Today I found this very interesting article on the life and work of St. Thomas Aquinas, including an overview of his works. In the article was a reference to the arabian philsophoer Averroes who was an arch-enemy of St. Thomas primarily because of Averroes' argument that philosophy occupies a higher stage of human development than theology. I'm thinking that St. Thomas' Summa theologica might make for some interesting reading.

Slashdot today asks the question: Should border agents be able to search laptops that are being brought into the country as they do luggage, and links to this article in the New York Times and this article in the International Herald Tribune.

I think the problem here is an economic one. As the authors of the articles remind us, business travelers often have information on their laptops that they do not wish widely disseminated but which is not criminal in nature. Making laptops subject to random search is likely to add an additional deterrent to companies interested in doing business with the United States, especially if there is a delay involved with the searches. Imagine an executive that flies from Milan to New York for a meeting, then has to wait two or three days for customs to examine his laptop. Will he be happy? Will the next meeting be in New York?

Too many people take the prosperity of the United States for granted. Sanctions, border security, excessive immigration controls all represent a burden on the back of our nation's business community. I think of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged". Will the Huckabees of the world succeed in bringing the country's engine to a stop?