Monthly Archives: October 2009

October 23, 2009 — Scott Johnson

Mark Falcoff: Comeuppance of the rich?

Mark Falcoff is our occasional contributor and Resident Scholar Emeritus at the American Enterprise Institute. He is the author, most recently, of Cuba the Morning After: Confronting Castro’s Legacy. He writes: The latest polls show Obama sinking among independent voters (and a few Democrats as well, though possibly for different reasons). They bring to mind an epiphany I had last summer while driving through the residential suburbs of Chevy Chase, »
October 22, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Success in Helmand shatters Obama’s pretext for inaction

The Washington Post reports on the success achieved in Helmand province over the past three months since Marines poured into the area and began waging war in the manner prescribed in Gen. McChrystal. According to the Post, in the district of Nawa, troop strength increased from 100 to 1,000 and our forces concentrated on improving security for the local population instead of chasing the Taliban. Since then, the area has »
October 22, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

The Obama administration — no class, bad character

In his speech last night to the Center for Security Policy, former vice president Cheney blew the whistle on some egregious dishonesty by the Obama administration: Recently, President Obama’s advisors have decided that it’s easier to blame the Bush Administration than support our troops. This weekend they leveled a charge that cannot go unanswered. The President’s chief of staff claimed that the Bush Administration hadn’t asked any tough questions about »
October 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Americans Wising Up, Despite AP’s Efforts

A growing body of poll data indicates that Americans are becoming more skeptical about claims of anthropogenic global warming. That’s partly because more people are learning about the science, and realizing that the actual evidence that supports the theory–as opposed to liberals’ lust for government takeover of the economy–is astonishingly weak, and partly because it’s hard to hide the fact that, contrary to the AGW theory, the globe isn’t getting »
October 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Best Client Letter Ever?

I’ve gotten some nice letters from clients, but nothing to match Mick Jagger’s 1969 letter to Andy Warhol, as reproduced by Swiss Miss. I especially like this line: “please write back saying how much money you would like.” The album cover that Warhol designed was for “Sticky Fingers.” It was controversial because it was slightly obscene and incorporated an actual zipper on the front of the album: But it sold »
October 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Obama’s Thuggery

Michael Barone locates Barack Obama squarely in the brass-knuckle Chicago style of politics: That’s governance, Chicago style. The head of government is friends with the heads of every big business, lobby and union, and together they make decisions on how everyone else will live. Those on the inside get what they want. Those on the outside — well, they get what the big guys want them to have. That’s life »
October 22, 2009 — John Hinderaker

What’s Black and White and Red All Over?

An embarrassed newspaper. From today’s New York Times corrections section: An article in some editions on Wednesday about a rash of umpiring errors in baseball’s playoffs itself contained an error. Tuesday night’s game in the American League Championship Series, when umpires missed three calls, was Game 4 of that series, not Game 3. It’s true that the men in blue have had a tough postseason, but they have a ways »
October 22, 2009 — Scott Johnson

A dirty mainstream

Jay Nordlinger recalls Anderson Cooper’s contribution to the coverage of the Tea Party resistance to the Obama administration on CNN in the context of the Obama administration’s effort to delegitimize FOX News: Yesterday, I had a note on Anita Dunn, Fox News, CNN, and all that jazz. I said that a CNN anchorman, Anderson Cooper, had coined this “teabagger” epithet against anti-Obama protesters. “Teabagging” is a sexual practice defined in »
October 22, 2009 — Scott Johnson

A walk down J Street

J Street is the phony pro-peace, genuinely anti-Israel organization that is putting on its first annual gala dinner/gabfest beginning this Sunday. Obama administration national security adviser General James Jones is slated to appear as the J Street event’s keynote speaker, which ought to clarify where the Obama administration stands on Israel for those still in doubt. In the New York Post Gabriel Schoenfeld frames Jones’s appearance as “Another Obama test »
October 22, 2009 — Scott Johnson

Dick Cheney speaks: The video

Reading the excerpts of Vice President Cheney’s speech at the Center for Security Policy last night, posted here by Paul (full text posted here), is bracing. Vice President Cheney expands on many of the themes we have pursued, including this one regarding the Obama administration’s abandonment of Poland and Czechoslovakia to appease Russia and Iran: [A]mong my other concerns about the drift of events under the present administration, I consider »
October 21, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Investigate this

Thomas Joscelyn reports that another former Gitmo detainee has been killed after returning to his terrorist ways. The jihadist in question is Yousef Mohammed al Shihri. He was killed in a shootout at a checkpoint along the Saudi-Yemeni border after he and his accomplices were stopped by Saudi security forces for suspicious behavior: Two of the travelers, including al Shihri, were reportedly dressed as women. Saudi security personnel decided to »
October 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

The Last Shoe Drops

I think it’s the last shoe, anyway–the last stop on James O’Keefe’s and Hannah Giles’ tour of ACORN offices around the country. ACORN’s last line of defense was Philadelphia; the organization told reporters that its Philadelphia employees had kicked O’Keefe and Giles out of their office, and a number of newspapers reported that claim as fact. It wasn’t true, of course. ACORN’s Philly office was as receptive to the undercover »
October 21, 2009 — Paul Mirengoff

Dick Cheney speaks

Former Vice President Cheney spoke tonight at Center for Security Policy. Below are key excerpts. The full speech is available on the Weekly Standard’s blog. On the abandonment of missile defense in Eastern Europe: Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before. You deploy a military force that was planned and »
October 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Meanwhile, Another $3.6 Trillion Tax

The Democrats’ assault on our economy is proceeding at such a frenetic pace that what would normally be front-page news can easily be lost in the shuffle. On the back burner, for now, is Waxman-Markey, the Dems’ carbon tax bill. At the Washington Times, Senators Kit Bond and Kay Hutchison remind us what a disaster the carbon tax would be: The controversial climate-change legislation winding its way through Congress will »
October 21, 2009 — John Hinderaker

Cut Their Pay and Send Them Home

Today “compensation czar” Kenneth Feinberg announced the Obama administration’s plan to punish executives of companies that received TARP money by cutting their compensation by an average of 90 percent: Under the plan, which will be announced in the next few days by the Treasury Department, the seven companies that received the most assistance will have to cut the cash payouts to their 25 best-paid executives by an average of about »
October 21, 2009 — Scott Johnson

Ascent of the flying imams: The settlement

The case of the six flying imams who were removed from a USAirways flight in Minneapolis for questioning by law enforcement authorities has proceeded in the Minnesota federal district court before Judge Ann Montgomery. Today comes word that the parties have reached a settlement of the case. In addition to our own notice, the case drew national attention including that of Congress, which passed a law protecting private citizens who »
October 21, 2009 — Scott Johnson

Peter Schweizer: Secrets of the financial crisis

Our friend Peter Schweizer is a Hoover Institution research fellow and the author of books including Reagan’s War, Victory, Do As I Say (Not As I Do) and Makers and Takers. Most recently, in Architects of Ruin, Peter argues that the global financial crisis was caused by an unholy alliance of liberal activists and politicians, rebutting the claim that it somehow constitutes a refutation of “unregulated capitalism.” John Hinderaker posted »