PBR: The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

PBR: The Faith-Based Initiative

PBR: What is Wrong with Socialism?

Socialism Flu Shots for Christmas
Got the socialism blues? Worried that a friend or maybe a teenage son or daughter may contract a nasty case of it? Marvin Olasky at World magazine recommends former Acton research fellow Jay Richards’ 2009 HarperOne book, Money Greed and God: Why Capitalism Is the Solution and not the Problem: Among the myths Richards demolishes: The Nirvana Myth (contrasting capitalism with an unrealizable ideal rather than with its real alternatives), the Piety Myth (focusing on good intentions rather than results), and the Materialist and Zero-Sum Game Myths (believing that wealth is not created but simply

Commentary — Chavez: Desperate, Delusional, and Dangerous
It’s ironic – and tragic – that as the world celebrates the twentieth anniversary of Communism’s defeat in Europe, the comic-opera that is Hugo Chavez’s “21st century socialist” Venezuela is descending to new lows of absurdity. Beneath the buffoonery, however, there’s evidence that life in Venezuela is about to take a turn for the worse. By buffoonery, I mean President Chavez’s decidedly weird statements of late. These include threatening war against Columbia, advising Venezuelans that it is “more socialist” to shower for only three minutes a day, telling his fellow citizens to eat less because “there are lots of fat people” in Venezuela, eulogizing convi

Acton Media Alert: Talking Health Care in South Florida
Acton Institute President Rev. Robert A. Sirico joined host Dennis O’Donovan this morning on Religion, Politics and the Culture on WLVJ in south Florida for a wide ranging, hour-long discussion on health care reform and the US Conference of Catholic Bishops’ role in the debate, among other topics. You can listen to the interview by using the audio player below.

Acton Institute presents Guardian of Freedom Award to Giancarlo Ibargüen
Giancarlo Ibárgüen, President of Universidad Francisco Marroquín in Guatemala City, Guatemala, received the institute’s first Guardian of Freedom Award in a ceremony at the university’s campus on Nov. 16. More than 250 guests attended the award ceremony including the presidents of leading free market institutions such as the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, the Cato Institute, Liberty Fund Inc., the Fund for American Studies, the Foundation for Economic Education, and the Acton MBA Program in Entrepreneurship.

The Novelty of ‘New’ Economics
Some of the aspects of the movement in ‘new economics’ highlighted by Sumita Kale sound quite promising. For instance, it is true that “many issues of economic policy (traditionally called ‘welfare economics’) are primarily ethical-economics in nature, and should be informed by moral philosophy rather than economics in isolation.” The growing conversation between economics and other disciplines, specifically moral philosophy and theology, is most welcome. Indeed, some of the principles animating the work of the