The Obama administration is pushing to ban Social Security beneficiaries from owning guns if they lack the mental capacity to manage their own financial affairs. When I first heard this claim, I assumed it must be a false rumor circulating on social media and less-than-reputable websites. Instead, it turns out, if the L.A. Times can be trusted, to be true account of the White House’s intentions. The push is intended to bring the Social Security Administration in line with laws...

In today’s American, nearly a quarter million women are incarcerated, primarily for drug-related or non-violent crimes. That’s roughly an 800 percent increase in the past 30 years. And female felons don’t have any easier a time finding work than their male counterparts. Typically, about half of those released from prison have no stable home, no transportation … and few legal job skills. Many of these people struggle with addiction and/or mental health issues as well. One woman, a social worker-turned-entrepreneur...

“Public money is used for a multitude of things that many Americans find objectionable,” says Zack Pruitt in this week’s Acton Commentary. “When standards for congressional spending e virtually obsolete, the financial door swings wide-open for potential abuse.” Planned Parenthood receives over $500 million each year from American taxpayers, prises over 40 percent of its budget. It was recently shown on video ostensibly seeking to profit from the sale of aborted baby parts (as opposed to being reimbursed for tissue...

Much has been written about the plight of the young in America today, many of whom are leaving college and entering a phase of long term underemployment or outright unemployment. The phenomenon of Millennials stuck living in their parents’ basements is a real thing, and it’s troubling. On this week’s edition of Radio Free Acton, Acton Communications Associate Sarah Stanley talks with Jared Meyer of the Manhattan Institute about his new book,Disinherited: How Washington is Betraying Amerca’s Young, which details...

Back in April I wrote about the Baltimore riots and noted the long term impactriots have historically had on cities. At the time I wrote, “Within a few weeks the riots in Baltimore will subside and the country’s attention will shift to other problems. But the economic damage caused by the violence and looting will affect munity for decades e.” Most of us who weren’t directly affected have indeed moved on to other problems. But in the wake of the...

At first blush, the issues of same-sex marriage and surrogacy don’t seem to have too great a connection. However, in Ireland, a public debate illustrates how closely these issues are related, and it isn’t good. In May, same-sex marriage became legal in Ireland by public vote. In the days before the vote, major news sources noted that “fears” of surrogacy would sink the vote for same-sex marriage, even though surrogacy is not legal in Ireland. The question raised is: Do...

“Why don’t we just get pletely out of the marriage business?” For decades, if someone asked that question it would be a safe assumption it ing from a libertarian. Shifting marriage to private contracts that didn’t require the government’s imprimatur has long been an issue championed by those who lean libertarian. But the rise of same-sex marriage—and it’s threats to religious liberty—have caused many others, especially Christian conservatives, to ask if that’s not the best solution to the problems that...

I believe that greatness, if defined by power, economic and cultural influence, requires us to acknowledge that the United States of America was once the greatest country in the world. However, as it ceases to lead the world in these areas – as one survey after another shows – and other countries take its place, it can no longer be considered the greatest. If we change our definition of “greatest” however, America might still be great. I believe we need...

Not the Only “Option” This is the question I ask in response to Rod Dreher et al. at Ethika Politika today. By liberalism, of course, I mean the (classical) liberal tradition as a whole, not just progressive forms of mon on the social and political left. I write, So in one sense Benedict Option enthusiasts are not all wrong. Liberalism is the problem the same way “culture” is the problem, or “society,” or “religion,” or “secularism,” or any other general...

Michael Severance, operations manager for Istituto Acton in Rome, wrote an article for Catholic World Report examining the economic concept of scarcity in light of Laudato Si’ and Pope Francis’s trip to South America. Severance focuses on the pope’s efforts to promote a culture of self-control and asceticism and specifically analyzes the implications of paragraph 222 of the encyclical, where Francis writes: “We need to take up an ancient lesson, found in different religious traditions and also in the Bible....