Matthew Schmitz

The Bowles-Simpson reform plan is receiving renewed attention from the left and right, but one aspect of it has received insufficient scrutiny: As part of an effort to “broaden the base” of taxation, Bowles-Simpson removes the tax deduction for charitable gifts and replaces it with a . . . . Continue Reading »

Ireland’s cabinet offered a proposal today that would legalize abortion in cases where the mother’s life is at risk, including from suicide. Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny says they system will not lead to “abortion on demand” : “[Suicide] is an issue that is . . . . Continue Reading »

For one week at least,  First Thoughts  wasn’t the only blog where readers could find a more than occasional and passing defense of what has come to be called “traditional” marriage. That thanks to the editors of  Ricochet , where Ryan T. Anderson devoted a . . . . Continue Reading »

The Jewish Daily Forward reports that British schools will be required to offer at least one of seven foreign languages, excluding Hebrew: LONDON — The British government reportedly is planning to exclude Hebrew from a list of recognized foreign languages in the national education . . . . Continue Reading »

Roger Scruton takes to the pages of the London  Times  with a circumspect, but terribly cutting, treatment of the push for gay marriage  (sub req): If we ask ourselves how it is that the advocacy of gay marriage has become an orthodoxy to which all our political leaders subscribe, we . . . . Continue Reading »

Filmed September 13 at the Royal Institution, London. . . . . Continue Reading »

In a review of Christine Overall’s  Why Have Children? , Amy L. Wax challenges feminists who simultaneously insist on the mother’s right to choose and the father’s duty to provide : [Overall] argues that the biological father should be charged with full . . . . Continue Reading »

From David Bentley Hart’s  Tsunami and Theodicy : Famously, Dostoevsky supplied Ivan with true accounts of children tortured and murdered: Turks tearing babies from their mothers’ wombs, impaling infants on bayonets, firing pistols into their mouths; parents savagely flogging their . . . . Continue Reading »

To think that only important things matter is the menace of barbarism, Nicolás Gómez Dávila reminds us, and so let us take a moment to turn our attention to New York’s latest fashion trend—men’s leggings, or “meggings.” Mollie Hemingway asks if we can’t all agree that they’re . . . . Continue Reading »

Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats have succeeded in passing a bill that protects the right to perform ritual circumcisions . Yet it was not a unanimous victory: 434 of the Bundestag’s members voted in favor, one-hundred against, with forty-six abstaining. The opponents—-members . . . . Continue Reading »