A short week, but a lot of work has been accomplished, at least on paper. There haven't been too many meetings, which is always a plus. At this point it's tempting to go into all the world problems that could be solved by judicious application of Just Third Way principles. It is, after all, becomingly increasingly obvious that something has to be done. The problem is that no one seems to be listening. This suggests that we need to redouble our efforts to open doors to prime movers. In the meantime:
• Discussions with the Fellows, both of whom are from African countries, have been very fruitful. Both have had important positions in their home countries, and have been seeing ways in which the principles of the Just Third Way can be applied to better the lives of ordinary people.
• CESJ has received an enquiry about a summer internship from a doctoral candidate from Turkey. We will be meeting with the prospective intern in the middle of June to see if there is a good "fit," and how best to benefit both the candidate and CESJ.
• Efforts are under way (or under weigh, depending on which source you accept — an issue as burning as whether it's a Tinker's dam or a Tinker's damn that you don't give a rat's tushy about) to arrange a meeting with an important Catholic prelate (a fancy word for "Bishop") at His Excellency's (hey . . . it's better than "His Lordship") earliest convenience. We have to wait and see — we understand that some important holy days are coming up which tend to take priority for some reason.
• In the "We're Not Complaining Just Wondering Department," sales of In Defense of Human Dignity seem to be edging up — there have been, so far, twice as many sold this month as last month. At the same time, the Amazon sales rating of Capital Homesteading for Every Citizen zoomed up, but our supplier has not reported filling an order of any size. If this is a spate of "panic buying" due to the announced revision of Capital Homesteading, don't worry. Whether we replace the current edition or keep it available to show historical continuity, the current edition is going to be available at least through the end of this year. (That's not to suggest you should stop buying the book . . . just don't panic and buy massive quantities. Just buy large quantities.)
• Work proceeds on a response to a critic who voiced some concerns about Supporting Life. The concerns, while serious, are not (we believe) valid, but we are doing our best to treat them with the respect the critic deserves. You never know. Someone's mind could change.
• We've noted a couple of times that people wanting to leave comments on the blog have been frustrated by the fact that the comments don't appear right away, and go away thinking that they have not been heard. Relax, don't worry, even have a homebrew. This is a "moderated blog," and all comments are reviewed before posting. This was necessary to prevent "trolls" from taking over the forum, although it has proven most valuable in deleting spamming advertising thinly disguised as comments, as well as a few comments (very few, actually) from posters who were clearly unhinged. Face it, we don't care how far you think your "freedom of speech" extends. You aren't going to use this blog to publicize anything we regard as deviant behavior or promote questionable products. Any questionable products promoted on this blog will be ours, not yours.
• As of this morning, we have had visitors from 51 different countries and 40 states and provinces in the United States and Canada to this blog over the past two months. Most visitors are from the United States, the UK, India, Canada, and Australia. People in Barbados, Nigeria, Honduras, Qatar and Portugal spent the most average time on the blog. The most popular posting this past week was once again "Thomas Hobbes on Private Property," followed by "Aristotle on Private Property," "Finding the Right Negatives," the memorial to Robert P. Woodman, and "The Keynesian Paradox of Thrift."
Those are the happenings for this week, at least that we know about. If you have an accomplishment that you think should be listed, send us a note about it at mgreaney [at] cesj [dot] org, and we'll see that it gets into the next "issue." If you have a short (250-400 word) comment on a specific posting, please enter your comments in the blog — do not send them to us to post for you. All comments are moderated anyway, so we'll see it before it goes up.
#30#