Hate crimes—offenses stemming from hatred of persons based on their race, religion, ethnicity or sexual orientation—continue to be an affront to the national conscience. Their incidence among some groups, moreover, has been rising. Such is the case with Asian Americans. Margaret Fung, ex

The statistics from Sudan appall any decent observer. In the last 17 years, two million persons have been killed, four million have been internally displaced and hundreds of thousands made refugees. Yet the West seems to evince little interest in the hidden holocaust that is consuming Southern Sudan

In a speech at the Joint Forces Command headquarters in Norfolk, Va., on Feb. 13, President George W. Bush warned that national security can be endangered in two new ways. We must confront the threats that come on a missile, he saidpresumably referring to possible attacks from hostile nations like N

The Bush presidency’s foreign policy has yet to take shape. Environmental and energy policy is solidifying, on the other hand, at too rapid a rate. The president reversed his campaign promise to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, the principal greenhouse gas, and unilaterally withdrew from th

The execution of Timothy J. McVeigh, scheduled for the morning of May 16, will be the first federal execution in almost four decades. This fact alone should occasion some soul searching, because it underscores the fact that our government firmly maintains its commitment to capital punishment. We the

The increasing number of drug offenders in prisons around the country is a major reason why our incarcerated population has reached the two million mark. Passed in the 1970’s, New York State’s so-called Rockefeller laws call for a penalty of 15 years for the sale of two ounces of a contr

J. R. R. Tolkien, the Oxford professor of Anglo-Saxon who became famous by inventing the Hobbits, once pointed out that the Gospel story begins and ends on a note of joy. It begins with the birth of Jesus under the stars in Bethlehem, a moment of purest joy, and it ends with his resurrection in the

The recent investigation and trial of the theologian Jacques Dupuis, S.J., alerted Catholics and others to the judicial methods of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (Am., 3/12, Signs of the Times).

It is understandable that at first glance the idea of a national missile defense system is appealing. It promises perfect safety, rendering obsolete the madness of nuclear deterrence based on mutual assured destruction. If the system were to work, the threat of some enemy from across the ocean pulve

Through Medicaid and other programs, most poor people in the United States have access to the new AIDS drug therapies. But in developing countries, their cost—over $10,000 a year—has made their use all but impossible. As a result, the AIDS pandemic has widened its devastating scope in bo