We have a new issue of Virtue Magazine coming out this Monday, so make sure you stop by and browse through the articles! Some of the highlights:

Derek Wallace on an “offer” you can’t refuse.

Alessandra Kroger on cosmetic fixation.

Sarah Meholick on the Moussaoui trial.

Sam Ashwood on Holocaust Revisionism in Europe and thought police.

A Religious and Social Observation by Adam Wall.

This and much will appear in our next issue, so stay tuned!

Yesterday, April 20th, is a holiday. The holiday has no specific name, but apparently it has “underground” or “counter-culture” roots and involves the use—perhaps abuse would be a better description—of marijuana.

I found this out today while reading an article in the “Editorial & Opinion” section of my college’s newspaper. The article, which you can read here, takes an alarming but unsurprising positive viewpoint toward this “holiday,” calling it “the nearest event the weed community comes to an International Marijuana Independence Day.”

Obviously this doesn’t say much for the state of my university’s (far-left) “newspaper.” (And as far as I’m concerned, any publication that runs material like this isn’t deserving of the title “newspaper.”) But putting that aside for the moment, I want to concentrate on one specific passage in the article. Noting that the date 4/20 is also the anniversary of the Columbine Massacre in Colorado seven years ago, the author writes:

This isn’t a hippie, “peace, love and weed, man” utopia I’m describing. Merely a mellower, contemplative and communal environment that is a rarity on a Thursday in raucous college towns.

Maybe April 20 wouldn’t be remembered as horridly if before they shot 12 fellow students on the morning of April 20, Columbine High School students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold had forgot that 4/20 signified the birthday of arguably the 20th century’s most vile human being.

What if they instead turned back home, and reconsidered this demonic plan over a stuffed bowl and the latest Marilyn Manson record?

After a few puffs of the notoriously-potent Colorado bud, it’s possible, hypothetical rhetoric aside, the stoned paranoia would’ve gotten the best of the duo, causing them to — at least for a brief spell — re-think the cowardly acts they were preparing to execute.

The author seems to be suggesting that smoking marijuana would have at least potentially stopped the two high school students who went on the murder spree. Interesting thought, to say the least. This has captured my interest enough that I’m considering writing an article on this for the next issue of Virtue Magazine.

Did you know the United States Treasury has an Office of Financial Education? The mission of this office is to teach Americans how to “make wiser choices in all areas of personal financial management.”

We’ll pause to let the irony of this situation—a federal office advicing Americans on how to manage their finances—sink in for a bit.

Granted, the advice the department offers is quite sensible: don’t spend everything you make, save, etc. The only problem is that our federal government itself doesn’t follow this advice—if it did, we probably wouldn’t have an “Office of Financial Education” in the first place. (The office, which was created in May 2002, undoubtedly cost a few million dollars to start up and a few million more each year to keep running.)

Writes the New Ulm Journal editorial page:

This agency . . . is emblematic of myriad nice ideas upon which the GOP-controlled Congress and the Bush administration evidently felt compelled to spend our money. With no sense of limitations on what government ought or ought not to do, seemingly every nice idea becomes a tentacle of ever bigger government.

This leads me to another excellent thought, this one from Bryce at Blog of Bryce. In a post titled “It Flies Away,” Bryce writes:

Please don’t tell me that Bush cut taxes. I really don’t care. In fact, if one more person reminds me of his tax cuts, I may just scream. You think I should be delighted because tax cuts are lifting the burden from me while concurrently deferring a greater weight of debt to my children and grandchildren?

Exactly. What good are tax cuts if the government continues to spend money at rates not seen since the days of Lyndon Johnson and The Greaty Society? Do conservatives think money grows on trees, and 20 or 50 years down the road we can pluck $100,000 dollar bills off the branches to pay for our government’s annual spending deficits and mounting debt? No; unless a future president and Congress drastically reduces spending—which seems highly unlikely—the taxpayers will once again foot the bill and be burdened with higher taxes than before.

It’s unfortunate that the federal government can’t take its own advice when it comes to spending. Perhaps the Office of Financial Education should be directing its message toward the federal government and not the American people.

The Associated Press has an article out today about how the feds are going to start cracking down on employers who hire illegal immigrants.

All we can say is: it’s about time! The most important thing that needs to be done—besides closing down the Mexico/U.S. border—is enforcing the laws that we already have on the books. Going after companies who aid and encourage illegal immigrants by giving them jobs is an excellent place to start. Companies who are willing to hire lawbreakers for the cheap labor are putting profit above the law and the nation’s best interests as a whole, and should at least face stiff fines if caught hiring illegals.

So far the crackdown has netted over 1,o00 illegal immigrants, who are reportedly being processed for deportation—another promising sign of action.

WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney’s former top aide told prosecutors President Bush authorized the leak of sensitive intelligence information about Iraq, according to court papers filed by prosecutors in the CIA leak case.

The filing by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald also describes Cheney’s involvement in I. Lewis Libby’s communications with the press.

There was no indication in the filing that either Bush or Cheney authorized Libby to disclose Valerie Plame’s CIA identity. But it points to Cheney as one of the originators of the idea that Plame could be used to discredit her husband, Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson.

You can read the rest of the story here.

Tom DeLay, the scandal-plagued former House Majority Leader, announced today that he is resigning from Congress. He presumably will also be ending his current re-election campaign.

This is probably the best thing for everyone involved. Regardless of whether DeLay actually committed any crime himself or not, the corruption surrounding him is impossible to defend and did not reflect well on him.

From the AP:

DeLay reflected Republican concerns that the GOP could lose the seat in November, saying his love and loyalty to the party played a role in his decision and adding, “I refuse to allow liberal Democrats an opportunity to steal this seat with a negative, personal campaign.”

President Bush said Tuesday that DeLay had informed him of his decision Monday afternoon.

“I wish him all the best,” Bush told reporters during a brief White House session, adding, “It had to have been a very difficult decision for someone who loved representing his district in the state of Texas.”

Bush said the Republican Party won’t suffer from DeLay’s decision to resign from Congress. “My own judgment is that our party will continue to succeed because we are the party of ideas.”

DeLay relinquished the post as House majority leader last fall after his indictment in Texas as part of an investigation into the allegedly illegal use of funds for state legislative races. He decided in January against trying to get the leadership post back as an election-year corruption scandal staggered Republicans and emboldened minority Democrats.