Orthodox Biz Blog

When President George W. Bush was in office, I was a flaming liberal. I opposed the Iraq War on a host of grounds, not the least of which was the Constitutional requirement that only Congress (not the president) could declare war.

I was critical of Bushian fiscal policies from profligate spending to steel tariffs to farm subsidies. I was bitterly opposed to the PATRIOT Act and other curtailments on the freedoms ordinary Americans enjoy. The various ideas coming out of the Justice Department about the ‘unitary executive' made my skin crawl, and please don't get me started at a party on the problems with torture and the ability to declare American citizens to be enemy combatants.

Are you an Orthodox Christian with friends or relatives in or around Damascus, Syria? Do you belong to the Antiochian jurisdiction, and so have ties to Syria that way? If so, you might want to notify all your Syrian contacts that Damascus, ancient seat of civilization and the home of the Patriarch of Antioch along with thousands of Christians, is about to be destroyed by Israel.

Handy links to all of the Orthodox Christian Network's new shows are included below.

In addition to those mentioned in the title of this post, be sure to check out "Journeys to Orthodoxy" for the story of an African-American jazz musician and Assistant Professor of Music at Ohio State University who recently entered the Orthodox Church.

In February 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia. This capped off a process which had begun with NATO's airwar on Serbia from 24 March to 10 June 1999. That campaign killed an estimated 5,000 Orthodox Christian Serb soldiers, and wounded an estimated 10,000 more. This is in addition to the estimated 500 innocent Orthodox Christian civilians that were killed by bombs striking non-military targets. The direct damage of the bombing campaign has been estimated at $30 billion dollars in one of the poorest nations in Europe. Serbia is not expected to recover from the U.S.-led bombing campaign for another decade or more.