Monthly Archives: March 2011

The Apple Store at the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota, has become my new hangout. It’s not because I enjoy dropping over. I don’t. The parking can be inconvenient and it’s always a challenge to find the damn store. It’s become my hangout because Apple has been unable to resolve recurring “kernel panics” on my low-end Macbook laptop. The kernel panics trigger a gray screen with a warning in »

• Read more...
• Responses

Questions about our military action in Libya, and in particular why President Obama did not seek Congressional support for it, are reverberating around the capital. Congressmen and Senators across the political spectrum are complaining about the administration’s handling of the crisis. In particular, the fact that Obama sought the approval of the United Nations, but not Congress, has made many in the latter institution unhappy. Of course, President Obama isn’t »

• Read more...
• Responses

Last week the State Department issued an explicit condemnation of the naming of a square in a West Bank town for a female Palestinian terrorist the week before the sickening murder spree in Itamar. The JTA noted: “The statement was more definitive than one issued earlier in the week by a State Department official who said the Obama administration was seeking clarification on the matter.” Having received clarification, State Department »

• Read more...
• Responses

George O’Har is a Power Line reader who teaches in the English Department at Boston College and writes novels on the side. Boston College’s The Heights newspaper profiled Professor O’Har a few years back in “Secret lives of professors.” Professor O’Har’s latest novel has just been published this month via Amazon Kindle. Professor O’Har has supplied the following description: The Thousand Hour Club is a story in which the main »

• Read more...
• Responses

…but some aspects of it you almost have to laugh at. Like today’s silliest headline, in the New York Times (naturally): “U.S.-Led Assault Nears Goal in Libya.” Really? So soon? Mission accomplished! Well, not exactly: An American-led military campaign to destroy Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s air defenses and establish a no-fly zone over Libya has nearly accomplished its initial objectives, and the United States is moving swiftly to hand command to »

• Read more...
• Responses

That is the question that Glenn Reynolds asks in his column in the New York Post: In Michigan, protesters opposed to Gov. Rick Snyder’s austerity budget broke a window to get into the capitol building. One faces felony charges after assaulting police with an edged weapon; 14 were arrested. In Washington, DC, the windows at GOP headquarters were shot out, not the first time that Republican offices have been subject »

• Read more...
• Responses

I am not one of those conspiracy theorists who believe that Barack Obama’s energy policies are designed to enrich George Soros, the Left’s prime sugar daddy. It is true, of course, that Soros is a major shareholder in Petrobras, Brazil’s oil company, and Obama has perversely frustrated American oil companies while at the same time hailing, and enabling, identical petroleum development by Petrobras. I don’t chalk that up to conspiracy, »

• Read more...
• Responses

We pointed out a couple of years ago–time flies–that the United States has the most progressive system of personal taxation of any developed country. Now, the Tax Foundation has the same message. The top ten percent of American taxpayers pay more to the national government in taxes, both as a percentage of the total taxes collected and in proportion to their share of the national income, than upper-income taxpayers in »

• Read more...
• Responses

I can’t remember a time when there have been so many vital issues and dramatic events in the news. Libya, Japan, Afghanistan, the budget, repeal of Obamacare, energy, entitlements–the list goes on and on. But let’s not forget about Yemen. Today, Stratfor posted an extensive analysis of the crisis there, which it describes as “of greater strategic consequence” than Libya. Here is an excerpt: Saudi Arabia is already facing the »

• Read more...
• Responses

Today, Tim Pawlenty announced his candidacy for President. Well, technically it was only the announcement of the formation of an exploratory committee, but there is no doubt that is where he is heading. In connection with the announcement, Pawlenty released this video. It is very effective, I think: As regular readers know, I am a fan of Governor Pawlenty. He did a tremendous job as Governor of Minnesota. Imagine Chris »

• Read more...
• Responses

The liberal backlash against the Libya campaign is beginning to build. It is a stroll down memory lane: Democratic Congressman Ed Markey says, “We’re in Libya because of oil.” Watch the video here. Some of those protesters must have old “No blood for oil!” signs lying around their garages. All they have to do is paint over the image of George Bush with a Hitler mustache and replace it with »

• Read more...
• Responses

At the micro level, I understand banking well enough: the bank lends me money and I have to pay it back with interest. At the macro level, however, the banking system is a mystery. So for me–and likely for you, too–a new video series on central banking by the Center for Freedom and Prosperity is of considerable interest. This leadoff video by Dan Mitchell of the Cato Institute offers a »

• Read more...
• Responses

The Old Progressives of a hundred years ago believed in . . . progress! Well duh, I can hear everyone groan. Rather obvious isn’t it? Yes, but it bears noting because it is not at all clear that today’s “Progressives” actually believe in progress in most of the same ways their namesakes did. In some ways, today’s so-called Progressives are anti-progress, or at the very least doubtful and underconfident about »

• Read more...
• Responses

Andrea Elliott is the Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter who wrote the sympathetic three-part series on the inner life of a mosque in Brooklyn and the imam at its center (Sheik Reda Shata). At points Elliott seemed to be writing from within the perspective of her subject. I thought the descent to dhimmitude was notable in Elliott’s series. In the first part of the series, for example, Elliott wrote: »

• Read more...
• Responses

I promised Power Line an exclusive report from Israel, and believe me, I will keep my promise–although it will be an exclusive report from Israel datelined “Istanbul,” because that’s just the kind of week it’s been, and this is the Mediterranean, the land that deadlines forgot. But the exclusive report is coming, Power Line, I promise. In the meantime, I thought I’d point you to a few things I did »

• Read more...
• Responses

This has been bouncing around over the weekend, but somehow I missed it until now. Presidential candidate Barack Obama, December 2007: The President does not have power under the Constitution to unilaterally authorize a military attack in a situation that does not involve stopping an actual or imminent threat to the nation. As Commander-in-Chief, the President does have a duty to protect and defend the United States. In instances of »

• Read more...
• Responses

…it means that at least some on the far left are willing to show some consistency. Yesterday the Democratic House Caucus held a conference call on Libya, and a “hard-core group of liberal House Democrats” “strongly raised objections to the constitutionality of the president’s actions.” Dennis Kucinich “asked why the U.S. missile strikes aren’t impeachable offenses.” From a political standpoint, it is probably a plus for Obama any time he »

• Read more...
• Responses