Published December 13, 2012
FEATURED PUBLICATIONS
Bargaining and Its Limits
There isn’t much middle ground in the budget showdown, explains EPPC Hertog Fellow Yuval Levin, because “Democrats want more money so that the entitlement system doesn’t have to be reformed, while the Republicans want to reform the entitlement system so that the government doesn’t have to take more of the country’s money.” Read more>>
The GOP’s Payroll Tax Opportunity
In the Weekly Standard, EPPC Fellow James C. Capretta and EPPC Hertog Fellow Yuval Levin urge congressional Republicans to push for an extension of the payroll tax cut and thus champion “all 155 million American wage earners whose tax burdens would be kept from rising.” Read more>>
Medicare Reform After the Election
EPPC Fellow James C. Capretta explains how to begin injecting “more rational consumer incentives” into the Medicare program in order to slow cost growth. Read more>>
MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HANUKKAH!
The Ethics and Public Policy Center sends to our supporters and followers hearty wishes for God’s abundant blessings during the Christmas and Hanukkah seasons.
Year in and year out, you know that you can count on EPPC scholars to be steadfast and vigorous and influential in advancing public policies that are faithful to America’s founding ideals and to our Judeo-Christian moral heritage.
Please remember EPPC in your year-end charitable giving. Or, better yet, please support EPPC right now!
See George Weigel’s recommendations for Christmas books as well as his new book, Practicing Catholic: Essays Historical, Literary, Sporting and Elegiac.
NEW PUBLICATIONS
Marriage at Stake
EPPC President Ed Whelan explains that the “future of marriage in this country is at stake” in the new cases before the Supreme Court. “And so, ultimately, are the rights of faithful Catholics”—and of other supporters of traditional marriage—“to participate fully in public life.” Read more>>
(See also Mr. Whelan’s overview of why the Defense of Marriage Act is constitutionally permissible—and of why the Court can’t coherently invalidate DOMA without inventing a constitutional right to same-sex marriage.)
Good Catholic, Good American
“In defending the conviction that the Church has ‘the right to be itself,’ as do the people of the Church,” says EPPC Distinguished Senior Fellow George Weigel, “Catholics are being the best Americans they can be.” Read more>>
The Sad and Sorry Smithsonian
The National Museum of American History is an “unwelcoming marble eyesore,” laments EPPC Senior Fellow Bruce Cole, but its interior is even worse—a hodgepodge of senseless displays that “prohibits a unified, chronological presentation of the history of the United States.” Read more>>
The Recalibration of Conservatism
“The necessary recalibration of conservatism is under way,” observes EPPC Senior Fellow Peter Wehner, and recent speeches by Representative Paul Ryan and Senator Marco Rubio provide “encouraging first steps.” Read more>>
Civil Society is Solidarity’s Natural Home
EPPC Fellow Stephen P. White argues that “both the ‘logic of the market’ and the ‘logic of the State’ are inadequate for understanding human beings and human society.” Read more>>
Yucca Mountain: A Post-Mortem
Decades ago, after extensive review, Congress chose Yucca Mountain as the site for a permanent repository for nuclear waste. Today, the Yucca project is effectively dead. In EPPC’s journal The New Atlantis, Adam J. White recounts how the Obama administration went around the normal legal process to kill the project, leaving a permanent waste solution more distant than ever. Read more>>
The Death of ‘Mediscare’
In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, EPPC Senior Fellow Peter Wehner (with co-author Dan Senor) finds “something significant and positive” amidst the recent election losses: “Republicans fought Democrats to a draw on the issue of Medicare.” Read more>>
Property Rights in Space
Private individuals and companies hope someday to develop and even settle outer space — but what legal protections do they have? In EPPC’s journal The New Atlantis, Rand Simberg looks at the space treaties now on the books and examines a proposal to recognize claims staked on the Moon, Mars, or asteroids. Read more>>