Fred Hutchison column

During my teen years, I discovered a passion for truth in my heart and also discovered I was a political conservative. During my college years I joined the debate team, got active in politics and discovered that I enjoy a philosophical approach to learning. I was deeply convinced that truth exists and can be found by those who mean to have it. I devoted myself to the search for truth and stuck with that devotion for the rest of my life.

At some point, I realized that to find truth one must go to the fountainhead of truth, namely God. I sought God during my last two years in college culminating in a traumatic and supernatural moment when I met Christ at the cross. From that moment to this, I have never doubted my eternal salvation.

Within four years, I was surprised to find myself preaching sermons from the pulpit and teaching bible studies. That began a lifelong interest in theology and Christian spirituality. I have written a book titled, The Stages of Sanctification.

However, I gradually discovered that I was meant to be more of a philosopher, historian, psychologist, a student of classical literature, a science buff, and a political writer than a pastor. I am a classic autodidact (self-taught) and polymath (student of many subjects). In keeping with my Myers-Briggs temperament of INTP, I have been chasing after intellectual excitement for most of my life. Several years ago, I was designated as a "Christian Intellectual" by a program of the Department of Philosophy of Talbot University.

In the seventies, I had a strong interest in American history and gave many talks on the subject during the seventies and eighties. In the eighties, I developed a theory of history and undertook a serious long term study of European history. At present I am writing two new books: The Rise and Fall of Western Culture, and A Brief History of Conservatism. The bulk of my writing is in essay form and I have written perhaps 500 essays in the last fifteen years.

My chief claim to fame is as an essay writer for a politically conservative and Christian web site which gets 1,000,000 hits a month. Beginning in the summer of 2006, my writings began to open opportunities as a political advisor, writer and operative at the local, state and federal level. Those involvements became progressively more intense during the year which followed.

I am a CPA and MBA and I worked as a technical expert in governmental auditing and accounting in order to pay the bills. I am now retired from conventional employment and have the luxury of pursuing writing, politics and the intellectual and spiritual treasures which are the joy of my heart.

Fred Hutchison

December 24, 2009

By now, most of my readers have heard of the scandal nicknamed "Climategate," involving the suppression of information that contradicts a supposed consensus of . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 14, 2009

In the movie Ben Hur, one of the Persian Magi who worshipped Christ in Bethlehem returned to Judea 30 years later to see the adult messiah-king. The old Magi . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 26, 2009

Conservatives will soon have one of the great joys of this life: the joy of rebuilding with like-minded comrades. I happen to believe that the time for . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 15, 2009

Letter to the Editor, First Things Robert George defines a person as a "dynamic unity of body, mind, emotion, will, and spirit." This is very similar to how . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 27, 2009

The Glenn Beck show sometimes displays a picture of the capitol building with a giant snake wrapped around the dome. This chilling image age is unforgettable. . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 21, 2009

Last November, the American people elected a man president who has never had management or executive experience, and who has only had two years experience in . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 17, 2009

Prior to the twentieth century, no one called health care a right. The idea seemed to have originated with the Progressive Movement in the early 20th century. . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 3, 2009

One can see a grassroots revolution in America in three places: The "tea parties" in the public square, the noisy "town hall" meetings between congressmen, . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 27, 2009

Renew America, now recognized by About.com as one of the top ten conservative web sites in the U.S., stands out as being the most Christian of the ten and the . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 12, 2009

Don't believe what you are told by Obama, Inc. about the proposed legislation to regulate medicine and medical insurance. Does this mean they are telling lies? . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 10, 2009

Natural law is a vital part of the conservative intellectual heritage. Among the five ancient kinds of conservatism, natural law is the second oldest. Natural . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 13, 2009

Self-deceiving pride leads the sons of Adam into many foolish vanities and conceits. Some people concentrate on the petty vanities, and others indulge in . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 10, 2009

Columnist Bob Herbert has historical amnesia about the Vietnam war but has total recall about the liberal myths of the anti-war movement. The central theme of . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 15, 2009

People are searching for the meaning of life as much now as they ever did. However, meaning is harder to find today because of a very tough skepticism in today . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 1, 2009

This is part 2 of an essay in which we are considering the "emergent church" — a postmodern cult disguised as a church — and the "seeker-sensitive church" that . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 18, 2009

Part 1 of this essay deals with the rise of the "emerging church," which is postmodern and heretical. As such, it is a double threat to doctrinally orthodox . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 23, 2009

We have traveled a long way through the history of conservatism and are nearing the end of the story. It is 2009, and I am doing post mortems of the disastrous . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 2, 2009

President George W. Bush appointed a handful of neoconservatives to positions of power and influence. These officials were highly visible and controversial.  . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 17, 2009

(Letter to the editor — the Columbus Dispatch) In a spectacular moment of irrationality and moral confusion, columnist Gwinne Dyer drew a moral equivalent . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 26, 2009

In the last essay in this series, part 15, we discovered in history a strong correlation between Christian spirituality and the vitality of Western culture. . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 10, 2009

We live in an age in which the great man has become a rarity. We little understand how impoverished we will be when we can no long bask in the light of great . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 5, 2009

In our walk through the history of conservatism, we have reached the period running from 1973 to 1988. In 1973, abortion was legalized, and 1988 was the last . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 22, 2008

"Hark the herald angels sing, glory to the new born king." Have you ever noticed that during the Christmas season, we sing a lot more about the birth of . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 20, 2008

Letter to the editor of First Things: regarding Messianic Gentiles and Messianic Jews Mark Kinzer is justified in his complaint that the Jews have been . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 24, 2008

The meltdown of the conservative movement is a greater calamity than losing an election! The civil war among conservatives has left an unknown number of . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 3, 2008

Does Barack Obama believe in the universal moral law? Hard to tell. Obama insists he is a Christian and admits that evil exists, but answers questions about . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 30, 2008

Is Barack Obama a socialist? Well, yes and no. If you mean by that what Americans used to call "creeping socialism" and the Brits called Fabian socialism, . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 29, 2008

I was invited by the Defender's Council of Vermont to debate with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) concerning an Al Jazeera channel on Burlington . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 22, 2008

Now that the brouhaha about The Da Vinci Code has died down, it is time to turn our attention to other historical myths that cast doubt upon the historical . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 7, 2008

The Hollywood movie The Hustler featured a marathon pool match between Minnesota Fats, played by Jackie Gleason and Fast Eddie Felsen, played by Paul Newman. . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 18, 2008

Pope Benedict XVI has identified several causes for the intellectual, moral, cultural, and spiritual decline of the European civilization. I was thrilled to . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 28, 2008

In this essay, we shall examine the early days of the culture war, which include a frenetic prelude (1967–68), and the development of a hideous counter-culture . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 5, 2008

(Letter to the editor, The Dispatch, July 4, 2008) Columnist George Will claims that when Thomas Jefferson wrote "We hold these truths to be self-evident" he . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 4, 2008

The last installment of this series (Part 12) ended with the nomination of Barry Goldwater for president in 1964. Senator Robert Taft, who was the preeminent . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 20, 2008

(Letter to the editor, the Columbus Dispatch) Although I am usually a critic of the liberal print media, I am now obliged to argue that the print media is a . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 16, 2008

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) was a philosophical pantheist, and his theory of general relativity is based upon pantheistic assumptions that rule out a . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 16, 2008

Senators, the gay agenda is radical, militant and well funded. If you pass the gay bill of rights, SB 305, they will flood Ohio businesses with lawsuits and . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 7, 2008

This essay deals mainly with the emergence of traditionalist conservatives in American politics during the 1912–1952 period. In 1912, Woodrow Wilson, a . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 7, 2008

I have been writing a series of essays on the five kinds of conservatives, but only recently realized that there are also five kinds of postmodern liberals. In . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 2, 2008

In consideration of a gay advocacy column by Ann Fisher, a gay rights bill in the legislature, and a general public invitation by the Dispatch to discuss the . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 17, 2008

The birth of the conservative intellectual movement in the 1940's happened at about the same time that the nihilistic philosophy of atheistic Existentialism . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 11, 2008

In our journey through history, we have reached the culture war of the twentieth century that began in the 1920's and accelerated during the counter-cultural . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 3, 2008

A large percentage of those who became conservatives during the last 50 years can hark back to a moment when the words of William F. Buckley, Jr., were . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 15, 2008

(Letter to the editor of First Things magazine) The book review God Returns to French Philosophy describes the French philosopher Jean-Luc Marion trying to . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 4, 2008

When the Republican primaries were a free-for-all with no front-runners, some called it a signal of conservatism in crisis. After the Florida primary, the field . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 14, 2008

Edith Wharton wrote The Age of Innocence (1920), which was about the high society of Old New York in the 1870's. She borrowed from the wisdom of the past to . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 24, 2007

"...these things the angels desire to look into." 1 Peter 1:12 The heavenly heralds sounded their trumpets in all the precincts of heaven. The News echoed . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 8, 2007

Letter to the Editor — Columbus Dispatch The Columbus Dispatch advocates both abstinence-only for teens, plus condoms, which is a contradiction. It is a . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 26, 2007

According to intellectual historian Richard Weaver (1910–1963), a republic devoted to freedom and order requires a rational citizenry who will hearken to the . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 29, 2007

In the last essay (part 7), we considered how Hegel propagated the cult of modernism. The modernists had faith in the inevitability of progress based upon . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 18, 2007

Letter to the Editor — The Dispatch 10/18/07 Columnist Jonah Goldberg's heart is in the right place about the right to life, but is a naive innocent when it . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 7, 2007

1) Traditionalist conservatism (first appeared in the 8th century BC) Ancient: Sought to restore a golden age, to venerate forefathers and heroes, to embrace . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 1, 2007

Conservatism passed through a series of fiery trials during the nineteenth century. The previous essay (part 6) viewed conservatism and Christianity in the . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 7, 2007

OP-ED Submission: The Columbus Dispatch Al Capone was beyond the reach of law enforcement in Chicago as long as he had friendly relationships with . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 5, 2007

Conservatism passed through a series of fiery trials during the nineteenth century. I shall tell the tale in two parts. This essay shall view conservatism and . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 19, 2007

Summer sunset in the Iowa countryside is often a brilliant red-orange and trails behind it a long twilight afterglow. During the Iowa Straw Poll, I stayed at . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 4, 2007

In my report "A Trip to Iowa," I mentioned Tom Immermann, a veteran of Iowa grassroots politics. Tom Immermann has proven to be the perfect mentor to me in all . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 31, 2007

Prior to 1600 A.D., much of what we now regard as conservative ideas was taken for granted by most people of the West. Although some counter-cultural ideas . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 11, 2007

I applaud everything Thomas Dyer said about the politicalization of global warming. I admire his correlation of long term climate cycles with solar cycles and . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 5, 2007

On June 29, I checked into my hotel in Des Moines, Iowa — the political capital of America. It was the night before the Republican Presidential Candidates Forum . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 25, 2007

According to conservative traditionalism, a large part of our wisdom comes to us from the past. According to Christian conservatism, man is a fallen creature, . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 14, 2007

Debates about gay rights which are coming before legislative bodies require candor, civility and clear thinking. However, some gay activists seem to think that . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 11, 2007

Historically, Europe enjoyed three periods of rapid cultural advance: 1) 1050–1250 A.D.; 2) 1375–1520; and 3) 1600–1750. During this seven-century developmental . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 13, 2007

My last essay was A Brief History of Conservatism, Part 1, 800 B.C. to 1300 A.D. During that journey of 2,100 years, we learned how four streams of Conservatism . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 8, 2007

Is a married couple who aborts their child more likely to divorce? If so, is there a direct relationship between high abortion rates and high divorce rates? . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 5, 2007

Letter to the Editor — The Columbus Dispatch We are living in the worst of all possible worlds in terms of intellectual culture. The diversity cult which . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 22, 2007

Bernard Goldberg wrote a book titled, Crazies to the Left of me, Wimps to the Right. As Tim Russert interviewed Goldberg about his book on TV, I wondered if . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 20, 2007

During this time of political setbacks for conservatives, it is a good time to consider the vital role of Conservatism in Western cultural and political history . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 18, 2007

Letter to the Editor, The Columbus Dispatch Andy Bowers wrote in his op-ed piece (4/18/07) that the education funding increases brought about by the DeRolphe . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 31, 2007

The central philosophical problem of modern democracy is the clash between natural law theory and social justice theory. Beginning with the era of the French . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 20, 2007

Letter to the Editor, The Columbus Dispatch On March 19, columnist Leonard Pitts called General Peter Pace a "bigot," and "immoral." General Pace had said . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 7, 2007

Leo Strauss (1899–1973), the father of Neoconservatism, predicted that liberalism must give way to relativism and that relativism must eventually give way to . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 13, 2007

Democratic politics is ultimately a battle of world views. A rising world view will eventually prevail over a declining world view in elections and in the . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 2, 2007

Letter to the Editor, The Columbus Dispatch Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant or a greenhouse gas. It is a wholesome, naturally occurring, colorless and . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 30, 2007

Letter to the editor, the Columbus Dispatch On 1/30/07, Mike Hardin ridiculed the opponents of lap dancing. His sniggering laugh lines indicate that he has . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 17, 2007

Both the Roman Republic and the American Republic enjoyed a period of energy and vitality. The thesis of this essay is that the American Republic is still in . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 21, 2006

Augustus Caesar's actions in Rome started a chain of events that governed the circumstances of Christ's birth in Bethlehem. Tiberius Caesar, who followed . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 7, 2006

Frances Schaefer once said, "There are not many men in the house." What he meant was there are not many world views and most world views are ancient. The . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 19, 2006

In this essay, we shall consider the nature of moral reasoning and why it essential to the health of a republic. We shall also take a look at natural law theory . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 3, 2006

This essay asks two questions: Are Europeans in the throes of passive cultural and political suicide as they ignore the threat of fanatical Muslims in their . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 21, 2006

The tendency of generals to re-fight the last war has been a recurring phenomenon since Carl Von Clausewitz wrote about it in his book On War (published 1832). . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 21, 2006

The defeat of moderate Democrat Senator Joe Lieberman by Ned Lamont, a relatively unknown liberal, in the Connecticut primary election was a historic election . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 8, 2006

In 1921, Karel Capek wrote the play RUR (Rossum's Universal Robots), about machines that became intelligent and turned against their human masters. The 1984 . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 23, 2006

The war by America, Britain, and Israel against Islamist terrorism is destined to be a long war in which all the depths of good and evil will be sounded. This . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 9, 2006

During part one of this essay, we took a tour of history, beginning with the birth of European civilization and finishing with the high watermark in Western . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 24, 2006

Pro-choice people fall into two categories, those who really care about a woman's right to choose and those who claim to be pro-choice but are actually pro . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 22, 2006

Every civilization has a theory about what man knows and how he knows it. The theory of a particular civilization will influence every area of human thought and . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 11, 2006

According to reports posted on the internet by several major news services on 6/13/06, 40,000 women were expected to be brought to Germany to sexually service . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 30, 2006

American Muslims tell us that Islam is a religion of peace. Jihadist leaders abroad describe Islam as a religion of war against infidels. Who is correct? Both . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 1, 2006

In my prior essay, I described seven historical waves of bad ideas for education that are responsible for the American educational crisis. In this essay, I will . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 17, 2006

The crisis in public education is well known. High dropout rates, low test scores, deficits in reading, math, and history, and inarticulate young people who do . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 3, 2006

The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown, and the second century Gospel of Judas are two books in the news that promote the heresy of Gnosticism. Gnosticism is the . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 14, 2006

In an earlier essay, I called for a national conversation on illegal aliens. Thankfully, we are finally having that conversation and debate in the Congress, the . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 11, 2006

We, the men of America are still here in spite of forty years of gender warfare against us. We are still here because God designed us to be men, placed us in . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 2, 2006

The culture war is in part a fight against evil. This essay will focus upon the nature of evil, how we should confront evil, and the agendas and tactics of evil . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 18, 2006

Theology has more influence on world views and on political ideologies than most people can guess. One particular field of theology has a disproportionate . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 3, 2006

Last fall, I had extended e-mail debates with two credentialed scientists. One was a defender of Einstein, and the other a defender of the global warming . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 15, 2006

The world view of political liberalism suffers from an inner contradiction that must in time prove fatal. The historic liberal world view is now in danger of . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 29, 2006

During the hearings in the Senate Judiciary committee, Judge Samuel Alito exhibited a quality called "professional skepticism." He is perhaps the most perfect . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 21, 2006

Dr. Jeffrey Thurston, in a letter published 1/21/05, thought to criticize intelligent design science and praise the theory of evolution. Unfortunately, Dr. . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 19, 2006

The cultural war debate often centers on life and death issues such as abortion and euthanasia, and the question of whether we are living in a culture of life . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 14, 2006

All the Senate Democrats on the Judiciary Committee have taken an adversarial position against Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito from the outset of Judge Alito . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 4, 2006

The traditional definition of the sociopath is one who is "morally insane." When a culture becomes morally insane, it descends into barbarism, and the . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 21, 2005

Memorials to Christmas have been removed from the public square in many places, due to legal threats from the ACLU and the timidity of politically-correct . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 12, 2005

American troops won every battle in the Vietnam War, but lost the propaganda battle waged on the streets, in the media, and in Congress. A democracy must win . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 29, 2005

When President Bush nominated Harriet Miers, a mediocre crony, for the Supreme Court, it was a prototypical example of how Multiculturalism has a deadening . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 13, 2005

The rioting and arson in Paris reminds me of the book Is Paris Burning? by Larry Collins and Dominique La Pierre, and the 1966 Hollywood movie of the same . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 6, 2005

In my last issue analysis titled The Revolt against Reason, I wrote, "It is up to the conservative movement and doctrinally-orthodox Christianity to rescue the . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 29, 2005

The culture war is part of a collision of two world views. Can the disagreements between these world views be settled through rational discussion? This can only . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 20, 2005

The strange nomination of Harriet Miers is one of the most astonishing political events in years. The more one learns about Harriet, the more peculiar and . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 13, 2005

President Bush had a historic opportunity to fill two seats on the Supreme Court and shift the legal philosophy of the court away from liberal activism. The . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 6, 2005

Those who believe that man has an innate nature and design generally oppose abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, stem-cell research, and cloning, because . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 30, 2005

The culture war is deadlocked. Conflicts between contradictory world views generally produce clear winners and losers, instead of going into extended deadlock. . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 21, 2005

Judge John Roberts was too clever a poker player to show his hand in the Senate hearings. In order to be confirmed, he concealed some of his cards so as not to . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 15, 2005

The California legislature voted to legalize gay marriage on Sept. 6. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger pledged to veto the bill because it contradicted . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 7, 2005

Some folks might be surprised that a hurricane can be relevant to the culture war. History provides a number of cases in which natural disasters have had . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 27, 2005

I am writing a book about Western culture, and I also write essays about the culture war. Obviously, I am interested in whether a necessary link exists between . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 18, 2005

President Bush said that public schools should expose students to both evolution and intelligent design science and discuss the scientific controversies as the . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 9, 2005

I spent a week in Oxford University in England, an ancient college town that is filled with architectural monuments to the founding and developing of a high . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 16, 2005

Seven of the nine justices of the Supreme Court were nominated by Republican presidents. Those who had a conservative track record prior to nomination have . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 5, 2005

The Supreme Court issued a split decision Monday, June 26, concerning state government displays of the Ten Commandments. The Texas state capitol was allowed to . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 24, 2005

In an op-ed piece in the Columbus Dispatch on 6/24/05, Professor Oldenquist asserted that there is no scientific evidence against the theory of evolution. Last . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 22, 2005

America has a de facto policy of open borders and virtually unlimited immigration along the southern border with Mexico. Americans like to call the eleven . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 14, 2005

The aggressive filibustering of judicial nominees by Senate Democrats finally provoked Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to threaten to use the "nuclear option, . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 9, 2005

Thomas Kuhn, historian of science and author of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, was interested in the phenomenon of two competing scientific models. . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 1, 2005

The issue of patriotism has become unusually contentious in American politics. To gain perspective of our present partisan quarrels over patriotism, an . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 20, 2005

The policy of Senate Democrats to filibuster conservative nominees for the Supreme Court--coupled with Republicans' threat to change Senate rules to curtail . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 6, 2005

Mayor David Dermer of Miami Beach is promoting a law that would prohibit sexual predators from living 2,500 feet from a park or a school. At first, this plan . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 27, 2005

One of the most contentious issues during the election of 2004 was the war in Iraq. The question of whether it was right to go to war, whether it was done in . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 19, 2005

The fight between the right to life movement and the right to die camp has all the ferocity and bitterness of two opposing orthodoxies. "Orthodox" is a word of . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 12, 2005

By coincidence, both Terri Schiavo and Pope John Paul II, the great advocate of the value of life, had feeding tubes inserted by doctors. Both Terri and the . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 25, 2005

The state and federal judges who have reviewed Terri Schiavo's* case are influenced by the medical diagnosis made by a few doctors that Terri is in a  . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 19, 2005

When a controversial issue in science is politicized and seems to become a fad, does an ordinary person have the tools to judge whether it is likely to be good . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 11, 2005

According to a CNN/USA Today poll, 76% of those questioned said they support the display of the Ten Commandments at the Texas Capital. The Supreme Court will . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 28, 2005

The seminal idea of western music is that music reflects the harmonies and the moral order of the universe and therefore, has a divine origin. This idea came to . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 17, 2005

"We didn't need dialog. We had faces." Gloria Swanson spoke these lines when she played Norma Desmond, a fading star of silent movies, in the movie Sunset . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 10, 2005

This essay is a rebuttal of the philosophy of materialism and its modern use to deny the existence of God. Atheists usually begin as theists, then decide for . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 7, 2005

Conservative and Christian college students face a solid phalanx of tax-supported liberal professors, many of whom use class time for left wing propaganda. . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 4, 2005

Last September, I wrote an essay about the rise of the new atheism which began with the birth of Modernism, around 1750. A friend has called my attention to a . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 28, 2005

Discover Magazine had a special Einstein issue for September 2004. Fifty-eight pages of glossy magazine space was devoted to Einstein! Einstein seems to be . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 23, 2005

A coherent philosophy or ideology must be true to the world view upon which it is based. When a philosophy or ideology borrows from two contradictory world . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 21, 2005

President Bush's second inaugural speech is historic because it will effect the course of history and permanently define his administration. It may also change . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 17, 2005

In 1980, I wrote a twenty page paper in which I predicted the collapse of Liberal Humanism. A year or two earlier I had predicted the gradual decline and . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 11, 2005

The Supreme Court decided not to review a Florida law which bans gay adoptions. (Associated Press story, 1/11/04) The ACLU attorney protested "...what all the . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 7, 2005

Happiness cannot be long sustained unless one lives a life of meaning and purpose. How does one obtain a strong sense of meaning and purpose? Meaning is derived . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 30, 2004

Deism had a rapid rise to popularity and an even more rapid fall into oblivion. The rapid extinction of the once popular and politically influential Deism in . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 22, 2004

Several of our Christmas carols describe the qualities of the Christ child in the manger. Have you ever wondered what the baby Christ's personal experience of . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 14, 2004

Christ by highest heaven adored; Christ the everlasting Lord! Late in time behold him come, Offspring of the Virgin's womb. Veiled in flesh the Godhead see; . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 9, 2004

The Postmodern World View is schizophrenic. It is split in two and the two parts contradict one another. Francis Shaeffer taught us to think of it as a house . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 2, 2004

The Conservative movement has many intellectual streams. Some of the names which readily come to mind are, Traditionalist, Idealist, Realist, Conservationist, . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 23, 2004

"I, wisdom, dwell with prudence...By Me kings reign, and princes decree justice. By me princes rule, and nobles, and all the judges of the earth.....When it . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 17, 2004

The stem cell hype goes something like this. "If we would only allow unrestricted research of embryonic stem cells, miraculous cures for some of the most . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 11, 2004

Four times in the last forty years there was a sense of being on the threshold of a new era. Four memorable years, 1968, 1989, 2001, and 2004 stand out as . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 8, 2004

Howard Phillips wrote a book titled, The Emerging Republican Majority, in which he analyzed Richard Nixon's electoral victories in 1968 and 1972. The theme was . . .

Fred Hutchison

November 4, 2004

When one makes political predictions, one is riveted to the television until the wee hours of the morning to see how he fared. Here is a brief summation of how . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 31, 2004

Ohio, an swing state with twenty electoral votes has been targeted by the Democrats, as must win or die. Republicans identify it as a crucial state. If they . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 28, 2004

When I go to the polls I will find Issue 1, The Ohio Marriage Protection Amendment, on the ballot. A majority of the Republicans holding state-wide elective . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 26, 2004

Have you ever noticed how some judicial decisions defy common sense? The cold abstract words of their decrees often seem to be the very antithesis of things . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 23, 2004

The presidential election campaign of 2000 revealed two parties of roughly equal popularity. Both parties are coalitions delicately stitched together from many . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 16, 2004

"Yesterday upon the stair / I met a man who wasn't there. / He wasn't there again today / I wish that man would go away." Hugh Means (1875 – 1965) I have often . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 15, 2004

It was nice to listen to an intelligent articulate political debate for a change. Alan Keyes is probably the nation's most articulate black conservative and . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 13, 2004

John Kerry recently said in an interview with the New York Times that we can hope for a time when terrorism can be reduced to the level of a law enforcement . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 9, 2004

The TV pundits generally regarded the second Bush-Kerry debate as a draw. But they are wrong. Bush won. The pundits in the TV studios did not err because they . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 7, 2004

Has the culture war become important enough that is relevant to a presidential election? If, so can we discover its influence in electoral college numbers? If . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 5, 2004

Kofi Annan, General Secretary of the United Nations (U.N.), said, "The war in Iraq is illegal." This is an absurd statement, of course. There are several levels . . .

Fred Hutchison

October 1, 2004

Pundit Dick Morris said of the first debate that Kerry won on style, and Bush won on substance. I believe that this is exactly correct. It was essential for . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 28, 2004

During the culture war of the last thirty five years, Evangelicals, devout Catholics, and moralists have been migrating steadily to the increasingly . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 22, 2004

Lee Harris, author of Civilization and its Enemies, believes that neither liberals nor conservatives understand the Muslim terrorists. We will have difficulty . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 16, 2004

By now most people have heard about the scandal at CBS involving the use of forged documents to discredit the National Guard service of President Bush. Dan . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 14, 2004

When I was eighteen I knew that the left is generally deceived. It required a few years to find out what the core delusion was but many years to appreciate how . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 9, 2004

Debates about abortion are often very heated because they involve a head-on collision of world views. Abortion cannot be supported within the internal logic of . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 5, 2004

When Zell Miller said that we honor Kerry for his service in Vietnam, I wish he had added the line, "...and we are tired of hearing about it." After all the  . . .

Fred Hutchison

September 2, 2004

Zell Miller's speech at the convention was like a barrage of big cannons opening fire. One could feel the ground tremble as the large caliber ordinance hit the . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 31, 2004

Great speeches have an enchanted message which abstracts one away from the realm of time and space and catches one up into a different world.. By this standard, . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 24, 2004

The scientists whose voices are quoted in the popular press sound like they are certain about global warming. But do they have adequate grounds for that . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 19, 2004

All but one of the sailors on Kerry's fast boat (patrol craft) are backing Kerry and his claims about his Vietnam service. Almost all the sailors in the other . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 17, 2004

The story titled "Income gap continues to widen" is a textbook example of how to lie with statistics. We are told that the gap between the highest 20% of . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 16, 2004

A few months ago, I wrote an essay in which I demonstrated how the knowledge of a few facts of history make many of the claims of the popular novel, The Da . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 9, 2004

Alan Keyes will run against Barack Obama for the U.S. Senate in Illinois. Keyes is one of the most articulate spokesmen for conservative Republicans. Obama is . . .

Fred Hutchison

August 5, 2004

In this essay I shall consider the transcendent source of justice, the universal moral law on which justice is based and capital punishment. The Transcendent . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 27, 2004

The price of getting help from the French in the war on terror is to give up a piece of American sovereignty — such the right of a sovereign state to choose the . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 26, 2004

A recurring theme of the pro-gay letters is that gay marriage is a "right." Saying so does not make it so. When carefully considered the claim does not make . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 21, 2004

Fighting fallacies one at a time as they spring from a false ideology is like Hercules' battle with the hydra — a serpentine creature with seven heads. When he . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 13, 2004

As I was sitting in a restaurant eating breakfast and reading the newspaper, I perused a table of the voting records of the nine Supreme Court justices over the . . .

Fred Hutchison

July 8, 2004

This essay begins with a recap and commentary on Thomas Sowell's brilliant critique of the old liberal obsession with "change" and with seeking socioeconomic  . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 30, 2004

The success of Michael Moore's film Fahrenheit 9/11 had nothing to do with the intrinsic merits of the film. It is a crudely made propaganda film posing as a . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 26, 2004

Certain aspects of the culture war have ancient roots. One of the central points of disagreement regards the existence of a universal moral law. Political . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 25, 2004

After listening to the debates about the popular and controversial book, The da Vinci Code, it has occurs to me that some important and relevant facts of . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 17, 2004

In this essay, I discuss some psychological similarities between Postmodernism and barbarism. Both seem to inflict some of the same kinds of torments upon the . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 13, 2004

How important was freeing the slaves to Abraham Lincoln? Was that his top priority? How did Lincoln view his primary mission as president? I have heard these . . .

Fred Hutchison

June 9, 2004

The body of the great president lies in state in the nation's capital. Endless lines of quiet, reverent Americans stand in the blistering June sun, patiently . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 31, 2004

I coined the term "Hard Postmodernism" as a shorthand reference to a set of theories of cultural determinism. I defined "Soft Postmodernism" in a recent essay, . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 20, 2004

This essay begins with a brief outline of the rise and collapse of Modernism. In the aftermath a number of disillusioned modernists committed a peculiar form of . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 16, 2004

The photographs of naked Iraqi prisoners being sexually humiliated by American military police may have lost the battle for many Arab hearts and minds. Arab . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 5, 2004

World Islam is in a state of crisis. This crisis is one of the reasons that many Islamic nations are at war with their neighbors or having strained relations . . .

Fred Hutchison

May 1, 2004

Glenn Scherdtfeger, a local pastor of liberal theology, argued for gay marriage in the Faith and Values section of the Dispatch (4-30-04). Some of his arguments . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 28, 2004

Over twenty years ago, I had an intermittent conversation about homosexuality with an gay man at work. Although he persistently brought up the subject, he would . . .

Fred Hutchison

April 8, 2004

There were moments at Dallas when the voices rang in my ears like the voices of prophets. After Ambassador Alan Keyes had finished speaking, a graphic . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 22, 2004

Syndicated columnist Thomas Friedman wrote a remarkable column (March 9, 2004, Columbus Dispatch) about the wonder of American innovation. "America is the . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 6, 2004

Postmodern liberals have taken control of the "peace" movement and have transformed it into a political weapon. The culture war has spread to questions of war . . .

Fred Hutchison

March 1, 2004

After watching Mel Gibson's movie, The Passion of the Christ, I was too shell-shocked by the graphic brutality of Christ's ordeal to do much analysis. But one . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 14, 2004

Baron Montesquieu (Mahn- tes'-kyoo) De Secondat (French political philosopher, 1689 - 1755) wrote The Spirit of the Laws (l'Espirit des Lois, 1750) which is . . .

Fred Hutchison

February 8, 2004

The culture war might be likened to fighting a war against a coalition of powers. Imagine WWI style trench warfare on a long front. In the center of the enemy . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 23, 2004

The Ohio House passed a Defense of Marriage Act last November. While the Senate was working on the bill, I was able to attend a Senate committee meeting and . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 19, 2004

(Document submitted with testimony by Fred Hutchison before the Ohio Senate Finance Committee, January 20, 2004, concerning the Ohio Defense of Marriage Act)  . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 12, 2004

One aspect of the culture war is the rejection of beauty and truth by the Postmodern left. The arguments center around whether beauty and truth have objective . . .

Fred Hutchison

January 5, 2004

We live in a society which is facing danger from two directions. Some do not believe that evil exists and would leave us unprotected against evil. Others have . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 22, 2003

Is Christmas an appropriate time to be discussing the culture war? Yes! Christmas is an opportune time for seeing the culture war in theological and historical . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 16, 2003

I met a traveler from an antique land who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, half sunk, a shattered visage . . .

Fred Hutchison

December 9, 2003

On Friday evening December 5th, I attended a banquet at which Ambassador Alan Keyes (former presidential candidate and former TV talk show host) was the speaker . . .