Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Tuesday, December 8, 2015
The President's Speech
When the President of the United States asks the television networks to set aside time for him to broadcast a speech from the Oval Office, we can usually expect that he has something new to say. But President Obama's speech Sunday night was just a rehash of what he has been saying all along, trying to justify policies that have repeatedly turned out disastrously for America and our allies. This was not a speech about how the Obama administration is going to do anything differently in the future. It was a speech about how Obama's policies were right all along. Obama is one of those people who are often wrong but never in doubt.
Democrats' Problem: Americans Have Little Faith in Government
The Republican Party certainly has its problems: a chaotic presidential race; a despised congressional party; unpopularity among the rapidly growing number of non-whites. But the Democratic Party has its problems as well. One of them is the fact that the two signature policies of Barack Obama — the Affordable Care Act and the nuclear agreement with Iran — are unpopular with most voters. You heard little from the president about Obamacare or his approach to Iran during his 2012 re-election campaign. You've heard little about them from Democratic candidates for Congress in 2010, 2012 and 2014 or those running for next year.
Clinton's Budget Blowout
Hillary Clinton seems to be in a race with Bernie Sanders to see who can spend and borrow the most taxpayer money. These days that's how you win the Democratic nomination for president. So far, Clinton's losing the spend-fest. But she's catching up. Clinton has just endorsed a $275 billion proposal for public works projects. No word yet as to whether these projects are "shovel ready." What is certain is that the proposal makes the unions and the construction lobby mighty happy.
President Obama's Umpteenth Tired, Dishonest Speech on Terrorism
Once again, President Obama emerged from his permanent sabbatical on the war on terror to inform us, in a bizarre address from the Oval Office, that he has things firmly under control and there's no need for us Americans to be concerned. Excuse me if I'm not comforted. Obama has made quite clear that he is blind to the threat that radical Islam represents to America and the rest of the civilized world. He obviously believes that Islam produces no more or worse terrorists than any other religion or cult and that it is wrong to focus on the radical strain of Islam because it leads to discrimination against other Muslims — discrimination he seems to see under every rock.
Too Little, Too Late
If you tuned in [Sunday] night to President Obama's Oval Office address expecting to hear something important, you were probably sorely disappointed. For those of you who missed it, here's my brief analysis. First of all, why was he standing, speaking from a podium, in the Oval Office? I was pondering that question and listening to his tone, which struck me as exasperated. He sounded like someone who just couldn't get the audience to calm down and listen to him. Then it occurred to me — he sounded like a professor lecturing a class. The president reiterated a constant theme of his administration, saying that we should not give in to fear. He misses the point. We are not afraid of radical Islam. We are afraid of the continued weak response to it.
No Margin for Terror
If Americans tuned in to the president's speech [Sunday] night hoping for a substantive, long-term strategy to defeat ISIS, they're still waiting. In a rare talk on terrorism (from an even rarer setting), the president managed to talk for 13 minutes without saying anything new. Backed into a corner by tragedies his failed policies helped create, President Obama tried to answer his critics on the administration's inadequate response to radical Islam. But after a familiar lecture on tolerance and gun control, all he accomplished was proving his opponents right.
Farook Was Obsessed With Israel — What Else Do We Need to Know?
According to the father of the San Bernardino terrorist, Syed Rizwan Farook, his son was "obsessed with Israel." In an interview in the Italian newspaper La Stampa, the senior Syed Farook said, "My son said that he shared [Islamic State leader] Al Baghdadi's ideology and supported the creation of the Islamic State. He was also obsessed with Israel." Likewise, the Los Angeles Times reported that "As the investigation unfolded, friends and family of the shooters came forward to offer snapshots that may point to what motivated Wednesday's attack, including Farook's apparent fixation on Israel and Malik's devotion to a fundamentalist strain of Islam."
Making Sure Christ Is the Essence of Christmas
Every day until December 25, we will be besieged by commercials ticking down the shopping days left until Christmas. It's a magical time of giving and getting gifts, but it should really be a celebration of the Lord's greatest gift to us — sending His Son to die for our sins and be the light of the world. For whatever His reason, God has especially blessed America. Our country was founded on a continent rich with natural resources and stunning beauty. God gave our Founding Fathers wisdom and insight about human nature, which enabled them to write a Constitution that made us the freest and wealthiest society on earth and has preserved our God-given rights for more than two centuries.
Why I Stand With Liberty University's Jerry Falwell, Jr. on Guns
I stand with Jerry Falwell, Jr. And like the president of Liberty University, I am proud to call myself a gun-toting, Bible-clinging American patriot. President Falwell is facing criticism from Democrats and jihadist sympathizers after he urged students at the nation's largest Christian university to carry concealed weapons on campus to counter any possible armed attack from jihadists. "Let's teach them a lesson if they ever show up here," Falwell told thousands of cheering students during convocation.
Monday, December 7, 2015
Benghazi Scandal Exposed
Hillary Clinton Slept Past Staff Efforts to Set Up Intelligence Briefing
Federal Judge Bans School's Live Nativity Show
A federal judge has banished the Baby Jesus and the Three Wise Men from an Indiana high school's Christmas musical. U.S. District Court Judge Jon DeGuilio, appointed to the bench by President Obama, issued an injunction against Concord Community Schools on Dec. 2. The court order forbids students from presenting a live Nativity scene during the Concord High School's Christmas Spectacular. The judge said that portion of the show is overtly religious in nature. "The living nativity scene impermissibly conveys an endorsement of religion and thus runs afoul of the Establishment Clause," the judge wrote in his ruling.
Congress Uses 'Sleight of Hand' to Pay for Highway Bill
After much debate and considerable delay, the House of Representatives has finally passed a highway funding bill. A big question that delayed the bill's passage was whether the federal fuel tax would be increased to fully cover planned spending from the highway trust fund. Since it was crafted by the Republican majority that opposed tax increases, the legislation did not increase the tax on gasoline or diesel fuel. Instead, the bill pays for much of the difference between projected expenditures and fuel tax revenues by draining $59 billion from the capital of the Federal Reserve. As the former head of the Congressional budget office Alice Rivlin points out, this is "a new low in budgetary gimmickry."
2015 Will be the 3rd Warmest Year in the Satellite Record
Way back in June, John Christy and I called 2015 as being the warmest year on record … *in the surface thermometer data*. Given the strong El Niño in progress, on top of the official thermometer data warming trend, this seemed pretty obvious. Of course, everyone has their opinions regarding how good the thermometer temperature trends are, with periodic adjustments that almost always make the present warmer or the past colder.
Putting Military Women's Lives on the Line
The key data Obama's move to force women into combat roles ignores.
Surveillance Is Not a Four-Letter Word
I understand that for someone like Rand Paul, who has pretty much based his primary campaign on leading the fight in Congress to shut down the government's ability to gather intelligence, the recent surge in Islamic terrorism is an inconvenient truth. He probably suspects that Donald Trump is somehow behind it. I also know that those who think the NSA is the worst of the alphabet departments in Washington like to refer to Benjamin Franklin's line about those who would sacrifice freedom for security deserve neither. If it were as simple as that, it would be hard to disagree. But it is a stretch of gargantuan proportions to pretend that the mere gathering of phone numbers infringes on anyone's freedom, except perhaps those engaged in terrorist activities.
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Is Liberalism Good for Poor People?
When is the last time you heard Hillary Clinton talk about poverty? How about Barack Obama? Or Bernie Sanders? Granted, they use the word "middle class" a lot. But when is the last time you heard them talk about what they want to do for the "poor"? I can't remember.
Garrett Swasey's Final Sermon
Garrett Swasey stood before the worshipers at Hope Chapel, the nondenominational, evangelical Colorado Springs church where he was an elder. He reminded them, in a 50-minute sermon that was by turns humorous, gentle, and earnest, that life is short and time is running out for all of us. He recalled Douglas MacArthur's admonition that in wartime the cause of failure can usually be summarized in two words: "too late." He urged them not to make the mistake of thinking that there will be plenty of time later to do the right thing.
The Empty Case for Progressive Taxation
Progressives are increasingly preoccupied with income inequality, and their current hero, Sen. Bernie Sanders, favors increasing the tax system's progressivity. So, in this 103rd year of the income tax, it is timely to note that there still is no intellectually sturdy case for progressive taxation. Arguments for it are invariably arguments for increased equality of social outcomes. Because individuals have different vocational desires and different aptitudes for adding value to the economy, inequality is inevitable
My Pervasive Egocentrism: I Am Possessed With Self
In "Pleading Guilty," best-selling novelist Scott Turow wrote, "What kind of ethical social system takes as its fundamental precepts the words 'I' 'me' and 'mine'? Our two-year-olds start like that and we spend the next twenty years trying to teach them there's more than that to life." Fyodor Dostoyevsky, in his novel, "The Possessed," built his entire tome around this idea, as he described humanity as we become possessed with self. His portrayal is so compelling that I personally consider this the greatest novel ever written.
Saturday, December 5, 2015
We're a Nation of Immigrants, Not Idiots
The Democrats keep insisting we have to let everyone into the country who wants to come in, but, as I'm sure you've noticed, the ones they're referring to are those most likely to vote for Democrats. The fact is whenever anyone starts quoting the inscription at the base of the Statue of Liberty, "The Modern Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, with its open invitation to the huddled masses and wretched refuse, I am reminded that we are already filled to the brim with welfare recipients who answer to that description. I would also like to point out that bad poetry is a lousy basis for national policy.