Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Tuesday, August 4, 2015
It's a Lion
The uproar over the killing of a lion named Cecil in Zimbabwe by an American dentist, Dr. Walter Palmer, is further proof that secular society inevitably produces moral confusion. In saying that, I do not in any way defend the killing of a protected animal. First, I do not hunt for sport (among other reasons, my religion, Judaism, opposes it). Second, if the lion suffered for a prolonged period, that would add to my condemnation. Third, if Palmer knowingly killed a protected animal, he should be prosecuted. Having said that, most of the reactions to what he did are more frightening than what Palmer did. Since I began writing and lecturing, I have been warning about the breakdown of the distinction between humans and animals (or, as the secular nearly always put it, "other animals"). For decades I have asked high school students: "If your dog or cat (or hamster or other beloved pet) and a stranger were drowning, which would you try to save first?"
Iran Deal Is Obama's Foreign Policy ObamaCare
President Obama's sordid Iran nuke deal is looking more and more like the foreign policy version of Obamacare. It's duplicitous, secretive, destructive and legacy-driven, and he's going to have to go full community organizer to get it passed. This deal was born in hell. It is the culmination of Obama's dangerously flawed philosophy that you enhance national security through appeasement. If we can secure a deal with Satan's stepchild, after all, we can remake the globe into the peaceful utopia progressives romantically envision. Never mind that this terrorist theocracy, by its own admission, is immune to rehabilitation. "Death to America, death to Israel." Even in the midst of negotiations with the Obama regime, the mullahs didn't bother to pretend they had goodwill toward us.
The Trump Card
With Hillary Clinton's multiple misdeeds coming to light and causing her political problems, reflected in her declining support in the polls, both she and the Democratic Party have reason to be concerned. But both of them may yet be rescued by "The Donald," who can turn out to be their Trump card. Donald Trump has virtually no chance of becoming even the Republican Party's candidate in 2016, much less being elected President of the United States. The reason is not hard to understand: Republican voters simply do not trust him, as the polls show. Nor is there any reason why they should trust him, given his chameleon-like changes in the past. Why then is he the "front-runner" in the polls?
Another British Invasion
When music fans think of "the British Invasion" they are referring to '60s bands like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. Britain today, however, faces a different type of invasion. Thousands of migrants, most from North Africa and the Middle East, are storming an ineffective "barricade" in Calais, France, as they attempt to enter England via the Chunnel, a 30-mile rail tunnel linking Folkestone, Kent, with Coquelles, Pas-de-Calais, in northern France. Some of these migrants hide on top of or inside of trucks or cling to the trains that travel beneath the English Channel. Some have died on the journey.
Five Myths About Capital Gains Taxes
The late, great Jack Kemp, an architect of the Reagan tax cuts, used to say, "Without capital, capitalism is just another ism." Capital is the plants, the machinery, the computers and trucks that businesses invest in to become productive and efficient providers of goods and services. So it's strange that last week Hillary Clinton declared war on capital with her plan to nearly double the capital gains rate for investments held less than six years. The capital gains tax rate fell to 15 percent in the George W. Bush years, was raised 23.8 percent under Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton would jack up the rate to as high as 42 percent — with the rate falling the longer the asset is held.
Obama Bets Nuclear Deal Will Change Iran's Regime; Few Agree
"Faute de mieux." That means "for want of something better" in Secretary of State John Kerry's second language. It's also the best case made by its journalistic defenders for approval of the nuclear weapons deal Kerry negotiated with Iran. Or to be more exact, for rallying 34 votes in the Senate or 146 votes in the House to uphold a presidential veto of a congressional vote to disapprove. It's a measure of the weakness of the deal that such a grudging argument is needed to rally such an unimpressive proportion of members of Congress. New York Times reporter Thomas Friedman, generally a supporter of Barack Obama's policies, makes the "faute de mieux" argument explicitly. But he also adds some conditions — er, recommendations — to his endorsement, which aren't likely to be congenial to the president.
Monday, August 3, 2015
All This for .01 Degrees Celsius?
As the president reveals his plan to reduce greenhouse gases to save us from an apocalyptic atmosphere, I wish to remind people of three things: 1.) **The true hockey stick of the fossil fuel era**: Global progress in total population, personal wealth and life expectancy. This is truly amazing. To show how fossil fuels played a roll in expanding the global pie, there are many more people alive today living longer and enjoying a higher GDP. One has to wonder if someone against fossil fuels is simply anti-progress. Ironic since many in the camp of anthropogenic global warming like to label themselves "progressive." They're certainly anti-statistic given something like this staring them in the face.
Planned Parenthood: Tear Down This Wall!
President Reagan went to West Berlin in 1987 and called upon Soviet Communist ruler Mikhail Gorbachev to "Tear Down this Wall." The President was also working against a near-total blackout of Western media coverage of the Berlin Wall. As former PBS news anchor Robert MacNeil said at the Newseum in 2009, the only time mainstream reporters covered the Berlin Wall was when U.S. Presidents — JFK and Reagan — went there. Then they had to. No wonder President Reagan also endorsed Dr. Bernard Nathanson's first film of an actual abortion, *Silent Scream*. Because he believed in the power of truth, Reagan sent a copy of this powerful video to every congressional office.
China Has Its Own Horrors to Atone For
Japan's less-than-wholehearted remorse for its World War II-era atrocities has long been an unhealed wound in its relations with its neighbors. The bruise is throbbing anew with the approach of August 15, the 70th anniversary of the announcement of Japan's surrender. China's ambassador to Tokyo revived the topic on July 23, when he pointedly advised Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe — who plans to deliver a speech marking the anniversary — to convey genuine contrition for the suffering caused by Japan's aggression. "We will be watching how Japan sums up its past and shows sincerity to the victimized countries," said the ambassador. Abe and other Japanese leaders have acknowledged their country's crimes during the war, but their apologies have tended to be grudging or awkward. Frequently they have been undermined by truculent rationalizations, or by suggestions that Japan's ugliest wartime offenses might still be open to debate.
Lincoln, Obama & Other Villains
Barack Obama has declared that the best way to defeat ISIS is not with guns, but by coming up with better ideas. I beg to differ. If you're ISIS and looking to terrify your enemies and trying to convert sadists to your mission, you'd be hard-pressed to come up with a better idea than beheading, burning and crucifying, the opposition. As for Obama, this is the same knucklehead who came up with Cash for Clunkers, Operation Fast & Furious, pushing the reset button with Russia, negotiating with Iran and the Affordable Care Act. If these are the best ideas he can come up with, we really do need to give guns a shot, as it were. Another of Obama's brainstorms was to deplete our Army from 570,000 in 2010 to 490,000 in 2014 and now all the way down to 450,000. I suppose this is Obama's way of letting us know that in spite of what's happening in Iran, Syria, Iraq, Ukraine, North Korea and China, we're safer than ever under his watch.
Sunday, August 2, 2015
The Barbarity of a Nation
Executives of Planned Parenthood's federally subsidized meat markets — your tax dollars at work — lack the courage of their convictions. They should drop the pretense of conducting a complex moral calculus about the organs they harvest from the babies they kill. First came the video showing a salad-nibbling, wine-sipping Planned Parenthood official explaining how "I'm going to basically crush below, I'm gonna crush above" whatever organ ("heart, lung, liver") is being harvested. Then the president of a Planned Parenthood chapter explained the happy side of harvesting: "For a lot of the women participating in the fetal tissue donation program, they're having a procedure that may be a very difficult decision for them and this is a way for them to feel that something positive is coming from ... a very difficult time."
Saturday, August 1, 2015
Playing Catch-Up
I know that there is no way I can ever really catch up with the news, but I'm addicted to trying. The problem is that even in the time it will take me to complete this article, eight or nine more things are going to be said or will take place that will make this piece every bit as dated as the Charleston. For instance, no sooner do I say that I'm glad Donald Trump is sticking around then he turns around and attacks John McCain. Normally, I wouldn't mind. After all, aside from being an out-spoken foe of Obama's conciliatory approach to Iran and ISIS, McCain has been a total washout as a senator. In spite of having limited arm movement thanks to five years of torture at the hands of Jane Fonda's good friends, the North Vietnamese, he has spent the last 30 reaching across the aisle to embrace the likes of Russ Feingold and Ted Kennedy.
Friday, July 31, 2015
Plunder and Deceit
Can we simultaneously love our children and betray their generation and generations unborn? Do I have your attention? I hope so, but I can't take credit for that lead. I stole it from Page 1 of Mark Levin's new book, "Plunder and Deceit: Big Government's Exploitation of Young People and the Future." Conservatives have long decried the left's feigned concern "for the children" while it pursues an agenda that is wrecking their future, from Social Security and other budget-busting entitlements to the undermining of our national security. But no one has devoted a book to turning this meme on its head and cogently proving the statists guilty of that which they falsely accuse others.
What's More Offensive Than Huckabee's Holocaust Remark? Obama's Iran Deal
In an interview with Breitbart News, Mike Huckabee accused President Barack Obama of being "naive" for trusting Iran to uphold its part of the recent agreement struck by the nations. By doing so, Huckabee said, Obama is marching Israelis "to the door of the oven." The Anti-Defamation League, self-proclaimed guardians of (imaginary) Jewish values, swiftly denounced Huckabee's language. Political reporters sprinted to the nearest Democrat to gauge exactly how offended Americans should all be. Huckabee was invited to appear on a bunch of TV and radio shows so that hosts could nudge him into expressing something even more disagreeable (as if such a thing were possible).
Huckabee's 'Oven' Remark Taken Out of Context
It's been a hard time for politicians not named "Trump" to get any attention, but Mike Huckabee managed it. He did it by comparing Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler. At least that's what I gathered from headlines like this one from Gawker: "Mike Huckabee Compares Obama to Hitler" I don't put huge amounts of stock in Gawker headlines (or really any headlines on the Internet), but then I saw that CNN's Wolf Blitzer said Huckabee had "essentially likened [Barack Obama] to Adolf Hitler." National Journal's Ron Fournier went on a tear on Twitter, insisting that Huckabee apologize for comparing Obama to Hitler. And of course, Hillary Clinton and Obama himself denounced Huckabee for making a Hitler comparison. Clinton even said she was "really offended personally," as if her feelings are what really matters.
Asymmetrical Politics
Republicans Act Like an Unruly Mob, Democrats Like a Regimented Army
Among the Ruins, a Case of Righteousness
Christianity, whose presence in the Middle East predates Islam's by 600 years, is about to be cleansed from the Middle East. Egyptian Copts may have found some respite under Abdel Fatah al-Sissi, but after their persecution under the previous Muslim Brotherhood government, they know how precarious their existence in 90 percent Muslim Egypt remains. Elsewhere, it's much worse. Twenty-one Copts were beheaded by the Islamic State affiliate in Libya for the crime of being Christian. In those large swaths of Syria and Iraq where the Islamic State rules, the consequences for Christians are terrible — enslavement, exile, torture, massacre, crucifixion. Over the decades, many Middle Eastern Christians, seeing the rise of political Islam and the intensification of savage sectarian wars, have simply left. Lebanon's Christians, once more than half the population, are now estimated at about a third. The number of Christians under Palestinian Authority rule in the West Bank has dwindled — in Bethlehem, for example, dropping by half. (The exception, of course, is Israel, where Christians, Arab and non-Arab, enjoy not just protection but civil rights. Their numbers are increasing. But that's another story.)
Dumb as Trump
Trump can't help being Trump. He says outrageous or dumb things about immigrants or his fellow Republican primary candidates five times a day. But no one — not even the liberals of the mainstream media — really takes Donald Trump or what he spews seriously. No one thinks the billionaire's mix of egotistical bloviating and off-the-cuff policy positions represents the Republican Party or conservatism. Mike Huckebee and Rick Perry are a whole other story.
Will Jewish Democrats Sink Iran Deal?
"Seven Jewish Lawmakers Could Tilt the Scales on Iran Deal," headlines The Times of Israel. The members — Sen. Charles Schumer, Rep. Steven Israel, Rep. Eliot Engel, Rep. Adam Schiff, Rep. Nita Lowey, Sen. Ben Cardin and Rep. Ted Deutch — are all Democrats. They must choose between loyalty to their party's president and concern about what the deal portends for Israeli and American security. There are long and short answers to the question: "Why are Jews liberal?" The long answer traces back to the Enlightenment in Europe, when parties of the right were monarchist and anti-Semitic, while parties of the left favored pluralism and religious freedom. I don't buy the long argument. Tsar Alexander III, who instigated pogroms against the Jews, is long dead. So is Napoleon, who liberated them. In the meantime, Jews have suffered under communists, who proved just as cruel as the monarchists.
Desperate Dems Recycle Planned Parenthood's Mammogram Lie
The gruesome hits keep coming for the baby butchers of Planned Parenthood. President Obama and his top health officials have one last-ditch response left: Quick, hide behind the imaginary mammogram machine! As more graphic, money-grubbing undercover videos of Planned Parenthood's for-profit aborted baby parts racket emerge thanks to the investigative work of the Center for Medical Progress, desperate Democrats are in full deflection mode. U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Sylvia Mathews Burwell defended federal funding for Planned Parenthood this week by invoking the women's health shield. "What I think is important is that our HHS funding is focused on issues of preventative care for women, things like mammograms," Burwell told the House Education and Workforce Committee. Just one teeny, tiny problem with this defense: It's a completely calculated fabrication.