Author: David Cloutier

Just about everything is wrong with the outline for tax reform offered by the Republicans. And it is wrong not simply for debatable reasons. A lot of it is flat-out lying. The truth about this overall proposal is that: (1) it is based on a non-evidence-based connection between taxation and economic growth, especially suspicious at a time when the American economy is actually relatively strong (albeit not for everyone) and (2) it will deliver a substantial tax cut almost exclusively to the very wealthy, while socking plenty of Americans in the middle with what could amount to a severe...

The bounds of “normal” behavior are funny things. They are pervasive, and it is unimaginable to have a shared culture without them. Yet we all know that they shift over time. We can have passionate arguments over whether this or that shift is “progress” or “decline.” I tend to lean on the side of flexibility: maybe teaching helps this, since every year I get one year older, but I face a set of students in their seats who are ever-fixed in their 18-22-ness. Norms shift. Get too fixated on that shifting, and it can be bad. But to say...

Mark Lilla’s much-discussed new book, The Once and Future Liberal, while not a work in Christian social ethics, nevertheless is a crucial touchstone for deep ethical debates about our present society. Beverly Gage’s New York Times review of Lilla’s book is quite instructive in displaying these challenges. I don’t intend to take sides here, in part because we are dealing with a discussion where the authors involved have substantial agreement about overarching challenges. To a significant degree, they agree about ends; their differences are about means, but not merely instrumental means. There are implied arguments about social morality intrinsic...