Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Brennan's Spooky Swearing-In
President Obama's choice to be Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) was approved by the Senate on a vote of 63-34, with thirteen Republicans voting to confirm him. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) created quite a stir with his 13-hour filibuster against the Brennan nomination. Not until he received written assurances from Attorney General Eric Holder that U.S. citizens would *not* be targeted for killing by drones on U.S. soil would the doughty Kentuckian stand down. Good for him. John Brennan then proceeded to take the Oath of Office, as administered by Vice President Joe Biden. Director Brennan then did something no other officer has done, something that occasioned its own measure of controversy. Brennan was sworn in on an original copy of the Constitution. It was a very august occasion, to be sure, but it was also a mysterious one.
Churches: Time to Fight!
You can't win the fight if you don't put on the gloves. A punch-drunk, old heavyweight boxer knows that's a truism, but not the churches of America. The Supreme Court heard arguments this week on the constitutionality of California's Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage in the state by a 52 to 47 margin in 2008 but has since been declared unconstitutional by federal courts. Fox TV, Rush Limbaugh and other talk-show pundits have weighed in, arguing the conservative -- and moral -- position that sanctifying gay marriage with the grace of the U.S. Constitution is not only wrong but a serious threat to the culture of this country.
The Left's Continuing War on Women
The New York Times caused a sensation with its kazillion-word, March 17 article by Michael Luo on the failures of state courts to get guns out of the hands of men in domestic violence situations. The main purpose of the article was to tweak America's oldest civil rights organization, the National Rifle Association, for opposing some of the more rash anti-gun proposals being considered by state legislatures, such as allowing courts to take away a person's firearms on the basis of a temporary restraining order. It's a new position for liberals to oppose the rights of the accused. Usually the Times is demanding that even convicted criminals be given voting rights, light sentences, sex-change operations and vegan meals in prison.
Such Touching Concern
WASHINGTON -- The American left cares so much for humanity that it even expends copious draughts of compassion toward us, toward you and me, toward suave, *dégagé* conservatives. The left's members really fret over how elements of the "extreme right" are undermining the Republican Party, consigning it to oblivion. The latest moral colossus to perform this exemplary task is Richard Cohen of the Washington Post, but there are many more from all the precincts of the left. This past weekend, I even detected this concern for us from the pollster, Andrew Kohut of the Pew Research Center. Writing a piece on the future of the Republican Party, he expressed his concern that advocates of "staunch conservatism" have left the Republican Party "estranged from America." If moderate Republicans do not smarten up and presumably rid the party of these "staunch conservatives," the party will go so far to the right that it will be replicating the political suicide of Senator George McGovern and his McGovernite zealots back in 1972.
Jim Carrey -- Not 'Dumb & Dumber,' Just Ignorant
Gun control advocate comedian/actor Jim Carrey becomes the latest Hollywood leftie to trash legendary actor and former NRA head Charlton Heston. About his new anti-Heston parody song, Carrey tweeted: "'Cold Dead Hand' is abt u heartless motherf -- kers unwilling 2 bend 4 the safety of our kids. Sorry if you're offended by the word safety." Lyrics include: "Charlton Heston movies are no longer in demand, and his immortal soul may lay forever in the sand. The angels wouldn't take him up to heaven like he'd planned, 'cause they couldn't pry that gun from his cold, dead hand. It takes a cold, dead hand to decide to pull the trigger, takes a cold, dead heart and as near as I can figger, with your cold, dead aim you're tryin' to prove your di-- is bigger ... ." You get the idea. Let's be charitable -- call Carrey ignorant, not stupid.
Beware Public Opinion
"If there is anything that links the human to the divine, it is the courage to stand by a principle when everybody else rejects it." -- Abraham Lincoln History is full of warnings about what happens when people follow public opinion instead of standing by their principles. In its most extreme manifestation, public opinion might well become mob rule when vigilantes take the law into their own hands. Major media have whipped the crowd into its latest frenzy over same-sex marriage, or should I say "marriage equality," the latest euphemism, likely intended to make the masses more accepting of what was once unacceptable. And the masses, which increasingly answer "none" when asked about any religious affiliation or moral code, appear ready for it. The U.S. Supreme Court, not the Supreme Judge, now rules supreme.
Republicans Grow Less Hawkish in Wake of Iraq War
Are Republicans no longer the party more inclined to military interventions and an assertive foreign policy? It's a question raised by the enthusiastic response to Sen. Rand Paul's 13-hour filibuster and to his not-very-interventionist foreign policy. It's raised also by House Republicans' willingness to accept the budget sequester, which includes defense cuts that former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta called "devastating." Barack Obama thought those cuts would be so unpalatable that Republicans would agree to increase tax revenues to avoid them. A decade or two ago, that would have been true. Not so today.
Iraq a Convenient Scapegoat
Bring up Iraq -- and expect to end up in an argument. Conservatives are no different from liberals in rehashing the unpopular war, which has become a sort of whipping boy for all our subsequent problems. The Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan recently enumerated countless pathologies that followed Iraq. Yet to examine her list is to learn just how misinformed we have become in our anguish over the intervention. Noonan writes of Republicans: "It [Iraq] ruined the party's hard-earned reputation for foreign-affairs probity. They started a war and didn't win it." We can argue over whether the result of the war was worth the cost. But by January 2009, the enemy was defeated. There was a consensual government in Iraq, there were few monthly American casualties, and there was a plan to leave a small constabulary force to ensure stability and the sanctity of Iraqi borders and airspace.
Apocalypse Now?
I know that Obama said that his primary concerns for his second term were major immigration reform and gun control. It's probably just a coincidence, but despots often feel compelled to deal with those two issues. They usually deal with guns by confiscating them, while their immigration policy generally involves box cars headed off to Siberia or Auschwitz. But, now, thanks to sequestration, he has to put those plans on the backburner so he can terrify Americans into believing that a tiny reduction in rising expenditures will lengthen the lines at airports, reduce the ranks of air traffic controllers, and turn teachers, cops and firemen, into sidewalk apple vendors.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Our Talking Points Society
An essay in the San Francisco Chronicle yesterday pointed out that as the oral arguments on same-sex marriage proceeded in the Supreme Court the use of the term "unfollow" jumped to ten times its normal frequency. For those who may be unfamiliar with the Twitter-verse "followers" are loosely analogous to "friends" on Facebook. A major difference is: Anyone can "follow" anyone else on Twitter. On Facebook you have to accept someone's offer of being a "friend." There is a competition for followers on Twitter. The worldwide leader in Twitter followers is Justin Bieber with 36,592,950 which, as luck would have it, is exactly 36,589,121 more followers than I have.
Reminder: How Mexico Treats "Undesirable" Foreigners
American politicians in both parties are stampeding all over themselves to pander to Mexico and adopt mass illegal alien amnesty schemes. But while the Mexican government lobbies for more "humane" treatment of illegal border crossers from their country into ours, Mexico remains notoriously restrictionist toward "undesirable" foreigners who break their laws or threaten their security. Despite widely touted immigration "reforms" adopted in 2011, Mexico still puts Mexico first -- as any country that is serious about protecting its sovereignty should and would. Article 33 of Mexico's constitution establishes the right of the president to detain and deport "any foreigner" and prohibits foreigners from participating "in any way" in the political affairs of the country.
If Same-Sex Marriage Is a 'Right,' There Are No Rights
The old adage that one lie leads to another is never more apparent than when modern American public officials deal with issues arising from sexual immorality. President Bill Clinton, for example, started a chain of lies when he decided to have an adulterous relationship with a White House intern. Clinton first lied to his wife, then to a federal court, then to the American people. Nor could Clinton's lies, delivered as president, be his lies alone. His partisans in Congress either had to abandon him or add another link to the chain of lies by declaring that perjury and obstruction of justice in a federal court, so long as they were intended to cover up presidential adultery with a White House intern, were not the sort of high crimes and misdemeanors that ought to be considered impeachable offenses under the Constitution of the United States.
Imperial Washington
The Senate did something this past weekend it hasn't done in four years: passed a budget. The law requires the Senate to pass a budget, but Congress often ignores its own laws. For most of Barack Obama's presidency, a series of continuing resolutions kept the money -- your money -- flowing. Now the Senate wants to add a trillion dollars of new taxes, even more than President Obama seeks. Despite our growing debt, the Senate wants to fund things like the Senate barbershop, which loses a third of a million dollars every year. It's like they live in a private bubble. Politicians say, "I'm going to Washington to *serve* others." Maybe they mean to. But after most "serve," they never leave. When I visit Washington, I see politicians and bureaucrats serving themselves.
Skipping an Abortionist's 'House of Horrors'
The liberal media know an abortion outrage when they hear it. Sadly, they only seem to hear them from the mouths of Republican candidates, and it only takes a *statement* to outrage the press. Can't they find a single abortion outrage inside an abortion clinic? Such is their radicalism that nothing, absolutely nothing regarding this gruesome procedure raises their eyebrows, never mind their ire. One emerging story proves the degree to which our "objective" media's views on abortion are dogmatic and extreme. Abortionist Kermit Gosnell is on trial in Philadelphia, and not just for killing babies outside the womb, but also for killing a mother through reckless use of anesthesia. Network TV coverage of the trial? Zero on ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, NPR and PBS. CNN's entire coverage seems to be one sentence from Jake Tapper on March 21.
When Proactive Policing Becomes Harassment
The first time David Floyd was stopped and frisked, on a Friday afternoon in April 2007, he was walking down Beach Avenue a few doors from his house in the Bronx when two police officers confronted him, demanding to know who he was, where he was going, what he was doing and whether he was carrying any weapons. Floyd, at the time a freelance film editor and now a medical student, presented his driver's license and explained that he was walking home. Unsatisfied, one of the officers searched Floyd, feeling under his shirt and inside his pants pockets. He found nothing illegal. Testifying last week in federal court, Floyd said the incident left him feeling "frustrated (and) humiliated, because it was on my block where I live, and I wasn't doing anything."
Are We Equal?
Are women equal to men? Are Jews equal to gentiles? Are blacks equal to Italians, Irish, Polish and other white people? The answer is probably a big fat no, and the pretense or assumption that we are equal -- or should be equal -- is foolhardy and creates mischief. Let's look at it. Male geniuses outnumber female geniuses 7-to-1. Female intelligence is packed much closer to the middle of the bell curve, whereas men's intelligence has far greater variability. That means that though there are many more male geniuses, there are also many more male idiots. The latter might partially explain why more men are in jail than women.
The Wisdom of Dan Quayle
Almost exactly 20 years ago, Barbara Dafoe Whitehead wrote a controversial essay for The Atlantic titled "Dan Quayle Was Right." In case you forgot (or never knew), let me fill you in on what Quayle was right about. There once was a popular sitcom called "Murphy Brown." The title character, played by Candice Bergen, was a news anchor. The show had its moments, but it was also insufferably pleased with itself and its liberalism. At least until the arrival of the Aaron Sorkin oeuvre ("The West Wing," "The Newsroom"), it set the standard for such things.
'Me Too' Republicans
Many ideas presented as "new" are just rehashes of old ideas that have been tried before -- and have failed before. So it is no surprise that the recent "Growth and Opportunity Project" report to the Republican National Committee is a classic example of what previous generations called "Me too" Republicanism. These are Republicans who think that the key to winning elections is to do more of what the Democrats are doing. In effect, they say "me too" on issues such as immigration, in hopes of gaining more new votes than they lose by betraying their existing supporters. In the wake of last year's presidential election debacle for the Republicans, the explanation preferred by "moderate" Republicans has been that the GOP has been too narrowly ideological, and needs to reach out to minorities, women and young people, rather than just to conservatives.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
An Offer Cypriots Can't Refuse
Citizens running scared after EU ruling class pushes through draconian cash confiscation deal.