was grunge there were a host of bands that would eventually be lumped together as “alternative” who displayed significant metal influences, even if they blended them with funk, modern rock, industrial or other sounds. I cut my teeth as a teenager in the early 90s on a lot of this stuff, so it’s…

  • Clueless economist watch

    Steven Landsburg writes in the NYT: All economists know that when American jobs are outsourced, Americans as a group are net winners. What we lose through lower wages is more than offset by what we gain through lower prices. In other words, the winners can more than afford to compensate the losers. Does that mean…

  • Animal cloning: cui bono?

    Marvin asks: So what if it’s safe? Do we need to clone beef cattle, dairy cattle, swine and chickens? It’s not like I’m starving, and I’m not sure how this helps people who are starving. Who benefits from cloning livestock? This seems to be yet another great example of what I’ll call “technologism:” If we…

  • A cross of black gold?

    This look at the “Christian oil industry” is bizarre and fascinating.

  • We’re doomed, the continuing series

    Two items from yesterday’s WaPo: Are we witnessing a massive slow-motion extinction of species? And what does that mean for our future and our children’s future? Cheap accessible cars for the people of India: commendable free-market egalitarianism or death sentence for the planet?

  • Friday metal – mainstream love edition

    This was published a while ago, but the Guardian asks: Why Is Metal Still Ignored by the Mainstream? Mastodon, “Sleeping Giant”