Monthly Archives: November 2011
November 22, 2011 — Scott Johnson
Much of Israeli Defense Minister Barak’s comments to Fareed Zakaria on CNN over the weekend had the formulaic quality of official public statements, but their urgency seemed to me a slight departure. The “time has come” to deal with Iran, he said, placing the military option to retard Iran’s nuclear program in an ominous silence. “I don’t think that that is a subject for public discussion,” he said. “But I
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November 21, 2011 — John Hinderaker
We don’t spend a lot of time deconstructing liberal op-ed columns, for a number of reasons. Mostly, life is too short. But every now and then there is enough entertainment value to warrant sharing a liberal turkey with our readers. Like this one in the New York Times, by Justin Smith. Smith’s column is in “The Stone,” “a forum for contemporary philosophers on issues both timely and timeless.” Titled “Cruel
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November 21, 2011 — John Hinderaker
This one, from Minnesota Majority, is just for fun: OWS Needs More Cowbell. Just seeing part of the classic Blue Oyster Cult sketch is fun enough:
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November 21, 2011 — John Hinderaker
The Supercommittee is now officially a failure. On balance, I think that is a good thing, in part because the whole approach of trying to solve our country’s deep-seated fiscal problems with a closed-door, back-room deal is fundamentally wrong. Senator Jeff Sessions, ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, reminds us of the history that gave rise to the present crisis and points the path toward a more sensible, if
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November 21, 2011 — John Hinderaker
Proof that the acorn doesn’t fall far from the tree: in Milwaukee, Occupiers are doing double duty getting signatures on petitions to recall Governor Scott Walker. In this video, you can see them recruiting young children to sign the recall petition, and then paying them off with cigarettes. Nice:
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November 21, 2011 — John Hinderaker
Brian Ward and I got together Friday night to record Episode 19 of the Hinderaker-Ward Experience, ably produced by Ricochet’s Scott Immergut and augmented by a Little Sumpin’. We talked about the issues of the day, including the latest in the GOP race–Brian is excited about Newt’s rise, I am not–the latest hilarity from the Occupiers, acerbic commentary on the much-hyped patriotic (i.e., pro-higher taxes) millionaires, and a prescient preview
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November 21, 2011 — Scott Johnson
In his novel 11/22/63, Stephen King employs a time traveler to interview Lee Harvey Oswald’s mysterious associate George De Mohrenschildt, who he died of a shotgun blast to his head on March 29,1977. But a time-traveling avatar is unnecessary. Edward Jay Epstein writes: “I was interviewing De Mohrenschildt the day he died for my book Legend: The Secret World Of Lee Harvey Oswald. The debriefing concerned his relations with the
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November 21, 2011 — Steven Hayward
“The New Malthusians” sounds like the name of a new wave or punk band, but just as new wave is old school, there is never anything new about Malthusianism no matter how many times it gets punked. Only the band members change. When the world’s population reached the estimated 7 billion mark a few weeks ago, the most famous Malthusian of modern times, Paul Ehrlich, made a few encore appearances
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November 20, 2011 — John Hinderaker
It recently came out that James Hansen, one of the two or three most prominent global warming alarmists on whose work the IPCC reports rest, “forgot” to report $1.6 million in outside income, as required by his government contracts. Is that significant? Well, yes: A handful of scientists, including Hansen, have gotten wealthy on climate alarmism. They have an enormous financial interest in the faux science they have done so
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November 20, 2011 — John Hinderaker
At PJ Media, Roger Kimball writes on “How to Reform Primary Education.” I have never been much interested in theories about education–reading books makes you smarter, watching television makes you dumber; that’s about all you need to know, in my opinion–so that isn’t a topic that would normally draw my attention. Except that what Roger writes about–the Washington Post’s book reviewer Michael Dirda, and Dirda’s fifth grade teacher, Mr. Jackson–is
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November 20, 2011 — John Hinderaker
It is now universally being predicted that the Congressional “Supercommittee” that was set up as part of the debt ceiling compromise last summer will fail to reach agreement on a proposed $1.2 trillion in spending cuts, spread over a ten year period. The committee’s theoretical deadline is Wednesday; realistically, however, it would probably have to announce a deal tomorrow, as it would take CBO two days to score whatever proposals
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November 20, 2011 — Scott Johnson
Peter Schweizer has responded in the comments to my nearby post on his new book. I want to excavate Peter’s comments and give them equal billing with my post. Here they are: I always value the thoughtful comments of my friend Scott Johnson. But I think he’s off base on several points. 1. Jenkins’ position is generally that insider trading is not a problem, whether on Wall Street or in
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November 20, 2011 — Scott Johnson
The Occupy movement has not been entirely useless. By my reckoning, itt has served one good purpose. It has demonstrated the permeable border between the left, represented by the Democratic Party and its media adjunct, and the sick left, represented by the Occupiers. The sickness has been manifested in a variety of phenomena in the Occupations, perhaps most notably the Occupy crime wave. We have done our best to keep
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November 20, 2011 — Scott Johnson
Peter Schweizer’s Throw Them All Out was published last week to wide acclaim, left and right. 60 Minutes led off its show on Sunday with a segment based on the book, featuring Steve Kroft’s dramatic confrontation with Nancy Pelosi. Peter Boyer summarized the book’s findings in a Newsweek article that extolled Peter and the book, as did Marc Thiessen in a Washington Post column. In her American Thinker column today
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November 20, 2011 — Steven Hayward
A few follow ups from posts recent and ancient. . . So Newt did it again last night, saying of Occupy Wall Street that they should “go get a job, right after you take a bath.” (The build up to this punch line is good too; see the whole video here—it’s short.)
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November 19, 2011 — John Hinderaker
In the early days of the movement, Democrats from President Obama on down–Nancy Pelosi was especially prominent–rushed to embrace the Occupiers. Once the Occupiers became known mostly for committing crimes, however, mainstream Democrats scurried for cover. So now, the Occupiers are asking the Democratic Party, wistfully, are you with us? Shepard Fairey, the graffiti artist who designed the famous Obama poster, certainly hopes so. He has produced a new poster,
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November 19, 2011 — John Hinderaker
NPR’s Laura Sullivan did a three-part series on Indian children in South Dakota, and the role of that state’s Department of Social Services in providing foster care for such children. The essence of NPR’s sensationalized account was that the state kidnaps Indian children from their homes for profit. I, in return, have done five posts critiquing the NPR story, the last of which, with links to the earlier posts, is
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