Author Archives: Paul Mirengoff

December 14, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Joe Lieberman’s MSM “hate mail” just keeps getting worse

Ezra Klein of the Washington Post says that Joe Lieberman “seems willing to cause the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in order to settle an old electoral score.” It is this sentiment, I suppose, that gave rise to the vicious article about Senator Lieberman written by Lois Romano and Alec MacGillis that appeared on page 3 of the Post last week. On the plus side, Klein is a »
December 14, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

ACORN cries foul, liberal judge agrees

A federal district judge, the Honorable Nina Gershon of the Eastern District of New York, has found that congressional legislation that restricts funding by the federal government of ACORN is unconstitutional by virtue of being a “bill of attainder.” Judge Gershon is best-known, at least until now, as the judge who ruled that Mayor Giuliani could not cut the Brooklyn Museum of Art’s funding after it displayed sickening pornography. Judge »
December 13, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Will democracy “medal” in the Obama administration after all?

Robert Kagan argues that President Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech signals that “the world had better get ready for a tougher, less forgiving, more quintessentially American approach from a man who certainly gave the soft touch a try.” Kagan sees the speech as a turning point not just with respect to Afghanistan policy, but also in Iran policy and, more generally, democracy promotion. Kagan suggests that Obama has revised »
December 13, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Planting the seed of failure in Afghanistan

My Examiner column is about President Obama’s handling of Afghanistan — his prolonged decisionmaking process, his West Point speech, and his plan for a surge. I conclude with this: It is possible that Obama’s plan will succeed. . . But the president has not used his three months of deliberations and his address to the nation to maximize the likelihood of success. Instead, he has planted the seed of failure. »
December 13, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

How dare they “complicate” reform?!

The Washington Post continues its attacks on Democratic Senators who dare to have reservations about the various health care reform bills the leadership throws together. This piece about Senator Ben Nelson isn’t nearly as nasty as the one the Post ran on Joe Lieberman. However, Post-man Paul Kane does manage to accuse Nelson of insincerity and opportunism. Nelson’s deepest reservations about the legislation pertain to abortion, and specifically the prospect »
December 12, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Senate Democrats behaving badly

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), a division of the Department of Health and Human Services, has concluded that if Majority Leader Reid’s “compromise” health care legislation becomes law, America will spend $234 billion more on health care over the next decade. This is only the latest blow to “Reid-care.” The Mayo Clinic has already denounced the expansion of Medicare and the American Medical Association also opposes this »
December 11, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

If less is less, that’s still an improvement

The Obama administration appears to be facing up to reality in the Middle East: With the Palestinians refusing to return to the negotiations, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu not calling for a complete settlement freeze and the Arab world declining to make any gestures to Israel, the current sense in Jerusalem is that the U.S. is scaling back its intensive involvement in the diplomatic process. This view is reinforced by the »
December 11, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

This day in baseball history

December 11, 1959 is a day of infamy for Kansas City sports fans of a certain age. On that day, Kansas City traded Roger Maris to the New York Yankees. In addition to Maris, the Yankees received Joe DeMaestri and Kent Hadley. Kansas City got Norm Siebern, Don Larsen, Hank Bauer, and Marv (soon to become “Marvelous”) Throneberry. After winning four pennants in a row, the Yankees had finished a »
December 11, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Joe, can you get me off the hook — for old times sake?

Rumor has it that the Democrats are contemplating throwing Sen. Chris Dodd overboard in order to preserve his Senate seat for party in the 2010 election. Jim Geraghty reports that Dodd had lined up Vice President Biden to attend a fundraiser for him today, but that Biden apparently couldn’t make it (Dodd himself backed out of the event due to the need to remain on the Hill and vote). Indeed, »
December 10, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Let’s not get carried away

I liked much of President Obama’s Nobel acceptance speech well enough, but I wouldn’t try to build a religion around it. Or even a doctrine. Yet, according to Politico, some folks (I suspect White House spinmeisters) purport to see the makings of an Obama doctrine: “a notion that foreign policy is a struggle of good and evil, that American exceptionalism has blunted the force of tyranny in the world, and »
December 10, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

From Obama, a pleasant surprise

President Obama’s Nobel Prize acceptance speech was, I thought, a mostly pleasant surprise. It’s a long oration, too long, and there is much legitimately to pick at. But fundamentally I think Obama delivered a mostly thoughtful discussion (as these things go) of how to reconcile our lofty ideals with the existence of evil, and how to reconcile the occasional need to go to war (including at times for humanitarian reasons) »
December 10, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Sarkozy’s message to France’s Muslims — the good, the bad, and the ugly

Earlier this week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy addressed French Muslims in a statement published in Le Monde. As is often the case with Sarkozy, the statement is a mixed bag of good and not-so-good ideas. I like this part: I address my Muslim countrymen to say I will do everything to make them feel they are citizens like any other, enjoying the same rights as all the others to live »
December 9, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

You gotta love this

According to Politico, President Obama’s support has declined to the point that only 50 percent of voters now say they prefer having him as President to George W. Bush. Forty-four percent say they’d rather have Bush. In one sense, this isn’t very surprising. Most people probably don’t believe they are better off economically than they were, on average, during the Bush presidency. In fact, it’s not clear that most people »
December 9, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Did Obama expose his own mendacity?

President Obama began his speech about the economy at the Brookings Institution yesterday by discussing how dismal the economic outlook was a year ago when he was president-elect: Almost exactly one year ago, on a frigid winter’s day, I met with my new economic team at the headquarters of my presidential transition offices in Chicago. And over the course of four hours, my advisors presented an analysis of where the »
December 9, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

This day in baseball history

On December 9, 1959, the Chicago White Sox traded Johnny Callison to the Philadelphia Phillies for Gene Freese. This was part of the White Sox’s campaign to shore up their pennant winning club with power, in order to stave off the expected challenge of the New York Yankees, and win the World Series. As part of the same campaign, they had already traded Norm Cash and John Romano for Minnie »
December 8, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Senate votes down Nelson anti-abortion amendment

The Senate just rejected (“tabled”) an amendment sponsored by Ben Nelson and Orrin Hatch that would have provided tougher anti-abortion language in the health care reform bill. The vote was 55-45. Senator Nelson has been pretty clear that he won’t vote for the Dems’ bill without the kind of language he unsuccessfully attempted to insert. Without Nelson and Lieberman, Harry Reid will have to hold onto Blanche Lincoln and win »
December 8, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

The Washington Post hates Joe Lieberman

In a ridiculously partisan bit of writing, even by Washington Post standards, Lois Romano and Alec MacGillis introduce a piece about Sen. Joe Lieberman this way: Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) has once again inserted himself into the middle of an inflamed partisan debate, raising questions about his motives, his ego and his fickle allegiance to the Democratic Party, which forgave him after he supported Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for »