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The Defense of the West: How to Begin, Roger Scruton, 04/12/2005

In his inaugural Wynnewood lecture, Roger Scruton, the leading conservative philosopher of the English-speaking world, argued that the first step in defending the West against its enemies abroad and at home is to understand the identity of Western civilization and to affirm it.

Audio CD $15

"Criticismism" (sic) 'Thinking Critically About Critical Thinking,' Roger Kimball, 09/29/2005

When Otto von Bismarck warned that "We must never ook into the origin of laws or sausages," he articulated a principle diametrically opposed to the Enlightenment ideal of intellectual exposure, summed up in Kant's motto for the Enlightenment: "Sapere aude," Dare to Know! What we call "critical thinking" today is an heir—often a wayward heir--of the Enlightenment project of making man autonomous by elevating human reason at the expense of the customary and conventional.

Audio CD $15

Liberalism and Catholicism in the Public Square, Robert P. George, 12/01/2005

In the modern disputes over “life issues,” such as abortion and infanticide, cloning and embryo-destructive research, and physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia, as well as issues pertaining to sex, marriage, and family life, what principles and norms can be reasonably affirmed both by religious believers and unbelievers? Robert P. George examines the answers that modern liberalism and catholicism provide to that question. He draws on the work of the two chief philosophers of modern liberalism, John Rawl and Jurgen Habermas, and on the Catholic doctrine of natural law.

Audio CD $15.00

The Role of Government in a Free Society, Walter E. Williams, 09/28/2006

We expect our government to do many things for us. Some of these things, however, violate both the letter and the spirit of our Constitution, and also have a very high price tag which will prove devastating to future generations of Americans. Renowned economist, controversial author and syndicated columnist Professor Walter E. Williams of George Mason University makes a compelling case for a return to the constitutional limits on government.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

Forbidden Grounds: The Case Against Employment Discrimination Laws, Richard E. Epstein, 10/24/2006

Should employers have the freedom to hire the people they want? This is the controversial question of celebrated legal scholar Richard A. Epstein, professor of law at the University of Chicago and the Hoover Institution. That freedom was once taken for granted in America and inspired employers to create so many millions of jobs that it was the envy of the world, but it was taken away by the federal government in 1964. Prof. Epstein argued that the current law undermines economic prosperity and personal freedom and, ironically, hurts the most the very people it was designed to help.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

Privatizing Education, Neal McCluskey, 11/21/2006

Many Americans take it as an article of faith that education in a free, democratic nation must be delivered in schools built and controlled by government and paid for out of taxes. But our system of public schools was largely copied from authoritarian Prussia in the 19th century: it is not particularly an expression of freedom or democracy. Neal McCluskey of the Cato Institute maintains that the fairest education system is one paid for by those who benefit from it. Experience has demonstrated the best education systems are built on private control and choice, not government authority and coercion.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

Manliness, Harvey Mansfield, 02/02/2007

Manliness means confidence in the face of risk and danger, argues Prof. Mansfield. This is a virtue we all have reason to value. If studies in social psychology show it is preponderantly a virtue of men, as they do, this is no reason to disdain it. Manliness serves the function of asserting a cause, standing up for something, making a point, correcting an injustice. It means having spirit and being courageous. It means taking responsibility for the well-being of those entrusted to one's care. At the present time manliness still exists, but in the gender-neutral society it is unemployed. In the world after 9/11, however, it is time to see it again as the virtue that it is.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

The Decline of the Secular University, C. John Sommerville, 03/08/2007 , Tim Kane, 03/27/2007

Despite the impressive size of our secular research universities, they are losing prominence in our national debates. They do not offer political, cultural, social or even scientific leadership to American society, in their increasing devotion to professional education. A denial of any religious values or arguments has finally left universities with a vacuum that is being filled with market values and a business model of organization, which are major faculty complaints today. Professor C. John Sommerville suggested ways in which religious considerations could help to revitalize the universities' core concerns.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

Globalization, Employment and Outsourcing, Tim Kane, 03/27/2007

If we try to book an airline seat at midnight, we are just likely now to get someone in India or the Philippines at the other end of the phone. One more American job has been exported overseas -- or so it seems. Outsourcing is part of globalization, so globalization, many think, must be losing us jobs. But is this true? Or is the current very low unemployment rate in the U.S. instead a result of our recent free trade agreements, and so a product of globalization? In this lecture Tim Kane examined the evidence for and against outsourcing and globalization in the light of their effects on employment and on America's economy as a whole.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

Iraqi Ironies, Victor Davis Hanson, 05/14/2007

The Iraq War was orphaned from the beginning. It had no natural constituencies either at home or abroad. As a result it has been a topsy-turvy war, plagued from the first by ironies, contradictions and inconsistencies. But the ironies seen in Iraq are not unique. The United States has seen greater opposition to other wars and other presidents. Lincoln’s popularity declined sharply after Gettysburg. Truman left office with a 22% approval rating.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00

How Election 1936 Gave Us Election 2008, Amity Shlaes, 02/21/2008

In this lecture Amity Shlaes takes us back and demonstrates that the roots of the problem lay in a single election year, 1936, when Franklin D. Roosevelt systematically established modern political interest groups from unions to artists to senior citizens. Roosevelt's electoral strategy was to lavish federal money on these groups, so much so that federal spending that year outpaced state and local spending for the first time ever in peacetime. The consequence was the Roosevelt landslide of 1936 and the setting of the modern spending trap. Roosevelt often spoke of the "Forgotten Man, the man at the bottom of the economic pyramid." Shlaes shows that Roosevelt's New Deal created a new: Forgotten Man," the man who subsidizes the funding of other constituencies and who haunts the politics of all developed nations today.

Audio CD $15.00

DVD 17.00