Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Wednesday, June 1, 2016
Taught Not to Try
The first step in inventing something shouldn’t be waiting for government approval. What would ever get done? “Regulators like to see new types of law and regulation imposed upon the internet and emerging technologies,” warns Adam Thierer, author of “Permissionless Innovation.” “From drones to driverless cars to the ‘internet of things’ ... they want to put the genie back in the bottle of all this wonderful innovation that’s out there.”
Constitutionalists Need a New Political Home
Perhaps it’s time to bring back the American Liberty League. Forgotten by everyone save a few history buffs, primarily on the libertarian right and the Marxist left, the League was formed early in Franklin Roosevelt’s first term by John Jakob Raskob, a former head of the Democratic Party.
Tuesday, May 31, 2016
Cities Should Have Room for Everyone
Nearly a century ago, in 1920, the Census Bureau caused a ruckus when it announced that, for the first time, a majority of Americans lived in cities — even though its definition of a city included every hamlet with a population of 2,500 and above. Today a majority of Americans live in what are by any reasonable definition very large cities, metropolitan areas with populations above 1 million. But the urban planning profession remains fixated on just one small portion of these metropolises, the central city downtowns, though none outside New York contains more than 10 percent of metropolitan area jobs.
Socialism for the Uninformed
Socialism sounds great. It has always sounded great. And it will probably always continue to sound great. It is only when you go beyond rhetoric, and start looking at hard facts, that socialism turns out to be a big disappointment, if not a disaster. While throngs of young people are cheering loudly for avowed socialist Bernie Sanders, socialism has turned oil-rich Venezuela into a place where there are shortages of everything from toilet paper to beer, where electricity keeps shutting down, and where there are long lines of people hoping to get food, people complaining that they cannot feed their families.
Monday, May 30, 2016
The Morphing of America
There’s no getting around the fact that America is not what she used to be. Depending on your worldview, which has more than a little to do with your age, that is either a good thing or the worst thing imaginable. Being a 76-year-old conservative, it should be no surprise that I believe it is the latter. I don’t believe it is a coincidence that three of the most repulsive candidates in our nation’s history are presently duking it out, hoping to be the next president of the United States. What makes it truly mind-boggling is that I believe the person who is the rudest and crudest of the three is the last best hope America has of recouping some of the enormous losses here and abroad the nation has experienced under Barack Obama.
Rules? What Rules?
“Rules are made to be broken” is a saying that has many variations, but perhaps no one has summed up Hillary Clinton’s attitude (and Bill’s, too) about rules more than the late science-fiction writer, Robert A. Heinlein, who said: “I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.”
A ‘What If’ Memorial Day
The news could not have been worse. Starvation, malnutrition, diseases such as typhoid, smallpox, dysentery, and pneumonia, along with freezing temperatures that assaulted thousands of shoeless feet bloodying the snow, attached to bands of “walking skeletons” exposed to the elements by threadbare garments. They all combined to claim 2,500 lives from General George Washington’s army of 12,000 Continentals, who struggled through their encampment at Valley Forge during the 1777-78 winter. One bitter soldier wrote, “Poor food — hard lodging — cold weather — fatigue — nasty cloaths — nasty cookery — vomit half my time — smoak’d out of my senses — the devil’s in it — I can’t endure it — Why are we sent here to starve and freeze…?”
Seven, Eight … Nine Brothers in World War II
Back during Memorial Day 2014, I wrote a piece on five brothers who served in World War II. I was blown-away impressed by the Bailey boys, from my neck of the woods in Western Pennsylvania, and still am. Imagine my surprise when a reader responded with a package of clippings informing me of his family, which had *seven* brothers in the war. Yes, seven. His name is Ted, and his parents were Stella and Walter Pietkiewicz, Polish immigrants in Pittsburgh.
Sunday, May 29, 2016
‘All-American City’ Confiscates Elderly Man’s American Flags
Ken Dabelstein is a proud American. He owns Ken’s Country Produce, a bedding plant business in Westland, Michigan — which has the distinction of being an “All-American City.” Folks around Westland have been getting their marigolds and petunias from Ken for 42 years.
James Comey: Enforcing the Law Requires Indicting Hillary Clinton
When James Comey was appointed FBI Director by President Obama, he became the “hands on” chief law enforcement officer of the U.S. As he laid his hand on the Bible and recited his oath of office on September 4, 2013, swearing to “faithfully discharge the duties of the office… without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion,” Mr. Comey never thought he would face indicting the heir apparent leader of the party under which he would serve.
Up and Down — but Mostly Up — the Income Ladder
Two researchers at the Bank of Italy have documented something remarkable about Florence, the gorgeous Tuscan capital where the Medicis ruled and the Renaissance was born: The city’s wealthiest residents today are descended from its wealthiest families six centuries ago. As The Wall Street Journal reported this month, economists Guglielmo Barone and Sauro Mocetti looked at tax records compiled in Florence in 1427 alongside municipal tax data from 2011.
An Independence Day for Britain?
Leaders of the campaign to end Britain’s membership in the European Union hope that next month’s referendum will make June 23, 2016, a date as luminous in modern British history as May 3, 1979, when voters made Margaret Thatcher prime minister. Michael Gove, secretary of justice and leader of the campaign for Brexit — Britain’s withdrawal from the EU — anticipates a “galvanizing, liberating, empowering moment of national renewal.”
Saturday, May 28, 2016
Senators to AG: Stop Targeting Opponents of Obama’s Energy Policies
On Thursday, five U.S. senators sent a letter to Attorney General Loretta Lynch demanding that she stop using Justice Department “law enforcement resources to stifle private debate on one of the most controversial public issues of our time — climate change.” Sens. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, Mike Lee, R-Utah, Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., David Perdue, R-Ga., and David Vitter, R-La., expressed their concern over the response that Lynch gave at an oversight hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee in March.
Don’t Let the 43 Republicans Who Voted for Obama’s Transgender Agenda Spin Their Vote
On Wednesday, 43 Republican members of Congress joined the Democrats to vote for President Barack Obama’s transgender agenda. Now they’re trying to spin their vote. These 43 Republicans voted for the Maloney amendment, which ratified Obama’s 2014 executive order barring private businesses who do contract work for the government from engaging in what the government considers to be “discrimination” on the basis of “sexual orientation and gender identity” in their private employment policies.
There’s No Corking DeWine on Obama Order
If Ohio is the bellwether of America, then the president’s agenda is in a heap of trouble. The Buckeye State isn’t about to stand back and let the Obama administration take its schools hostage to a transgender agenda that puts its students at risk. This morning, Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine joined the chorus of state leaders resisting the tyranny of the Departments of Justice and Education for its order that schools open their showers, bathrooms, and locker rooms to boys and girls — no matter how unsafe or uncomfortable it may make them.
Confusing Main Street With Wall Street
Billionaire and former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg recently complained to a Wall Street gathering that “the Republican Party is no longer the party of business.” He predicted that union members, not corporate executives, would be voting GOP this fall. This is a problem? Many union members vote Republican. They were the core of the “Reagan Democrats.” Working people need a growing economy with increasing opportunity. Of course they should vote GOP.
Underdogs & Other Curs
Most of us are raised to root for the underdog, for the person or people who somehow succeed in spite of the odds stacked against them. At least that used to be the case. These days, it seems what we keep seeing are those who were previously held down behaving as if they are now entitled to rule the roost and call the shots.
Patriot Graves
Monday is Memorial Day, a national observance first known as Decoration Day. The first Memorial Day was observed on May 30, 1868. Flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. Initially meant as a time to remember those who fell during the bloody battles of our brutal Civil War, the holiday’s significance has been extended to honor all those who paid the ultimate price for our nation.
Friday, May 27, 2016
Yes, Hillary Was an Enabler
Donald Trump’s philosophy is never to use a scalpel when a meat ax is available, and so it is with his attack on the Clinton scandals of the 1990s. And yet, in slamming Hillary as Bill’s “enabler” and daring to invoke the allegation of rape against Clinton, Trump is again demonstrating his unsurpassed ability to needle his opponents and expose their vulnerabilities.
Students Defy Atheists, Recite Lord’s Prayer at Graduation
It was the best kept secret in East Liverpool, Ohio. Just moments before the graduation ceremony at East Liverpool High School on Sunday, the senior class gathered in a nearby auditorium. Together, they decided to do something that would make national headlines. The week before students learned they would no longer be allowed to perform “The Lord’s Prayer” – a graduation tradition dating back some 70 years.