In Praise of Fatherhood

Today I honor the beauty and grace of fatherhood. I am recently graduated from law school, and getting ready to start a job at my dad’s firm in August. Dia and I have very little money. Yet we have just made a down payment on our first house. I am studying for the bar exam in July and occasionally relieving Dia from the sole care of two girls under the age of two. We have very little time. Yet we have just returned from a ten-day Hawaii vacation.

The house was a little miracle. Continue reading

Audience on Demand

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Photo by Dorien Meijerink from freeimages.com

 

 

“Michael, do you know what time we’re supposed to be at my mom’s?”

In a relationship I am almost always both very happy with and very comforted by, I can sense the contrast as I’ve started a habit of waiting minutes after asking Michael for something before following up on my request—not out of patience, but to prove a point. After ten minutes or more of waiting, when I finally do follow up, Michael can’t say that he was about to respond or that he was just finishing up a task before getting back to me—though sometimes, contrary to my expectations, I find out that he was just taking a little longer to respond and that he did, after all, just need to finish up a task. Continue reading

The neglected key to quality brainstorming

Since we began The Brother’s Sabey almost a year ago, many have asked us how we come up with, and I’m quoting here, “such profound insights into the recesses of human experience.” The truth is it’s a collaborative effort fraught with a fair share of ups and downs. We wanted to provide a “behind the scenes” look for our faithful followers. Thanks everyone for your support!

Why I’m Jealous of Liberals, and What Conservatives Can Do About It

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I’m jealous of my liberal friends. I’m jealous because they seem to have a corner on the compassion market. Their political representatives champion the poor, minorities, and marginalized, while mine seem intent on invoking Reaganomics and the importance of a balanced budget. Although the economy is fundamentally important, the rhetorical superiority of the liberals should be evident. (Rhetoric 101: When you want to create a following, you should not turn to your accountants for most of the speech material.) It may well be that a more conservative fiscal and economic policy will end up benefiting the most people, but the people, not the policies, should be the focus. As I have written, I tend to believe that conservative principles will ultimately be more beneficial than liberal policies (although I think there are exceptions); however, I find liberal rhetoric much more compelling–it feels more altruistic and mission-driven: Let’s make this a truly equitable country! While equality is not an infallible ideal, it is a powerful rallying cry. Continue reading

“Reductio ad Hitlerum”

 

I get it. The bad guys in these movies are like the Nazis (that means they must be really bad). Nothing is more frightening to the contemporary Western psyche than the rise of another Hitler. In our mind, Nazi Germany is the quintessence of evil. Although there was undoubtedly evil in the Nazi regime, I wonder if our obsession with Hitler and the Nazis has become unhealthy. Continue reading

Against Chronological Snobbery: The Supreme Court

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This is the first in a series of posts intended to expose the snobbery that is often entailed by claims of the “progress” of culture. I hope to attack various manifestations of the view that currently popular moral, social, and philosophical views may safely be regarded as superior to those that were popular in past ages. Subsequent posts will deal with issues such as the alleged progress of our moral ideology, our philosophical understanding of the nature of things, and our ability as a culture of foster human thriving. But here I will attack chronological snobbery as it is found in the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence. Continue reading