Monthly Archives: February 2017

Donald Trump “normalizes” himself

Featured image We’ve heard plenty of talk from Democrats, “never-Trumpers,” and some in the mainstream media about how they cannot allow Donald Trump to be “normalized.” Much of the media coverage of Trump’s first month in office should be understood as an attempt to prevent such normalization. President Trump has assisted their efforts by not behaving like a normal president. I have in mind his tweeting, his transparently thin skin, and his »

A Great Night For Trump and Republicans

Featured image I don’t have much to say about President Trump’s speech to Congress tonight, beyond the obvious. The speech itself was tremendous, and Trump delivered it effectively, often passionately. It was an interesting reminder of how much better Trump is, as a speaker, than his predecessor, when he sticks to the script. The speech’s opening was inspired, with its reference to Black History Month and denouncing of recent hate crimes, especially »

Democrats Say: We Need To Be Farther Left!

Featured image As the Democratic Party slides inexorably downward, its leaders don’t seem inclined to question whether infantile leftism is really the path to electoral success. Nancy Pelosi looks back. Regrets, she has a few: Pelosi added that she got grief from the Left for not impeaching George W. Bush over the Iraq War after the 2006 midterms, where the Democrats regained control of Congress. In fact, she said she never recovered »

Does the NFL combine violate the ADA?

Featured image If your answer is, “you can’t be serious,” you’re not fully in tune with the contemporary landscape. On the other hand, your common sense quotient is high. The NFL scouting combine is basically an audition by more than 300 of the best collegiate football players who are eligible for the NFL draft. They come to Indianapolis each year to undergo on-field workouts, medical testing, interviews, and psychological testing. The workouts »

On Immigration, the Art of the Deal

Featured image Drudge’s headlines scream: “DREAMERS MAY GET THEIR DREAM / TRUMP DEALING ON IMMIGRATION.” CNN, the president’s most reviled network, says: “Trump envisions bill allowing many immigrants to stay in US.” President Donald Trump wants to pass an immigration reform bill that could grant legal status to millions of undocumented immigrants living in the US. “The time is right for an immigration bill as long as there is compromise on both »

Out of order

Featured image Something tells me that if California state senator Janet Nguyen were a liberal espousing the sacramental view of abortion or the fictitious evils of Jeff Sessions she would be an overnight sensation. As it is, Senator Nguyen’s removal from the state senate chamber when she sought to take issue with her colleagues’ recent tribute to the late Tom Hayden remains something of a secret. Senator Nguyen is not inclined to »

The Oscar flub: a “Harvey Mansfield” theory

Featured image Pricewaterhouse Coopers insists that the initial awarding of Best Picture to “La La Land” was the result of human error. No doubt, this is correct. I’m confident that the Academy intended to give the award to “Moonlight,” a film about African-Americans in Miami that was written by two African-Americans, one of whom directed it. But here, mostly in jest, is an alternative theory based on the grading practice that Harvey »

Fake news: A case study

Featured image You may have read about the former Obama White House staffer who resigned from the Trump White House after only eight days. Rumana Ahmed thought she should “try to stay on the NSC staff during the Trump Administration” she wrote at the Atlantic last week, “in order to give the new president and his aides a more nuanced view of Islam, and of America’s Muslim citizens.” But then, according to »

Donald Trump, George Bush, and the press

Featured image George W. Bush is a good man. The mainstream media hammered him mercilessly and mostly unfairly for eight years. One media mainstay tried to take Bush down late in the 2004 campaign with fake news. Yet, Bush spoke up for the embattled mainstream media today. He called it “indispensable to democracy.” Politico portrays this as “a break from the position of his fellow Republican, President Donald Trump, who has called »

Who cares about “conservatism”?

Featured image “Tom Hagen” doesn’t. He’s the author of a piece by that name in American Greatness. In form, Hagen’s argument parallels that of Michael Anton (aka Decius), discussed here. Anton’s subject is the “liberal international order.” He argues that it is a means to ends, not an end in itself, and thus must be rated on its ability to serve core American foreign policy interests — peace, prestige, and prosperity. Hagen »

How the Administrative State Threatens Our Liberty: VIP Live, With Howard Root

Featured image The administrative state is the #1 threat to our freedom, a fact which no one knows better than our friend Howard Root. Howard was the founder and CEO of Vascular Solutions, Inc., a successful medical products company that was set up as a victim by Barack Obama’s hyper-politicized Department of Justice. For five years, Obama’s DOJ persecuted and harassed Howard and his company with bogus claims. Thankfully, Howard Root had »

Trump Unbound, At Dinner

Featured image Donald Trump continues to bestride the world like a colossus. I can’t recall a precedent for the extent to which he monopolizes public attention and discourse. You could prove that with newspaper headlines just about every day, but here is an example of how thorough Trump’s dominance is–a list of the most-read articles on Politico that I captured at a random moment during the day: Is it smart for the »

More Soldiers, Fewer Bureaucrats

Featured image That is President Trump’s budget proposal in a nutshell. Trump’s plan will include a “whopping” $54 billion increase in defense spending, according to the Associated Press. That will take the defense budget a little more than half way to where it was when President Obama started cutting it in 2011. The president’s budget will “impose corresponding cuts to domestic programs and foreign aid,” meaning pretty significant cuts for most federal »

Academic Absurdity of the Week: It’s Whitey’s Fault—Again

Featured image One of the main argument of a certain new book that you may have heard about is that the idea of statesmanship has been abandoned in favor of “leadership studies,” which tend to be content-free when not downright stupid. Needless to say, there is an academic journal simply titled Leadership that describes its purpose thus: Leadership is an international, peer-reviewed journal designed to provide an ongoing forum for academic researchers to »

Oscar Week in Pictures: Ha Ha Land

Featured image I almost—almost—wish I had watched the Oscars last night to take in the sublime moment when the best picture award was flubbed. It was the perfect Twitter moment. La La Land blows 28-3 lead! But La La Land won the popular vote! All La La Land had to do was kick the field goal! Warren Beatty’s biggest flop since Ishtar! Only one thing to do morningafterwise—yup, a special edition of »

Understanding the administrative state

Featured image For the 20-plus years my friend Bruce Sanborn served as chairman of the Claremont Institute, we attended the annual meeting of the America Political Science Association over Labor Day weekend. At the APSA convention we attended the panels sponsored by the Claremont Institute. It was our idea of a good time. In those panels we heard a lot about “the administrative state,” frequently from Professor John Marini. Professor Marini had »

“The administrative state,” what’s that?

Featured image Last week, in a speech to CPAC, Steve Bannon declared that the Trump administration is battling for the “deconstruction of the administrative state.” CNN’s coverage of the speech appeared under the following headline: “Steve Bannon outlines his plan to ‘deconstruct’ Washington.” The Washington Post’s headline (in the paper edition) was similar. It mentioned “deconstruction” but not that which is to be deconstructed — the administrative state. In its story, CNN »