Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Thursday, February 5, 2015
Hyphenated-Nation
As if we aren't already divided enough by race, class, gender, political party, economic status and sexual orientation, the federal government is reportedly thinking about creating a new category of Americans just in time for the next census. According to the Associated Press, "The U.S. Census Bureau will test the new Middle East-North Africa classification for possible inclusion on the 2020 census if it gets positive feedback about the proposed change by (last) Sunday, when the public comment period ends." Americans of Arab descent have previously been classified as "white" in the census, but carving out a special category for them will allow this group access to federal dollars and likely create another group to which politicians can pander for votes.
Weapons, Not Blankets, Are What Ukraine Needs Now
Four months after Ukraine's president traveled to Washington to plead for lethal military aid in its fight against Russian-sponsored violence and treachery, the US government is finally taking his entreaty seriously. The New York Times reports that "an array of administration and military officials" are leaning toward providing defensive weapons to Kiev's struggling armed forces, a step the White House has so far rejected. According to the Times, those in favor of arming Ukraine now include Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and NATO's military commander, US Air Force General Philip Breedlove. Secretary of State John Kerry and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff are reportedly "open" to the idea. Even National Security Adviser Susan Rice, long opposed to supplying lethal assistance, is now prepared to reconsider. But not, it seems, President Obama.
When Leftwing Economists Gruber and Krugman Practiced Economics
President Barack Obama, in his State of the Union speech, called for a minimum-wage hike and for government-mandated paid family and medical leave. "We are the only advanced country on Earth," said the President, "that doesn't guarantee paid sick leave or paid maternity leave to our workers." On the minimum wage, Obama issued this challenge: "And to everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, try it. If not, vote to give millions of the hardest-working people in America a raise." Minimum wage and paid family leave are not only moral imperatives, says Obama, but good economics to boot. Employees, he tells us, are happier and therefore more productive. Minimum wage and paid medical leave, understand, actually benefit business. It's just that dumb businessmen and women don't realize it.
Defining Economic Failure Down
Two phrases that Daniel Patrick Moynihan put into America's political lexicon two decades ago are increasingly pertinent. They explain the insufficient dismay about recent economic numbers. Moynihan said that when deviant behaviors -- e.g., violent crime, or births to unmarried women -- reach a certain level, society soothes itself by "defining deviancy down." It de-stigmatizes the behaviors by declaring them normal. And sometimes, Moynihan said, social problems are the result of "iatrogenic government." In medicine, an iatrogenic ailment is inadvertently induced by a physician or medicine; in social policy, iatrogenic problems are caused by government. When the economy grew by just 2.6 percent in 2014's fourth quarter, The New York Times headline cheerfully said "Economy Pulls Ahead." The story said the U.S. economy is "an island of relative strength" in a world facing "renewed torpor and turmoil." This was defining failure down.
Wednesday, February 4, 2015
Appeasement as Narcissism
Members of the Obama administration have insisted that the Taliban are not terrorists. Those responsible for the recent Paris killings are not radical Islamists. The Muslim Brotherhood is largely secular. Jihad is a "legitimate tenet of Islam." And "violent extremism," "workplace violence" or "man-caused disaster" better describe radical Islamic terrorism. Domestic terrorism is just as likely caused by returning U.S. combat veterans, according to one report by a federal agency. What is the point of such linguistic appeasement? The word "appeasement" long ago became pejorative for giving in to bullies. One side was aggressive and undemocratic; the other consensual and eager to avoid trouble through supposedly reasonable concessions.
Quit Wasting Time on Moore, Maher & Dean
Bill Maher called Chris Kyle of "American Sniper" a "psychopath patriot." Michael Moore called military snipers "cowards" who shoot people in the back. Howard Dean said "American Sniper" appeals mostly to angry Tea Party types. So what? Why do we conservatives give two cents about what these lefties and liberals say about "American Sniper" — or anything else? Nothing they ever say is surprising. Nothing they say ever adds to the debate, has any effect on anything or helps us find a solution to a serious problem.
Obama Estate Tax Plan: Die Once, Get Taxed Twice
President Obama's proposed changes to inheritance and capital gains taxes could raise the estate tax rate in the U.S. to the highest in the industrialized world. The plan, announced during the State of the Union address, would eliminate what is called "step-up basis at death" on capital gains taxation. And the top capital gains rate would jump to 28% from 20%. Under current law, when a parent or grandparent dies, the increase in the valuation of his or her asset from when it was originally purchased is not taxed. This is to offset the effects of the estate tax.
$6,099,996,642,000: Govt. Spent More Per Earner Than Median Earnings
The good news is that total net local, state and government spending dropped slightly from fiscal 2011 to fiscal 2012 (the latest year for which full state and local spending numbers are available from the Census Bureau). The bad news is that government spending nationwide still topped $6 trillion in fiscal 2012 and equaled more per earner than the nation's median earnings. There were 157,191,000 workers 15 years old or older in the United States who had earnings in 2012, according to the Census Bureau's Historical Income Table P-43. Their median earnings that year were $31,921 and their average earnings were $45,053.
The GOP's Orrin Hatch Problem
Did the 2014 midterms really happen? Less than three months after a red tide rolled over the country, the Senate Republican Rollover Caucus is back to its default position in Washington, D.C.: Hands up, bow down. Last week, senior GOP supplicant Sen. Orrin Hatch announced that he will support the confirmation of President Obama's attorney general nominee, Loretta Lynch. He praised her "qualifications" and decried the Justice Department's previous leaders who "have facilitated executive abuses by this president rather than upholding the rule of law."
Obama, the Very Worst Deficit President
The press has barely noticed that President Obama has offered a new federal budget. Even in its paucity was a slant to be found. Like an obedient servant, NBC morning anchor Natalie Morales relayed: "President Obama, unveiling a record $4 trillion budget on Monday aimed at helping the poor and middle class. President Obama says the budget is practical, not partisan." David Nakamura of The Washington Post began a story on the Obama budget sounding slightly less servile. He described it as "a bet that the country has moved closer to his way of thinking just three months after an election in which both he and his party were roundly rejected by the voters."
Anti-Vaccine Fanatics Kill
This week, controversy broke out over whether state governments have the power to require parents to have their children vaccinated. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, no stranger to compelling his citizens to stay off the roads during blizzards, announced that he had some sympathy for the anti-vaccination position: "I also understand that parents need to have some measure of choice in things as well. So that's the balance the government has to decide." Kentucky Senator Rand Paul doubled down on Christie's remarks, stating, "I have heard of many tragic cases of walking, talking, normal children who wound up with profound mental orders after vaccines. ...The state doesn't own your children." Christie and Paul aren't the only politicians sympathizing with anti-vaccination fanatics; in 2008, then-Senator Barack Obama repeated widely debunked claims of links between autism and vaccination. Skepticism of vaccination crosses party lines, unfortunately -- although the most organized anti-vaccination resistance comes from the New Agey left in places like Santa Monica and Marin County, who worry more about infinitesimal amounts of formaldehyde in vaccines than about death by polio.
How Uncle Sam Became a Bank Robber
Civil Forfeiture and Money Laundering Laws Let the IRS Seize the Accounts of Legitimate Businesses
Dessert Storm: Oregon Bakers Found Guilty
Make them bake cake! That's the verdict of an administrative judge in the case of Oregon bakers Aaron and Melissa Klein. The couple, who became the brave face of America's religious liberty clash, were informed [Monday] by the state's Bureau of Labor and Industries that in the battle over marriage, their First Amendment rights no longer counted. In the first of what will almost certainly be several rulings, the Kleins were found guilty of violating state law for politely declining an order for a same-sex "wedding" cake. As part of his 52-page order, Judge Alan McCullough claims that "requiring them to provide a wedding cake for Complainants does not constitute compelled speech." Aaron Klein disagrees. "First Amendment, Constitution. Freedom of religion. I'm free to exercise my religion however I see fit. If I'm told to make a wedding cake for a same-sex marriage, I feel that I'm violating my beliefs. I don't think I should have to do that."
ISIS Burns Jordanian Pilot to Death
The failure of Obama’s “degrade and destroy” strategy.
Obama Versus America
In his recent trip to India, President Obama repeated a long-standing pattern of his -- denigrating the United States to foreign audiences. He said that he had been discriminated against because of his skin color in America, a country in which there is, even now, "terrible poverty." Make no mistake about it, there is no society of human beings in which there are no rotten people. But for a President of the United States to be smearing America in a foreign country, whose track record is far worse, is both irresponsible and immature. Years after the last lynching of blacks took place in the Jim Crow South, India's own government was still publishing annual statistics on atrocities against the untouchables, including fatal atrocities. The June 2003 issue of "National Geographic" magazine had a chilling article on the continuing atrocities against untouchables in India in the 21st century.
It's Deja Vu, All Over Again
The source of the title is Yogi Berra, the Hall of Fame Yankee catcher and part time pundit. And never have his words been truer than they were on January 20th, when Barack Obama delivered his penultimate State of the Union address. Because I feel it's my duty, I actually watch these snoozearamas every year. But I can't tell you what a relief it is to realize I only have to sit through one more with Barack Obama at the podium. To be fair, Obama's addresses are not a lot worse than anyone else's. The difference is that all of his are the same. They invariably ignore all the problems created by his policies – especially when it comes to foreign affairs – and invariably call for additional taxes so that Democrats can use the revenue to buy up votes by providing federally-funded bribes to women, students, blacks and illegal aliens.
Parasites
Politicians and lawyers pretend that they are important people doing important work. But often they're important because they are parasites. They feed off others, while creating no wealth of their own. We all complain about businesses we don't like, but because business is voluntary, every merchant must offer us something we want in order to get our money. But that's not true for politicians and their businessman cronies. They get to use government force to grab our money. Those people who *take* instead of producing things make up "the parasite economy," says Cato Institute Vice President David Boaz. It's my favorite chapter in his new book, "The Libertarian Mind."
Tragic School Stories
New York's schools are the most segregated in the nation, and the state needs remedies right away. That was Chancellor Merryl H. Tisch's message to New York's governor and Legislature. She said that minority children are disproportionately trapped in schools that lack teaching talent, course offerings and resources needed to prepare them for college and success. Simply calling for more school resources will produce disappointing results. There are several minimum requirements that must be met for any child to do well in school. Someone must make the youngster do his homework, ensure that he gets eight to nine hours of sleep, feed him breakfast and make sure that he behaves in school and respects the teachers. None of these requirements can be satisfied by larger education budgets. They must be accomplished by families, or all else is for naught.
The Vanilla Power of Republican Scott Walker
Vanilla is the most popular ice cream flavor in America, not because it is the best (that would be coffee) but because it is the least objectionable. Put another way, vanilla is the most acceptable to the most people; it's not many people's favorite, but nobody hates it. And that's why Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is the vanilla candidate. A new Des Moines Register poll has Walker in first place -- narrowly -- among likely Republican caucus-goers. With Mitt Romney included in the poll, Walker was the respondents' first choice with 15 percentage points. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul was second with 14 percentage points and Romney third with 13. With Romney out, Walker rose to 16 percentage points and Paul to 15. First place in a tightly packed field is better than any of the alternatives, but it's not that big a deal this far out.
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
Obama's Shadow Immigration System
A bombshell report by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) reveals the Obama administration is involved in another massive scandal. More than 5.5 million new work permits were issued to aliens from 2009 to 2014 in addition to the the green cards and temporary worker admissions over that same time period. The CIS further reveals this "huge parallel immigrant work authorization system" operates "outside the limits set by Congress" and "inevitably impacts opportunities for U.S. workers, damages the integrity of the immigration system, and encourages illegal immigration." Thus, President Obama's overt contempt for the American worker and Congressional authority goes a long way towards explaining why all net jobs growth from 2007-2014 has gone to both legal and illegal immigrants. During that time frame, native-born employment declined by more than 1.45 million, while the number of employed immigrants increased by 2 million—along with a rapid growth in immigrant population. "Native employment has still not returned to pre-recession levels, while immigrant employment already exceeds pre-recession levels," revealed the report released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) in December. "Furthermore, even with recent job growth, the number of natives not in the labor force (neither working nor looking for work) continues to increase."