Known as the “Door to the Sahara Desert,” Morocco and its great cities Casablanca, Tangier, and Marrakesh symbolize everything exotic about Arabic culture. The films “Gladiator,” “Lawrence of Arabia,” “Black Hawk Down,” and “The Last Temptation of Christ” were shot…
Portugal comes back from the economic brink
Trump boasts about the nation’s economic recovery, but during his first year the economy grew only 2.3 percent. The average for Obama, as he brought the nation out of the Great Recession, was 2.2 percent. In 2017 growth for those…
Donald Trump vs. Barack Obama: A Question of Character
Trump is normalizing all this; he is, to borrow a phrase, “defining deviancy down.” —Bret Stephens, conservative columnist Disorder, chaos, instability, uncertainty, intemperate statements are not conservative virtues in my opinion. —GOP Congressman Charlie Dent These are soulless people working…
Private school voucher students are doing poorly
A 2017 study in the District of Columbia about the effects of private school vouchers has further confirmed the results of recent studies in Indiana, Louisiana and Ohio. By and large, the performance of voucher students on standardized tests who…
Christianity without Crucifixion in the Early Church
In July 2002, Rita Brock, a Disciples of Christ minister, and Rebecca Ann Parker, former president of Starr King Theological School, set out on a Mediterranean journey to confirm a claim that had been made for many years: Christian art…
University “shared governance” and faculty discontent
What faculty governance? I thought that was what we were for. —a former member of the UI Board of Regents Proposals to make governance “more efficient” by reducing or limiting the faculty role in shared governance are likely to diminish…
A turning point in the campaign against gun violence?
The combined voices of students, teachers, businesses, and legislators may represent a turning point in the battle against gun violence. It is now time for our legislators to heed the will of the people, large majorities of whom have long…
George Washington’s religion revisited
As a fellow minister in Peter Lillback’s denomination [conservative Presbyterian], I can tell you that a large number of us are embarrassed by his poor historical methodology. —Anonymous posting to a review of Lillback’s Sacred Fire Being no bigot myself,…
Gov. Otter: fund our budgets, not higher ed CEO
Even though it was not recommended by his Higher Education Task Force, Gov. Butch Otter took the advice of seven business leaders and proposed a new position of “chief education officer.” Initially, this person would consolidate the “back-office” functions at…
Mahatma Gandhi’s profound influence on Martin Luther King
Christ furnished the spirit and motivation, while Gandhi furnished the method. —Martin Luther King, Jr. I firmly believe that the Gandhian philosophy of nonviolent resistance is the only logical and moral approach to the solution of the race problem in…