Young Evangelicals
Credit: Melanie Stetson Freeman
NEW YORK—For Andrew Walker, the current “post-Christian” state of American culture has posed a serious challenge to the faithful.
For a variety of reasons, fewer and fewer Americans now have a grasp of the fundamentals of orthodox, biblical teachings, says Mr. Walker, director of policy studies for the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. Like many who keep attuned to the country’s religious landscape, he notes, too, the dramatic rise of the so-called “nones,” especially among the young, who may believe in God, but have begun to refuse to identify with a particular religious group.
“They grew up in a nominal Christian culture, where it’s no longer of a cultural or social benefit to identify as a Christian,” he says. “To add to that is, there’s often not only no social prestige to gain, there’s also social prestige to lose, if you say you are a Christian in our society.”
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Is American democracy in decline? Should we be worried?
On October 6, some of America’s top political scientists gathered at Yale University to answer these questions. And nearly everyone agreed: American democracy is eroding on multiple fronts — socially, culturally, and economically.
The scholars pointed to breakdowns in social cohesion (meaning citizens are more fragmented than ever), the rise of tribalism, the erosion of democratic norms such as a commitment to rule of law, and a loss of faith in the electoral and economic systems as clear signs of democratic erosion.
No one believed the end is nigh, or that it’s too late to solve America’s many problems. Scholars said that America’s institutions are where democracy has proven most resilient. So far at least, our system of checks and balances is working — the courts are checking the executive branch, the press remains free and vibrant, and Congress is (mostly) fulfilling its role as an equal branch.
But there was a sense that the alarm bells are ringing.
Yascha Mounk, a lecturer in government at Harvard University, summed it up well: […]
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President Donald Trump’s administration has been discreetly diminishing federal support for halfway houses used by federal prisoners by severing numerous contracts in recent months, which has sparked concern that, as a result, inmates will be forced to spend more time in prison than necessary.
The decision to reduce federal funds falls in line with Trump’s pro-law enforcement agenda as well as the actions taken by Attorney General Jeff Sessions to revamp to the war on drugs with longer prison sentences for drug crimes as well as crackdowns on immigration.
The cuts were confirmed by Federal Bureau of Prisons spokesman Justin Long, who said only areas with small populations and facilities that are underutilized will be impacted, according the exclusive report by Reuters.
“The Bureau remains firmly committed to these practices, but has had to make some modifications to our programs due to our fiscal environment,” Long said. He added that referral or placement rates had not been reduced.
Thousands of […]
New Motion Electric Charging Station
Credit: Self Driving Cars
AMSTERDAM — Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) has agreed to buy Dutch-based NewMotion, the owner of one of Europe’s largest electric vehicle charging networks, marking the company’s first deal in electric mobility as demand for cleaner vehicles is expected to soar.
Shell said NewMotion, which manages over 30,000 charging points for electric vehicles in Western Europe and offers access to thousands more, will operate in parallel to Shell’s program of rolling out fast charging points at its forecourts.
“They’re complementary offers. One is fast charging on the go on the forecourt and the other is a slightly slower rate of charge at the workplace or at home. At this stage there are no plans to integrate the two,” Shell’s vice-president for new fuels, Matthew Tipper, told journalists.
Shell is installing electric vehicle charging points at retail stations in Britain, the Netherlands, Norway and the Philippines.
Demand for electric vehicles is expected to rise significantly in coming decades and Morgan Stanley estimates that 1-3 million public charging points […]
The latest stats from the CDC show that just short of 4 in 10 American adults had a body mass index that put them in obese territory. In addition, just under 2 in 10 American children are now considered obese as well.
Credit: Los Angeles Times
Americans’ obesity rates have reached a new high-water mark. Again.
In 2015 and 2016, just short of 4 in 10 American adults had a body mass index that put them in obese territory.
In addition, just under 2 in 10 American children — those between 2 and 19 years of age — are now considered obese as well. (emphasis added)
The new measure of the nation’s weight problem, released early Friday by statisticians from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, chronicles dramatic increases from the nation’s obesity levels since the turn of the 21st century.
Remote Viewing the Year 2060
