Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Wednesday, December 4, 2013
Not a Good Enough ObamaCare Fix
Success! The Obama administration announced over the weekend that it had hit its deadline of Nov. 30 for HealthCare.gov. Of course, there were caveats. The site will still probably get buggy when there's a lot of traffic, which is why Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius advised people to use it at off-peak hours. But that simply means peak hours will be moved to after midnight. After all, you don't alleviate crowding if you tell everyone to try a different door.
Tuesday, December 3, 2013
Obama to Netanyahu: Shut Up
As Iran announces plans for a new nuclear facility in Bushehr.
Black Friday: Dark Night Rises
"If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace." -- John Lennon "Black Friday" was a metaphor beyond the merchants' bottom line. Headlines on last Friday's Drudge Report reflect a culture that is being trampled by the greed and me-only attitude of a growing number of us...
A Toast to Buckley
The right-thinking trailblazer opened he way for modern conservatism
Obamacare and Government Failure
We conservatives are always on about the "unintended consequences" of government programs, but we didn't expect the Obama administration and congressional Democrats to provide such a vivid object lesson. If the tipsy, teetering debut of Obamacare invites a new skepticism about the capacity of government to run things, it will be the most welcome unintended consequence since Alexander Fleming left his staphylococci samples on a workbench over summer vacation. Government programs, after all, fail frequently but are almost never held to account, far less held up to ridicule.
Website, Schmebsite, Keep Your Eyes on the Big Ball
I'm not sure which the Obama administration is better at, deceiving the American people into accepting its initial policy changes or conning them into accepting, after the fact, the lowering of expectations for these failed policies. Just look at this president's miserable track record on both counts. His administration predicted his exorbitant stimulus package would create boatloads of "shovel-ready" jobs (not to mention reduce unemployment), but it didn't even come close. In response, Obama insisted the economic circumstances he inherited were far worse than he had imagined. He also cynically joked away his promise to generate shovel-ready jobs -- as if to say the American people were fools and dolts for taking him seriously about such a claim.
A World of Lies
Remember the terrible murder of Matthew Shepard in Laramie, Wyo. in 1998 -- tortured, beaten and left hanging on a fence to die because he was gay? The American people were led from the outset to believe that Shepard was the victim of a hate crime, murdered because of his sexual orientation. And that is how virtually every American still views the story.
The Pope and Rush Limbaugh
You'd have thought the president of the NRA had called for the tarring and feathering of mourning dove hunters! All it took for Pope Francis to bring down on himself the Wrath of Rush Limbaugh last week was to disrespect -- or appear to be disrespecting -- capitalistic economics, in the context of calling for a new Christian evangelism. "The worship of the ancient golden calf," said the pope, "has returned in a new and ruthless guise in the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose." Further: "The culture of prosperity deadens us; we are thrilled if the market offers us something new to purchase." There was, to make matters worse, some severe language regarding "trickle-down economics" and that good old Darwinian notion called "survival of the fittest."
Under ObamaCare, Misery Loves Companies
Before Cyber Monday, it was Cyber Saturday for HealthCare.gov, as the President's deadline for fixing the website came and went without most of the improvements he promised. Of the "hundreds of problems" Secretary Kathleen Sebelius admitted to, many remain. According to insiders, a full 10% of the portal is still completely dysfunctional or worse, unfinished, leaving tens of thousands of consumers dangling without the insurance they were promised.
A Stinkweed by Any Name
Wouldn't it be nice to be able to get through a single day without being reminded that something in the air or in the water has polluted America to such an extent that we have come to accept insanity as the norm? For instance, the annual furor over Christmas has already begun. While it appears to be perfectly fine for textbooks to praise Islam while ignoring all the other religions and for schools to celebrate Muslim culture while denigrating our own and for teachers to indoctrinate our kids with the glory of socialism, the one place where the line gets drawn is when it comes to singing Christmas carols. The three options seem to be that they are banned entirely, banned only during the month of December or merely sprinkled in among such holiday ditties as "Frosty the Snowman" and "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."
A Challenge to Our Beliefs
Depressing news about black students scoring far below white students on various mental tests has become so familiar that people in different parts of the ideological spectrum have long ago developed their different explanations for why this is so. But both may have to do some rethinking, in light of radically different news from England. The November 9th-15th issue of the distinguished British magazine "The Economist" reports that, among children who are eligible for free meals in England's schools, black children of immigrants from Africa meet the standards of school tests nearly 60 percent of the time -- as do immigrant children from Bangladesh and Pakistan. Black children of immigrants from the Caribbean meet the standards less than 50 percent of the time.
For Pakistan and the US, It's One Delusion After Another
Not many foreign policy experts would argue with the proposition that the country with which the United States has the most problematic relationship is Pakistan. Most Americans, when they have thought about it, have taken a similar view since Osama bin Laden was killed in a raid by Navy SEAL Team Six in May 2011.
Monday, December 2, 2013
The Dishonest Selling of ObamaCare
As we experience more of the unpleasant realities of the Affordable Care Act, Americans are questioning, finally, the forthrightness and honesty of their president in his selling of this law. As millions of individual health insurance policies are cancelled, it is transparent that the president distorted the truth when he told Americans, "if you like your plan you can keep it."
'Tis Better to Give, but Some Give More
When it comes to charitable giving, America is a world-beater. According to Giving USA, an annual compendium of national data on philanthropy, Americans last year donated more than $316 billion to charity, or roughly 2 percent of GDP. Contrary to popular belief, most of that money didn't come from foundations or corporations. It came from individuals. In 2012, donations from private American households added up to about $223 billion.
Where Is the Outrage?
With some notable exceptions, including a very large one for veterans of the Vietnam War, no previous generation of Americans was as self-*absorbed* as my own generation of Boomers. Note the word "previous." Unfortunately, we have done a rather remarkable job of cultivating that noxious trait among subsequent generations.
Sunday, December 1, 2013
A Reality Check
It's mainly because we get to see senators on TV all the time, making pronouncements from on high that when it comes to handicapping presidential runs, senators get most of the attention. However, all that being a senator prepares you for is voting. That's because the Senate is part of the legislative branch of government, whereas being president puts you atop the executive branch.
Tattering the Safety Net
Here is irony: the people who talk the most about the need for a social safety net (including the president himself!) are cheerleaders for a health reform that is going to shred it. How is that happening? By means of the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare). Through the Medicare and Medicaid programs, the federal government provides billions of dollars in subsides every year to hospitals that see a disproportionate number of patients who are poor and uninsured or who are on Medicaid. In both cases the result is the same: hospital revenues fall well short of the cost of care they dispense.
Wisconsin's Action Governor
In 2011, tens of thousands of government employees and others, enraged by Gov. Scott Walker's determination to break the ruinously expensive and paralyzing grip that government workers' unions had on Wisconsin, took over the capitol building in Madison. With chanting, screaming and singing supplemented by bullhorns, bagpipes and drum circles, their cacophony shook the building that the squalor of their occupation made malodorous. They spat on Republican legislators and urinated on Walker's office door. They shouted, "This is what democracy looks like!"
Saturday, November 30, 2013
From The Comedy Store
Caroline Kennedy arrived in Tokyo to present her credentials as the U.S. Ambassador to Japan. The next day Harry Reid decided to kill the Senate filibuster rule. Leave it to Democrats to exercise the nuclear option with the last living Kennedy in Japan.
Friday, November 29, 2013
The ObamaCare Propaganda Campaign
The effort to rebrand the president's disastrous health care law begins.