Monthly Archives: January 2011

In the Crosshairs

Many have ridiculed CNN for apologizing yesterday when a guest used the word “crosshairs.” “We’re trying to get away from that language,” said CNN’s John King. “We won’t always be perfect, so hold us accountable when we don’t meet your standards.” This all relates, of course, to the Tucson shootings and the Left’s effort–which apparently is ongoing–to blame Sarah Palin’s map for Jared Loughlin’s rampage. So Byron York did some »

It’s okay to tread on me now

Putting Obamacare out of its misery is the critical mission that must be carried out be Republicans in the coming years. It seems to me to raise in a profound form the question Lincoln asked regarding Douglas’s professed indifference to slavery: “I ask you in all soberness, if all these things, if indulged in, if ratified, if confirmed and endorsed, if taught to our children, and repeated to them, do »

Judging Chris Christie

We have been unabashed admirers of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie in his mission to get state obligations under control. At Sultan Knish, Daniel Greenfield reviews the troubling history behind Governor Christie’s appointment of an attorney who is a pillar of the Islamist establishment in New Jersey (as I think Greenfield makes out) to the state bench. Jonathan Tobin comments further on “Chris Christie’s troubling appointment.” The attorney’s name is »

Uncommon Knowledge with Epstein and Yoo

As Congress convened during the first week of January, Peter Robinson sat down with Professors Richard Epstein and John Yoo to discuss current issues in constitutional law. Professor Epstein teaches at the New York University School of Law and the University of Chicago Law School; Professor Yoo teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, Boalt Hall School of Law. Professor Epstein is the author of many important books including Simple »

Are Dems Giving Up On the Senate?

Don’t be silly–of course not. 2012 is an eon away. But two Democratic Senators announced their retirements today, Kent Conrad and Joe Lieberman [UPDATE: Lieberman’s announcement was reported today but is expected to take place tomorrow]. For their party, the numbers are daunting. I was struck by how The Hill described the Democrats’ predicament. The Hill is non-partisan, but it is very much a beltway publication, and the Dems are »

Don’t tax me, bro’!

The Wall Street Journal’s James Taranto is an incredibly talented and witty daily journalist, as he regularly demonstrates in his Best of the Web Today column. He’s also a wonderful critic of the New York Times. Here, for example, is his “shorter Paul Krugman,” condensed version of Krugman’s Thursday column: “Uh-oh, Obama’s talking about me! ” Taranto considered last week’s New York Times editorial Krugmania at greater length in “The »

The Tom Friedman of Climatology

One of the striking features of our political era is that increasing numbers of liberals are coming out of the closet as enemies of the Constitution and of democracy. The latest is James Hansen, who heads the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies. Hansen is, to be blunt, an awful human being and one of the worst of the global warming fraudsters. Under his guidance, NASA’s data have become so »

Case Closed

Can you guess who wrote this, about Barack Obama’s largely channeling the Bush administration when it comes to combating terrorism? Dick Cheney is not only free of ignominy, but can run around claiming vindication from Obama’s actions because he’s right. The American Right constantly said during the Bush years that any President who knew what Bush knew and was faced with the duty of keeping the country safe would do »

We Are All Rhetoricians Now

A Google News search on “heated rhetoric” yields 3,650 results; “harsh rhetoric” turns up 1,490, “rhetoric” 22,300. Just about everyone seems to think that we are living in an era of vituperation. Steve Hayward provides a useful corrective to that amnesiac perspective. Hayward notes Chris Matthews’ silly yearning for the days when “Ronald Reagan and Tip O’Neill…managed to temper their philosophical divide with a public, and sometimes personal, cordiality.” Right. »

Can’t We All Just Get Along?

Maybe not. Willis Elliott is a contributor to the Washington Post’s “On Faith” blog. Elliott submitted an article to the Post that responded to a piece on Muslim-Christian relations by another contributor. The Post declined to publish Elliott’s essay, so Pajamas Media did. Elliott responded to this discussion topic, posted by Elizabeth Tenety of the Post: The Mutual Blasphemy of Christianity and Islam. 2011 began with some bleak news for »

GOP: Don’t Back Down, the Voters Are With You

Congressional Republicans arrived in Washington with a mandate from voters to shake things up. While compromise is inevitable, given that the Democrats control the Senate and the White House, Republicans should do all they can to sharpen the differences between themselves and the Dems. They should be encouraged to stand their ground by today’s poll data indicating that likely voters trust Republicans over Democrats on every key issue, often by »

Criminal Justice vs. Immigration: Which System Is Worse?

This morning’s Minneapolis Star Tribune reports on an illegal immigrant whom we can’t seem to get rid of: “3 times deported, killer still here.” What seems most outrageous to me is that the illegal in question, Mario Montalban-Ramirez, has committed at least two murders without incurring significant punishment: Mario Montalban-Ramirez, 61, was convicted of manslaughter in Illinois in 1982, convicted of murder in Texas in 1984 and sent back to »

Krugmania strikes deep

Yuval Levin addresses Paul Krugman’s most recent New York Times column. According to Krugman, the Republican opposition to Obamacare represents a “war on logic.” Here is Levin contra Krugman: Let’s get clear on the basics. Everyone agrees that Obamacare involves a massive increase in spending and a massive increase in taxes. Defenders of the law, including Krugman, want to suggest that the massive tax increases are larger than the massive »

Hu’s Next

China’s President Hu Jintao is in the U.S. and will meet with Barack Obama at the White House tomorrow. The New York Times Editorial board gives Obama some advice: For Mr. Obama, the top items include: China’s currency manipulation; its enabling of North Korea and Iran; its abuse of human rights; and its recent challenge to American naval supremacy in the western Pacific. … For a long time we weren’t »

A period of madness

In his NRO Impromptus column this morning, Jay Nordlinger asserts: You know what’s wrong with targets on maps — targets of the kind Sarah Palin used, and the Democratic congressional committee has used? Nothing, absolutely nothing. Not one thing. Neither is there anything wrong with talking about “campaigns,” “battleground states,” “bombshells,” and the like. You know the expression “Give it a shot”? Nothing wrong with it, not one thing. The »

Looking for a few good fellows

Our friends at the Claremont Institute are again recruiting applicants to their Publius Fellowship program. Every summer since 1979, the institute has brought together a select group of young conservatives for the Publius program. Publius Fellows meet with the institute’s Senior Fellows and other distinguished visiting scholars to study American politics and political thought. In intensive daily seminars and relaxed evening symposia, fellows discuss great American readings — from the »

Signs Of Decline

Two unrelated stories in the news tonight remind us of the importance of the regulatory environment. First, Goldman Sachs announces that Americans will not be permitted to invest in Facebook: Goldman Sachs decided to exclude US clients from the private offering of as much as $1.5 billion in shares of social-networking company Facebook, citing “intense media attention.” In a statement provided to The Wall Street Journal Monday, Goldman said the »