Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Thursday, August 4, 2016
Trump’s Shallowness Runs Deep
In the 1870s, when Boss Tweed’s Tammany Hall controlled New York City, and in the 1950s and 1960s, when Chicago’s Democratic machine was especially rampant, there was a phenomenon that can be called immunity through profusion: Fresh scandals arrived with metronomic regularity, so there was no time to concentrate on any of them. The public, bewildered by blitzkriegs of bad behavior, was enervated. What Winston Churchill said about an adversary — “He spoke without a note and almost without a point” — can be said of Donald Trump, but this might be unfair to him. His speeches are, of course, syntactical train wrecks, but there might be method to his madness. He rarely finishes a sentence (“Believe me!” does not count), but perhaps he is not the scatterbrain he has so successfully contrived to appear. Maybe he actually is a sly rascal, cunningly in pursuit of immunity through profusion.
What’s Wrong With Honest Elections?
Again state legislatures have approved new rules to prevent election fraud. Again federal courts have struck the laws down. Much of America’s political and legal establishment is resolutely opposed to election integrity. It makes you wonder what they believe democracy is all about. Obviously, there is no excuse for racial discrimination. But protecting elections against cheating has nothing to do with race. Democracy doesn’t work unless the votes are counted accurately. There has been election fraud as long as there have been elections. Great Britain was the fount of parliaments around the world, but it was infamous for such abuses as “rotten boroughs.” It took centuries to clean up the process, and even today many parliamentary districts are unfairly drawn. The U.S. long suffered through manifold abuses of ethnic and urban “machines.” Party bosses ruled in Chicago, New York City, other big cities, and even some rural areas.
Wednesday, August 3, 2016
Student Facing 50-Day Suspension for Saying ‘All Lives Matter’
Politically correct tyranny is afoot at the University of Houston. I was recently made aware of a student at the university who was suspended for 50 days by the student government association and ordered to attend diversity training over a reference she made about the Black Lives Matter crowd. “#ForgetBlackLivesMatter; more like AllLivesMatter,” wrote Rohini Sethi, the vice president of the school’s student government association. Ms. Sethi wrote those words last month just a few hours after five Dallas police officers were assassinated. Her belief that every life matters set off a firestorm of controversy among students — including the Black Student Union.
The Wildly Profitable Gift Shop on the Titanic: The Dilemma
It was April 14, 1912, day four of Margaret Fuller’s virgin voyage on board the Titanic. Things could not be better. Her bid to open the only gift shop on the new mega-ship had been accepted three months earlier. She had operated other shops on several ocean liners during the past decade. As a result, she had achieved some degree of success and affluence from those years of hard work, sacrifice and optimism. But none of those other shops had begun with such a burst of passenger excitement, which directly translated to record setting sales. In the first three days of the voyage, her shop’s revenue had already surpassed the sales of the last two transatlantic voyages combined. Margaret could not be more pleased.
Trump vs. The Khans
Donald Trump got sound advice the other day. At a rally at Davenport, Iowa, he told the crowd that a prominent supporter had called and urged him not to sweat all the attacks at the Democratic National Convention. “Don’t hit down,” the supporter urged, according to Trump. “You have one person to beat. It’s Hillary Rodham Clinton.” By Trump’s account, he conceded the good sense of this, although he noted how he always prefers hitting back — “it makes me feel good.” If so, he must have enjoyed his weekend. He spent it attacking not just Khizr Khan, the Muslim father of a soldier killed in Iraq who spoke at the DNC, but his wife. In other words, roughly 48 hours after publicly sharing the advice he had gotten not to punch down, Trump delivered a flurry of downward blows the likes of which we haven’t seen from a presidential candidate in memory.
Why Hillary’s Candidacy Is More ‘Historic’ Now Than in 2008
Among the innumerable flip-flops, course corrections and reinventions that have come to define Hillary Clinton’s three decades in public life, perhaps the most interesting one is her decision in 2016 to go all in as the woman-candidate. In 2008, Clinton downplayed her gender. Mark Penn, her chief strategist in that campaign, had a “FWP” (First Woman President) plan that emphasized toughness, not nurturing. Voters, he argued, did “not want someone who would be the first mama, especially in this kind of world.” Ann Lewis, a 2008 senior adviser, told the New York Times last year that the decision not to double down on gender was the “biggest missed opportunity” of Clinton’s presidential bid. “It was not a major theme of the campaign,” Lewis added.
Trump Simply Can’t Stop Himself
This week, Donald Trump decided to step on every rake in a 30-mile radius. Fresh off of Hillary Clinton’s pathetic display of insanely soporific robotics — she really is remarkably lifelike for an evil cyborg sent from the future to kill Sarah Connor — Trump decided to redirect the news cycle. He did so by attacking a Gold Star family who spoke at the Democratic National Convention. After the Khan family excoriated Trump for his proposed Muslim immigration ban by speaking in emotional terms about their slain son, Capt. Humayun Khan, Trump couldn’t stop himself. He fired back. He did so by questioning why the mother, Ghazala Khan, hadn’t spoken out, implying strongly that her religion prevented her from doing so. He then said that he has made sacrifices akin to those made by the Khan family.
Beyond Two Evils
Many people dislike both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton — for good reason: Both are power-hungry threats to democracy and rule of law. But what can we do? What’s the alternative? Fortunately, one political party wants government to have a little *less * power. Former governors Gary Johnson and William Weld, the Libertarian Party’s presidential and vice presidential nominee, don’t have to be smarter or more moral than Clinton and Trump (though they are) because they want to *reduce* the power that government has over your life.
In Search of New Black Role Models
Two large questions loom on the question of race in America. One, after almost eight years of a black man as president of the United States, why does the country remain so deeply racially divided? Two, why, after more then a half-century since the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, do such profound social and economic problems persist in many of America’s black communities? In a recent survey from the Pew Research Center, 8 percent of blacks, compared to 38 percent of whites, agreed with the statement, “Our country has made the changes needed to give blacks equal rights with whites.” And 43 percent of blacks, compared to 11 percent of whites, indicated that, “Our country will not make the changes needed to give blacks equal rights with whites.”
Not All U.S. Muslim Soldiers Are Equal
Bronze Star and Purple Heart recipient Captain Humayun Khan died heroically. But his exceptional courage in Iraq and his Muslim father’s post-Democratic convention histrionics on TV do not erase the security threat posed by killer warriors of Allah infiltrating our troops. Don’t take my word for it. Ask all the forgotten Gold Star moms and dads who have lost their children because politically correct pushovers at the Pentagon looked the other way at the Muslim military menace. Don’t take my word for it. Just re-read the ignored warnings issued by Muslim soldier Nidal Hasan, the vengeful mass murderer who gunned down 13 service members — including a pregnant private first class who lost her life and her child — and wounded more than 30 others at Fort Hood in 2009.
Khan and the Constitution
An important point that has been lost in all the controversy over Khizr Khan’s DNC speech and Donald Trump’s response to it is that Khan’s main point was shockingly wrong. He suggested that Trump’s proposal to temporarily halt Muslim immigration is unconstitutional. He even brandished a pocket copy of the Constitution to punctate his point and accused Trump of never having read it. It was an amazing moment. Khan’s suggestion that it is unconstitutional to limit immigration based on religion may be taken for granted by the left and most journalists, but it’s incorrect. The response often heard last week in the wake of the speech was that the Constitution says religious tests are not permissible. The religious tests provision appears in Article VI of the Constitution. It states that no officeholder or government employee can be required to adhere to a particular religion.
Media’s Convention Tilt Is Unmissable — Again
It’s an ironclad principle. Media coverage of the quadrennial Republican and Democratic conventions is a laboratory exercise to demonstrate how shamelessly partisan our political reporters truly are. In this topsy-turvy year, it would be obvious for the media to proclaim that the Democratic convention went much more smoothly, was professionally organized and had a greater star-power presence. As usual, the Democrats squeezed a lot more free time out of the networks. Their celebrities spoke far into the 11 o’clock news hour. Trump, on the other hand, closed with a fizzle the first two nights, featuring a (boring) general and a former soap opera star.
Compensating Differences
What economists call an ability to make “compensating differences” is a valuable tool in everyone’s arsenal. If people are prohibited from doing so, they are always worse off. You say, “Williams, I never heard of compensating differences. What are they?” Jimmy Soul’s 1963 hit song, “If You Wanna Be Happy,” explained the concept of compensating differences. His lyrics went: “If you want to be happy for the rest of your life, never make a pretty woman your wife. So from my personal point of view, get an ugly girl to marry you.” His point was that an ugly woman would treat you better. But more importantly, a less attractive woman’s willingness to compensate for her differences enables her to effectively compete with a pretty woman.
Tuesday, August 2, 2016
Teen Singers Honor Fallen Soldier Aboard Jetliner
After back-to-back weeks of bickering and bloviating, I’m about all politicked out. So the other day, I sent a message to our good readers that I was searching for stories to share that would inspire, not inflame. Soon, my in box was flooded with great stories from across the fruited plain. But one in particular stood out. So pour yourself a glass of sweet tea, settle back into your Cracker Barrel rocking chair, and prepare to have your bones blessed. Our story took place on July 18th aboard Delta Airlines Flight 15 from Frankfurt, Germany.
Trump on Russia: Historical Perspective From FDR to Reagan to Obama
There is real danger in Donald Trump’s statements and attitude toward Vladimir Putin and Russia. “Putin likes me,” glowed Trump in a July 25, 2016, tweet. On ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday, Trump basked in the warmness that he’s apparently feeling from the Russian authoritarian: “He has said nice things about me over the years,” Trump admired of Putin. “I remember years ago, he said something, many years ago, he said something very nice about me.” Trump reciprocates the love he believes he feels. He seems to genuinely like Putin, given that, as he says, “Putin likes me.” And we’ve come to painfully see that there’s nothing that Donald Trump likes more than people who like him. (Conversely, there’s nothing that Donald Trump dislikes more than people who don’t like him, or merely criticize him.)
Welfare Is the New Work
Two recent news stories highlight how pernicious the welfare state has become in America today. The first was an announcement by the feds that food stamps can be used to have groceries delivered right to a recipient’s door. Service with a smile. The Obama administration says it is too much of a hardship for those on welfare to actually travel to the grocery. What’s next, cooking the meal for them? If only the DMV would do home deliveries for driver’s licenses.
Does Either Party Have a Winning Strategy? Not Clear
What is the campaign strategy for the two political parties? Clues can be had from the responses to a question I asked about a dozen dignitaries of each party at their conventions in Cleveland and Philadelphia. What’s your best guess, I asked, emphasizing guess, of your nominee’s percentage of the popular vote in November 2016? I understood the responses, being on the record, were not entirely frank. Only two Republicans guessed Donald Trump would lose; only one Democrat said he was uncertain about the result. It would be churlish to hurl the responses of those who turned out to be less than prescient back at them in scorn. One thing the responses had in common is that they reflected pre-convention polling, which showed Clinton 3 to 5 points ahead. Democrats did not seem to be taking into account post-Republican Convention polling that showed the race essentially even.
The Political Picture
The good news is that both political conventions are now behind us. The bad news is that the election is ahead of us. No one knows how this election will turn out but — given the awful presidential candidates in both parties — the worst case scenario may be only marginally worse than the best case scenario. National polls may suggest a close election ahead but presidential elections are not decided by who has a majority of the popular vote. In a country already divided, if not polarized, one candidate could win the popular vote and the other candidate win the Electoral College vote, which is what decides who goes to the White House. That could polarize us more than ever.
Hillary’s Recycled Speech
Environmentalists should be pleased with Hillary Clinton’s acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention Thursday night, because it was largely recycled talking points we have heard for decades. Putting aside the theatrics designed to make Hillary Clinton appear to be something she is not -- the white pantsuit was a nice touch, as white is traditionally the color of purity and also the color of the suffragettes — we’ve heard it all before. First there was the charge that Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump cannot be trusted with the nuclear codes. The same was said about Ronald Reagan in 1980. Democrats called him a “cowboy” who might blow up the world. Instead, he rebuilt America’s military, as Trump has promised to do, and helped bring down the Soviet Union. Can Hillary be trusted with classified documents?
America and Immigration
Results of a new poll conducted by Breitbart News/ Gravis Marketing on American attitudes toward immigration will be a shock to many political and media elites. Some highlights: By nearly a 6-to-1 margin U.S. voters want immigration of all kinds decreased. By a 25-to-1 margin voters want unemployed American workers to be given the preference for a job opening over a worker brought in from a foreign country. A whopping 61% of voters believe that any politician who would rather import foreign workers to take jobs rather than give them to current U.S. residents, is unfit to hold office.