Obama: Yes we can but I need more time

Yes, keep hoping for that change, guys. Keep up your faith in science, technology, the human will, the human intellect, the sexual revolution, the this revolution, the that revolution... Utopia is just around the corner.

The fundamental questions in Thomas More's trial... and Britain today

The fundamental questions at stake in Thomas More’s trial continue to present themselves in ever-changing terms as new social conditions emerge. Each generation, as it seeks to advance the common good, must ask anew: what are the requirements that governments may reasonably impose upon citizens, and how far do they extend? By appeal to what authority can moral dilemmas be resolved? These questions take us directly to the ethical foundations of civil discourse. If the moral principles underpinning the democratic process are themselves determined by nothing more solid than social consensus, then the fragility of the process becomes all too evident - herein lies the real challenge for democracy.

words of Pope Benedict XVI in Westminster Hall, 2010

Acknowledgment to Joanna Bogle

Echoes of Dune

Do any of you Dune fans get a frisson of recognition as Somalis, warlike desert people, carry out a daring raid to capture high-tech weaponry, in the process threatening the balance of power? A little too much water around, I'll admit, but even so...!

Whose voice counts in the end?

"Socialism collapsed because it did not allow the market to tell the economic truth. Capitalism may collapse because it does not allow the market to tell the ecological truth."

Oystein Dahle, former vice president, Exxon Norway and North Sea.

To put the world in order...

To put the world in order, we must first put the nation in order;
to put the nation in order, we must put the family in order;
to put the family in order, we must cultivate our personal life;
and to cultivate our personal life, we must first set our hearts right.
Confucius