Monthly Archives: May 2009

May 23, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Moral Guidance from the United Nations

Bernard-Henri Levvy, Elie Wiesel and Claude Lanzmann have written an open letter addressed to the United Nations. It begins: Who declared in April 2001: “Israel has never contributed to Civilization in any era, for it has only ever appropriated the contributions of others” — and added almost two months later: “the Israeli culture is an inhumane culture; it is an aggressive, racist, pretentious culture based on one simple principle: steal »
May 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Emily Litella Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi made the absurd claim that the CIA “lied” to her and “misleads Congress all the time,” without offering any support for her explosive assertions. I think everyone understands that Pelosi offered no evidence because she has none. Now, naturally, she wants to forget the whole thing: she says that she will have nothing more to say on the matter. Think about it: the Speaker of the House of »
May 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Dueling Speeches On PJTV

We do periodic Power Line Reports on PJTV; it’s a lot of fun and viewership is exploding as PJTV has established itself as a key alternative media source. Plus, more important, it’s fun. Yesterday I interviewed Walid Phares and Megan Ortagus of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies on the dueling speeches by Dick Cheney and Barack Obama. Go here to watch the interview. »
May 22, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Judge Diane Wood — more case studies

Even though Judge Wood reached the correct, non-empathetic result in the Ameritech case (as discussed here), she did not distinguish herself through her reasoning. Moreover, Ed Whelan has identified several other cases in which he found Judge Wood’s reasoning to be sloppy and/or well wide of the mark. In Hinrichs v. Speaker of the House, 506 F.3d 584 (7th Cir. 2007), Wood wrote a “dissent” in which she concluded that, »
May 22, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

A word from Jack Goldsmith

Jack Goldsmith has sent us this response to my posts about his important article in the New Republic comparing the anti-terrorism policies of Presidents Bush and Obama: You made some fair points about my piece but I think you were wrong to say that “Roosevelt operated at a time when foreign policy was a less partisan affair.” The isolationists that he faced in Congress and the country were a vicious »
May 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

About the Would-Be Synagogue/Airplane Bombers

I don’t think we’ve written anything about the four men who were arrested in New York while in the act of bombing synagogues–or trying to, anyway, since their “explosives” were dummies sold to them by a federal agent. They also wanted to shoot an airplane out of the sky with a Stinger missile. The timing of the story is awkward for the Obama administration, especially because the four men are »
May 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Headwinds For the Left

A series of polls reported over the last few days by Scott Rasmussen paint an interesting picture of an electorate that may be on the eve of what the Democrats intend to be the most radical transformation in our history. By a 77 percent to 14 percent margin, voters say the big problem in the United States is politicians’ unwillingness to cut spending, not the electorate’s unwillingness to pay more »
May 22, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Justice Souter and Judge Wood — a case study

Wouldn’t it be interesting if Judge Diane Wood — arguably the front-runner for nomination to the Supreme Court — wrote an opinion on an issue recently decided by a divided Supreme Court? And how cool would it be if the majority opinion at the Supreme Court level reached the same result as Wood and was written by Justice Souter, the person she would replace? And, to stir the pot a »
May 22, 2009 — Scott Johnson

Obama’s crock

In his speech at the National Archives yesterday, Barack Obama gave a full-throated, campaign-style version of the left-wing critique of the Bush administration’s national security policies. As John pointed out in his excellent dueling speeches series of posts, the speech cannot withstand serious scrutiny. It is a crock. Where was the brilliant Lincolnian rhetoric Professor Goldsmith finds in Obama’s deep thoughts? Where the Rooseveltian diplomacy? Perhaps it was in the »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

The Most Insanely Biased “News” Story In History

At least I think it’s intended to be a news story. It popped up on Yahoo News a while ago, which I assume means that many thousands of people will read it. It’s written for McClatchy by two reporters–I guess they are supposed to be reporters–named Jonathan S. Landay and Warren P. Strobel and is titled “Cheney’s speech contained omissions, misstatements.” The article is basically a compendium of DNC/Daily Kos »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Where Pinch Has Gone, Barack Is Following

More bad news for the New York Times: “S&P cuts New York Times rating deeper into junk status.” Glenn Reynolds comments: Remember, the people who are running the Times are the people who think Obama is doing a good job running the country. . . . Exactly. The Times’ problem is that it isn’t allowed to print money. But then, that only delays the inevitable. »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Dueling Speeches, Part IV

A principal theme of Barack Obama’s speech today was that the Bush administration had shredded the Constitution and imperiled the “rule of law.” Obama delivered his speech at the National Archives, before an inscription that said “the Constitution of the United States of America” and just a few steps away from the Constitution itself. His speech, among many other attacks on the Bush administration (as I noted earlier tonight), repeatedly »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Dueling Speeches, Part III

One of the most dishonest moments in Obama’s speech came when he assured us that detaining terrorists at Guantanamo Bay has undermined our security: Guantanamo became a symbol that helped Al Qaida recruit terrorists to its cause. Indeed, the existence of Guantanamo, likely, created more terrorists around the world than it ever detained. So the record is clear. Rather than keeping us safer, the president at Guantanamo has weakened American »
May 21, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Is Cheney keeping Obama relatively “honest”?

Andy McCarthy made a shrewd observation in response to Jack Goldsmith’s discussion about the extent to which President Obama has largely adopted the anti-terrorism policies of President Bush — an observation that is particularly relevant following today’s “dueling speeches” of Obama and Dick Cheney. Andy writes: I think there’s a critical question that needs asking — and it goes to a big plus for Vice Presdient Cheney that should be »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Dueling Speeches, Part II

I wrote earlier today that President Obama’s speech today was deeply dishonest. Here’s the first reason why. Obama portrayed himself, as he so often does, as a uniter, above the political fray. He decried the “politicization” of national security issues. He said that he had “no interest in spending all of our time relitigating the policies of the last eight years,” and that “we need to focus on the future.” »
May 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Dueling Speeches, Part I

Earlier today, Barack Obama and Dick Cheney delivered major speeches on security policy. Obama’s was, I thought, deeply dishonest. I’ll have much more to say about this later. For now, though, this Rasmussen Survey is timely: In the tension between individual rights and national security, 39% of voters nationwide now believe that our legal system worries too much about protecting individual rights. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found »
May 21, 2009 — Scott Johnson

It’s the jihad, stupid!

The New York Post reports: “Four homegrown Muslim terrorists on a mission from hell were arrested last night as they planted what they thought were high-powered plastic explosives at two Bronx synagogues, authorities said.” Why would they do something like that? “They stated they wanted to commit jihad,” NYPD Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said in a press conference. Three of the four jihadi wannabes (to borrow the Post’s formulation) converted »