A recurring criticism of academic life is that it is too theoretical. The public tends to be impatient with basic research; we want instant gratification, and often the practical applications of scholarship do not become evident for decades. That’s why a project researching Indiana nonprofits underway at Indiana University is so exciting: the results of the work will be both important and almost immediately useful.
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Category Archives: Random Blogging
Confusing Sin with Crime
Is anyone else sick of hearing Katie Couric discuss semen-spotted dresses? Does anyone else find graphic discussion by pontificating network anchors about presumed Presidential sexual behavior unseemly? The other day, I picked up a newspaper: Monica Lewinsky had the front page pretty much to herself, the fact that…
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The Elephant in the E-Living Room
The third annual Bulen Symposium on American Politics, held last Monday at IUPUI, was devoted to “epolitics.” The discussion was lively. Depending upon the speaker, we learned that the Internet has lessened (or increased) political participation, is used more by Republicans (or libertarians), circulates devastating (or puerile) political humor, and will replace “butterfly ballots” with reliable electronics (or will enable fraud of hitherto unknown magnitude).
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Magic of Prayer
Well, I see where someone has stolen a plaque of the Ten Commandments from the Morgan County Courthouse. Reporters have expressed surprise, because one of the Commandments, as we all…
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DiverCity
In all of the years I have been attending the Taylor Symposia, I cannot remember confronting a more important topic than the one implicit in the Symposium title, DiverCity…
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