May 24, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
In a post below, I noted that during his appearance tonight on Sean Hannity’s program, Marco Rubio failed to defend his immigration bill, even though the format of the show was highly favorable to the Senator from Florida. Here is what happened. Hannity asked a central question that has become even more pressing in view of recent Obama administration scandals, particularly the one involving the IRS. That question, in essence,
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May 24, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
Tonight, Sean Hannity had Marco Rubio on his show for an hour to advocate the Schumer-Rubio amnesty bill. The program was an embarrassment at two levels. First, as I feared, the format was heavily skewed in favor of Rubio and his position. Second, even with this skewing, Rubio’s main arguments were pathetic. As to the format, Rubio spent roughly the first half of the program answering questions from Hannity. Some
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May 24, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
On May 24, 1963, the first place San Francisco Giants took on the second place Los Angeles Dodgers at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. It had taken a dramatic playoff series (won by the Giants) to separate the two teams in 1962, and well into the 1963 season, they were separated by only one game. To add to the drama, the pitching matchup featured Sandy Koufax for the visitors and
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May 24, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
President Obama’s legendary intellectual dishonesty was on full display once again in his “The Future of our Fight Against Terrorism” address. In essence, the speech called for a pullback, if not an end to, the “war” on terrorism. He prefaced this call with a quote from James Madison: “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” And he pushed it home by emphasizing the duration of
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May 24, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
I have written before about the lack of expression of opposition to the Schumer-Rubio amnesty legislation on leading Fox News programs such as Sean Hannity’s. While amnesty opponents receive little or no air time, Marco Rubio appears fairly regularly with Hannity to field mostly softball questions. Now comes word that Rubio will appear tonight on a “special edition” of Hannity to field questions from an audience of experts on immigration.
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May 23, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
President Obama delivered an address today at the National Defense University called “The Future of our Fight Against Terrorism.” Actually, part of the speech was about the past, including much self-congratulation and some shots at President Bush. This part of the speech is revisionist rubbish. As Max Boot explains: Obama said, for example, that after he came into office, “we unequivocally banned torture, affirmed our commitment to civilian courts, worked
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May 23, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
John Hay’s The Breadwinners: A Social Study (1883) is hardly a great novel. But it is, I’m confident, the best novel ever written by a future U.S. Secretary of State. And it’s a nice send-up of the “professional reformer” of the late 19th century — precursor of the modern “community organizer.” Indeed, the only fully realized character in The Breadwinners is its villain, a professional reformer. Claiming a commitment to
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May 23, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
With so many scandals in the picture or looming, it’s easy to miss the fact that President Obama may soon become one of the most successful presidents in American history. I’m defining success as fulfilling Obama’s mission of substantially transforming America. The Obama administration scandals matter because, to one degree or another, they involve scandalous conduct. But step back for moment. In 20 years, very few people will remember any
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May 23, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
The Daily Caller reports that White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler had three unprecedented one-on-one meetings last year with the Treasury Department’s chief lawyer, Chistopher Meade. The meetings were in September and December of 2012. Meade had known about the inspector general’s investigation of the IRS’s targeting of conservative nonprofits since at least June 2012. According to the Daily Caller, Ruemmler had never previous met with Meade one-on-one. Meade and Ruemmler
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May 22, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
William Taylor III, the lawyer Lois Lerner selected to represent her before the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee, is part of a firm that’s about as tight with the Obama administration as it could be. According to Washingtonian Magazine, the firm, a boutique litigation shop called Zuckerman Spaeder, has sent a higher percentage of partners into the Obama administration than any other law firm. But did Lerner’s lawyer do
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May 22, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
The emerging conservative line on the Obama administration’s aggressive investigations of journalists is that national security leaks should be dealt with by going after the leaker, not the reporter. I’ve heard this line from a number of conservative commentators, most notably Karl Rove. I couldn’t disagree more. Reporters are not above the law. And, as John has explained, the law (per the Espionage Act, 18 US Code Section 793) prohibits
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May 22, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
We’ve always viewed the Benghazi scandal in terms of (1) the Obama administration’s failure to provide requested security before the attack, (2) its conduct, or lack thereof, during the attack, and (3) its cover-up after the attack (along with, as we recently learned, its retaliation against those who didn’t feel comfortable about the cover-up). But there’s always been a fourth element — the administration’s failure to bring the attackers to
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May 22, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
The House Oversight Committee hearing on the IRS scandal is underway. I missed the beginning because I was appearing on Chuck Morse’s radio program. I’m tuned in now and will do a bit of live-blogging. I understand that, as expected, IRS official Lois Lerner has invoked the Fifth Amendment and, after saying she would answer no questions, has been dismissed from the hearing. I caught the end of the questioning
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May 21, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
I will be on the nationally syndicated radio show “Chuck Morse Speaks” tomorrow morning at 10:00 Eastern Time. I am scheduled to be on for an hour. We will discuss Ted Cruz as a possible presidential candidate and, to the extent I can do so intelligently, whatever else the host wants to talk about.
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May 21, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
A subcommittee of the House Committee on Oversight & Government Reform held a hearing today on the government’s Obamacare “outreach” program. Obamacare authorizes the government to provide information to the uninsured, and to assist them in obtaining insurance, through the use of “navigators.” Today’s hearing addressed concerns of Republican committee members about how this process will work in practice. The only witness was Gary Cohen, deputy administrator of the Department
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May 21, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
John Yoo identifies the common thread in the major Obama administration scandals: Add up all the recent scandals and the message is clear: the Obama administration is showing that it cannot be trusted with the basic functions of government: law enforcement (surveillance of reporters), taxation (IRS scandals), and national security (Benghazi). How, then, can we trust the administration when it comes to immigration — an area in which it already
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May 21, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
While attention is focused on various Obama administration scandals, the Schumer-Rubio immigration reform legislation keeps chugging along in the Senate. What are the prospects for enacting this law, or some similar version? I believe the Senate is likely to pass Schumer-Rubio. All or nearly all of the Senate Democrats will vote for it. That’s 55 votes or close to it. The four Republican members of the Gang of Eight –
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