Joseph Bottum

In addition to Ken Woodward’s fine piece on the reporting of the Church scandals, there comes Philip Jenkins’ fascinating relating of demographics to the reaction in Europe : Most evidence suggests that the Church will endure and even enjoy a historic boom—just not in places it has . . . . Continue Reading »

Over at Reason , Andrew Potter has a fine piece about the tenth anniversary of Naomi Klein’s book No Logo . The book was intended to be an unsparing attack on branding and consumerism—and instead (as the always useful Arts & Letters Daily puts it) the book “became a research bible . . . . Continue Reading »

I wanted to say something about the legal case of the Mojave Cross , which has now been decided by the Supreme Court as not a violation of the establishment clause. But I couldn’t, for the life of me, draw any conclusion from the incredible mishmash of the opinions. This particular cross is . . . . Continue Reading »

I thought President Obama’s executive order was supposed to eliminate the promotion of abortion by the new health-care bill? Comes this line , in the Detroit News : An early sign of health care reform’s impact is Planned Parenthood’s decision to open a new Oakland County clinic . . . . Continue Reading »

In the latest issue of the Weekly Standard , I argued that, to account for the press frenzy of recent weeks, it isn’t necessary to seek anti-Catholic motives in the media: Several Catholic commentators have charged that the European and American press is out to destroy the Church. “The . . . . Continue Reading »

One tries—with the greatest of charity, of course, and good will—to remember where these people were when bills to extend the statute of limitations were naming only lawsuits against the Catholic Church. Some of the currently proposed bills allow time-extended lawsuits against any . . . . Continue Reading »

A story about Amtrak’s new beef-powered train: Taking Amtrak’s Heartland Flyer train between Fort Worth and Oklahoma City sometime in the next year? You will be hitching a ride on the first beef byproducts-powered biodiesel train. The train, which runs on 80% regular diesel and 20% . . . . Continue Reading »

I spoke, in the new issue of the Weekly Standard , about the effect of the atmosphere created by all the reporting on clerical abuse: The best sign of such hysterical moments may be the difficulty of anything sane or sensible being heard in them. As Newsweek noted on April 8, the surveys and . . . . Continue Reading »

“Future Pope’s Role in Abuse Case Was Complex,” read the headline this morning in the New York Times . Which is, I suppose, an improvement over what it could have been. The Catholic World News remarked on it under the hopeful headline , ” New York Times highlights Pope . . . . Continue Reading »

According to a Montreal newspaper , “Distribution Percour Inc., owner of Boutique Séduction in Montreal North, has been ordered by a Quebec Court judge to pay $500 for selling an item called Sleeve Super Stretch whose packaging was in English only. Acting on a citizen’s complaint, . . . . Continue Reading »