The Social Conservative Review: June 6, 2013

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Dear Friends,

One of the distinguishing characteristics of Christians is that their hope is not in any human institution, political leader, or social movement. It is in Christ Himself, the Lord of history who is weaving, subtly but unstoppably, every disparate strand of life to create the final, majestic tapestry of human experience - for His glory and the good of those who love Him.

This great truth is always relevant, but it's a good reminder as we consider the events of our time.

• FRC's friend U.S. Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) has offered legislation to protect all unborn pain-capable babies nationwide.
• The Boy Scouts of America voted to allow "open and avowed" homosexuals in their ranks, even as the Illinois legislature refused to vote for permitting same-sex marriage.
• A federal judge has ordered that a version of the notorious abortifacient drug "Plan B" can be sold over the counter to anyone of any age.

Some defeats and some victories, none complete or necessarily final. The one great constant is the Resurrected One, Whose triumph over sin and death is comprehensive and eternal. In all the battles we fight and prayers we offer, let's always remember that.

Sincerely,

Rob Schwarzwalder
Senior Vice President
Family Research Council

P.S. Be sure to watch our latest adult stem cell video, which tells the remarkable story of kidney transplant patient Rob Waddell. Unlike so many kidney patients, Rob received adult stems cells that enable him not to need anti-rejection drugs. View his story here.

Educational Freedom and Reform
Homeschooling

• "For Education, There's No Place Like Home," The Christian Post
• "Protecting Your Front Door," Home School Legal Defense Association
• "Iowa Homeschooling Law Changes Brings Out Liberal Ignorance," Caffeinated Thoughts

Legislation and Policy Proposals

• "Pulling the Parent Trigger," EducationNext
• "Deeper Learning Is Deep Knowledge," Alliance for Excellent Education
• "Common Core Education Is Uncommonly Inadequate," The Wall Street Journal
• "A roadmap for education reform," American Enterprise Institute
• "The Data Are In: Religious Private Schools Deserve a Second Look," The Public Discourse

College Debt

• "Don't Believe Everything You Read About Higher Education," Commentary Magazine
• "TRUE CONFESSION: I've Completely Given Up Hope Of Paying Off $186,000 Worth Of Student Loan Debt," Business Insider
• "What Sallie Mae's Split Says About Student Loans," Forbes
• "Student loan interest rates expected to double," The Daily Caller

Government Reform
Regulation

• "Here's why Texas is so darn optimistic," AEIdeas.org
• "Government Is Not a Necessary Evil," First Things

Waste/Fraud/Abuse

• "Living Large: IRS Spent $4.1 Million Dollars on a Single Conference in California," Townhall.com
• "Dissolve USAID and Revamp Foreign Aid," Commentary Magazine
• "California's Phony Budget Surplus," Library of Economics and Liberty

Health Care
Abstinence

• "The New Birds and the Bees," The Public Discourse
• "Girl Scouts versus right and wrong," WORLD Magazine
• "Real Purity," The Gospel Coalition

Health care reform: Political and Legislative efforts

• "Death Panels? Of course ...," The Center for Vision and Values
• "New light on the emergency room," Columbia Journalism Review
• "ObamaCare Bait and Switch," The Wall Street Journal
• "The IRS and its 47 new powers to enforce ObamaCare," The Galen Institute

Homosexuality

• "DOJ Informs Employees to 'Verbally Affirm' Homosexuality," The Christian Post
• "We Will Surrender Nothing," First Things
• "California Senate votes to revoke Boy Scouts' nonprofit status," The Washington Times
• "Socialist president of Ecuador rejects homosexual 'marriage' and adoption as contrary to nature," LifeSiteNews.com
• "The Global Divide on Homosexuality," Pew Research Center

Human Life and Bioethics
Abortion

• "New Wave of Fetal-Pain Abortion Bans Faces Court Scrutiny," Christianity Today
• "The myth of empowerment through abortion," The Washington Times
• "Cuomo To Propose Bill Allowing For Abortions After 24 Weeks Of Pregnancy," CBS New York
• "Two abortionists' medical licenses revoked after patient's death," The Daily Caller
• "How the Supreme Court Gave Us Gosnell," First Things
• "Ask RC: Why won't my pastor preach against abortion?," R.C. Sproul, Jr.
• "House Panel Approves Bill Banning Abortions at 20 weeks of Pregnancy," LifeNews.com
• "Annie Murphy Paul: What we learn before we're born," TED
• "Gosnell case shows abortion law needed to protect unborn children," The Washington Post
• "Women Deliver: The Polished Veneer and the Ugly Truth," C-FAM
• "Late-Term Abortionist: 'Abortion Can Never Be Late'," Turtle Bay and Beyond
• "Who or what is a "child"?," MercatorNet

Bioethics and Biotechnology

• "The Time Has Come to Outlaw Human Cloning," First Things
• "Manimal Rights: How far should science go in making human-animal chimeras?", Slate.com
• "Biology's drive toward engineering," Phys.org

Euthanasia and End of Life Issues

• "Who Decides How You Die? Inside Montana's Assisted Suicide Fight," Reason.com
• "Maine Rejects Bill to Become Fourth State Legalizing Assisted Suicide," LifeNews.com
• "Whose Life Is It Anyway?," National Review Online

Stem Cell Research
To read about the latest advances in ethical adult stem cell research, keep up with leading-edge reports from FRC's Dr. David Prentice, click here.

• "Biomarker could help scientists choose the right cell line when conducting stem cell experiments," Phys.org
• "Kidney Transplant With No Anti-Rejection Drugs? Thank Adult Stem Cells," LifeNews.com
• "Adult Stem Cells truly are life savers," National Right to Life News
• "Not with a bang, but a whimper," Mercatornet

Human Trafficking

• "Sexual slavery throughout the world," Digital Journal
• "Caring for Victims of Sexual Abuse," The Gospel Coalition
• "Children for Sale in Thailand," Not for Sale Campaign
• "Human-trafficking bill would make minors immune from prostitution charges," JournalStar.com
• "Shouldn't buying sex with children be a felony?," The Oregonian

Marriage and Family
Adoption

• "Nearly 70 percent of adoption credit claims were audited by IRS, report finds," Fox News
• "We've found the next enemy: adoptive families," GetReligion
• "Utah adoption law provision discriminates against men, attorney claim," The Salt Lake Tribune
• "Advocates Educate Congress on Lack of Normalcy for Children in Foster Care," National Council for Adoption
• "USCIS Implements Pre-Adoption Immigration Review (PAIR) for Ethiopia Cases," America World Adoption

Family Economics

• "No, it's not another housing bubble," Columbia Journalism Review
• "The fallacy of the 'revenue neutral' tax," The Daily Caller
• "The 30-Hours-Per-Week Job Hurdle," The Acton Institute
• "Glass 45 Percent Full," Library of Economics and Liberty
• "Will "Tax-Free Zones" Boost New York's Economy?," Via Meadia
• "Breadwinner Moms: It's Complicated," Juicy Ecumenism

Family Structure

• "Is Your Church Ready for the Marriage Revolution?," Moore to the Point
• "The Boy Scouts' Doomed Compromise," The Public Discourse
• "The Gift of Siblings," New York Times
• "Unequal, Unfair, and Unhappy: The 3 Biggest Myths About Marriage Today," The Atlantic
• "A Silent Crisis: Changing Families in America," Values & Capitalism
• "On the roots of community," Mere Orthodoxy
• "The New Purpose of Marriage," The Gospel Coalition
• "Sexual Assault in the Military a Symptom of Cultural Breakdown," Religion Today

Media
Pornography

• "First pornographic app for Google Glass set to launch 'within days' as adult film directors pledge to explore 'full potential' of the controversial gadget," The Daily Mail
• "FBI Ran Pedophile Ring to Nab Pedophiles," Breitbart.com
• "Graphic, Pornographic Exam Shocks Cambridge Law Students," The College Fix
• "Desecration and Titillation," Challies.com

Internet

• "No hiding place," The Economist
• "What technology exists that most people probably don't know about & would totally blow their minds?," Marginal Revolution

Religion and Public Policy
Religious Liberty

• "Religious Liberty May Be Threatened for U.S. Military," The Foundry
• "Religious Freedom: A Civil-Rights Issue," National Review Online
• "In defense of Hobby Lobby," The Washington Post
• "Fear, Loathing, and Demographics," The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty
• "Thomas More Society Warns That Pending Illinois Same-Sex Marriage Bill Provides the "Worst Protections for Religious Liberty in the United States," Thomas More Society
• "Supreme Court to Hear Landmark Case Defending Public Prayer," Alliance Defending Freedom
• "Religious Freedom: The Cornerstone of Strong Social Architecture (Part One)," Comment
• "Religious liberty is 'endangered,' warns Hispanic Christian leader," Catholic News Agency

Religion in America
Check out Dr. Kenyn Cureton's feature on Watchmen Pastors called "The Lost Episodes," featuring how religion has had an impact on our Founding Fathers.

• "Which Combination of God and Guns Produces the Fewest Suicides?," Christianity Today
• "The Book We Still Can't Spare," The American Spectator
• "Poll: Most Americans Say Religion Is Losing Influence in U.S.," Gallup
• "Slippery slope to accepting atheist Boy Scouts," USA Today
• "How criminals use religion to justify their crimes," Patheos.com

Secularism

• "No, the Pope Didn't Just Say All Atheists Go to Heaven," The Atlantic
• "Atheists Erect First Public Monument," The American Spectator

International
Israel

• "Assad: Arab world prepared to join fight against Israel," The Jerusalem Post
• "The Palestinian Excuse Machine," Commentary Magazine
• "Will the "Party of the Devil" Get Chased Back to Hell?," Via Meadia

International Economy and Family

• "Not always with us," The Economist
• "Southeastern shift: The new leaders of global economic growth," Financial Times
• "Would a New 'Bretton Woods' Save the Global Economy?," Council on Foreign Relations
• "How Did the Global Poverty Rate Halve in 20 Years?," The Acton Institute

Religious Persecution

• "Paying Off Egypt's Persecutors," Family Research Council
• "Arab Spring Egypt's 'Legal' Persecution Of Christians," Human Events
• "Islamic Traffickers Cry Forced Conversion in Attempt to Retaliate Against Christian Rescuers," Persecution.org
• "Christian Persecution - East and West," CultureWatch

The Courts
Constitutional Issues

• "The Upside-Down Constitution: Recent Reviews and Further Reflections," The Library of Law and Liberty
• "Obama's Agenda Depends on Packing the DC Circuit Court," Breitbart.com
• "Is it Time for the Conservative Legal Movement to Give Up "Judicial Deference"?," The FedSoc Blog

Other News of Note

• "The Uses of Scandal," The American
• "Communism's Forgotten Crimes," First Things
• "One Tough Nutter," City Journal
• "Opposing, Loving and Persuading," Religion Today

Book reviews

• "Ever the Prophet, Never the King," The American
• "We're All Makers Now," Christianity Today
• "The Court that John Marshall Inherited," The Library of Law and Liberty
• "College and Its Discontents," The Wall Street Journal
• "Enduring Empire," Claremont Review of Books