Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Saturday, February 2, 2013
How the Republicans Could Lose the House
The Republican Party is in danger of another big loss. This time, they could lose the House of Representatives, giving the Democrats control of both chambers as well as the White House. The Democratic Party cannot possibly achieve this victory on its own. We are experiencing the slowest recovery in our nation's history. Economic growth is tepid. The job numbers are awful. Millions of people are out of work precisely because of the policies of the Obama administration. Ask any employer, any banker, any investor -- regardless of party affiliation -- and you are likely to hear the same stories. ObamaCare is making companies reluctant to hire. Dodd/Frank financial reform is making banks reluctant to lend. President Obama's continuing threat to raise taxes is making investors reluctant to invest. Labor policy and environmental regulations are compounding these negative factors.
From The Comedy Store
North Korea announced it will conduct a nuclear test and a long-range rocket test in preparation for a missile attack aimed at the U.S. They claim their missiles can hit the West Coast. Hillary Clinton is already blaming the attack on a film student's senior project.
Enlisting in the War on Liberalism
Even back in the 1960s when I was in my 20s and a registered Democrat, I refused to call myself a liberal. To me, liberals were those of my fellow collegians who dodged the draft and pretended it was character and not cowardice that sent them north to Canada or those others who evaded service through deferments and medical fraud, but got to display their moral superiority by spitting on returning veterans. Even that long ago, I couldn't quite decide if it was their lack of spine or their hypocrisy that I found more reprehensible. On top of everything else, it didn't help that I hated their music, their movies, their fads, their lack of personal hygiene and their infantile slogans. It never occurred to me that 50 years later, they and their goofy offspring would be America's school teachers, professors, journalists, judges, union leaders and politicians, and that they'd still be mucking up the works.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Immigration: Getting It Right
WASHINGTON -- Immigration reform is coming. Let's get it right. What counts as getting it wrong? The 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli Act, signed by President Reagan. It granted amnesty to the then 3 million illegal immigrants and promised border enforcement. Amnesty came. Enforcement never did. Reagan was swindled. Americans are a generous people. They don't want 11 million souls living in fear among them. They would willingly, indeed overwhelmingly, support amnesty -- as long as it is the last. They don't want another Simpson-Mazzoli, another bait-and-switch that lets in another 11 million illegal immigrants -- and brings us back where we began.
Hagel Testimony = Fail
I subscribe to the general theory that a President -- Republican or Democrat -- should be able to have the people running his Departments, Commissions and Agencies that he wants. Unless there is some overriding disqualifying reason to reject him or her, the Senate should abide by the terms of Article II, Section 2 that says the President "shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint ... Officers of the United States." The nomination of Chuck Hagel to be Secretary of Defense is an excellent case in point. I may not agree with Hagel on the 3 I's -- Iran, Iraq, and Israel -- but we don't generally allow Secretaries of Defense to make foreign policy. Nor, for that matter, do Secretaries of State make foreign policy.
Israel Threatened by Syria and Iran
Jewish State makes it clear it will meet existential threats head-on.
Surrounded by Enemies
JERUSALEM -- Until Jan. 30, I was working on a story about reaction here in Israel to the Obama administration's decision to provide advanced F-16 aircraft to Egypt. All that changed early Wednesday, when I received a call from an Israeli friend who told me: "Last night, the (Israeli air force) carried out a raid on a weapons convoy in Syria." He said the trucks were en route to Lebanon, making a "delivery of arms to Hezbollah," and "all aircraft returned safely." He then added, "Let's see how long it takes for us to be condemned by the 'friends of terrorists' for protecting ourselves." Less than two hours after that call, Syria's government-controlled media announced that "Israeli warplanes have violated international law and attacked a scientific research center in the Jamraya district of Damascus province." The Assad regime's state television claimed that "two innocent civilians were killed, and five were injured" in this "breach of Syrian sovereignty." European and U.S. news agencies speculated that the target may have been chemical weapons being moved out of the grasp of rebels fighting Bashar Assad's Iranian-supported army.
Sound and Fury of Immigration Debate
"Enforcement first" has become the mantra of conservatives opposed to comprehensive immigration. However, what opponents refuse to recognize is that illegal immigration is under better control today than at any point in the last half century. Last year, net immigration from Mexico was zero -- as many immigrants (legal and illegal) left the United States as came here. The flow of illegal immigrants has plummeted in the last few years -- down to the lowest level since the 1970s. What's more, the Obama administration has deported more illegal immigrants than any previous administration since the Great Depression - including 450,000 last year.
Ladies Against Senator Sleaze-Bob
Conservatives are always told they don't do enough to reach across the aisle. We're divisive, obstructionist and hostile to bipartisanship. So in the spirit of unity and comity, I'm announcing the formation of a new social justice group: Ladies Against Senator Sleaze-Bob. Now all I need are some principled Democratic ladies and liberal media lionesses to step up to the plate with me to protest the vulgar, sexist behavior of Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J. Surely, Nancy Pelosi, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Cher, Sandra Fluke, Eva Longoria and I can all agree that when a powerful Washington politician abuses his power to victimize young women, we should join hands to demand justice. Right? Surely, Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer, Arianna Huffington, Rachel Maddow, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Lena Dunham, Tina Fey and every card-carrying member of NOW across America are outraged by this Beltway playboy's tawdry exploitation of underage prostitutes.
Can GOP's Local Success Translate to Federal Level?
The Republicans are doomed. Conservatism is over. President Obama is conducting a mop-up operation at this point. That's the basic consensus in places like New York City, Washington, D.C., and other citadels of blue America. And let's be fair, liberals have every reason to gloat -- a little. The GOP has its troubles. Long-term demographic trends; often-irrational animosity from Hollywood, the media and academia; a thumbless grasp of the culture on the part of many Republicans: All of these things create a headwind for the party and the broader conservative movement. But here's the weird part. That's all true of presidential politics, but less so when it comes to state politics or even other federal races. In 2010, the GOP had its best performance in congressional races since 1938.
The Abortionist Saints of Sundance
Robert Redford's Sundance Film Festival featured a documentary celebrating four "amazing" abortionists who evacuate wombs in the third trimester of pregnancy. The critics in attendance loved it. The Philadelphia Inquirer boasted it drew "two standing ovations -- one for the doctors." Sundance attendees in Utah were greeted by police and armed sheriffs in green jumpsuits that made a show of force outside the theater. They had to have their bags searched and were inspected with handheld metal detectors. After the movie was shown, two police officers stood at the front of the auditorium as the directors and the four abortionists featured in the film answered audience questions. The message was clear: pro-lifers are dangerous.
High Culture Belongs at Inaugurations
In the days since the second Obama inauguration, I've been thinking about Kelly Clarkson and Beyonce. No, not the great lip-synching controversy, but the choice of popular entertainment for a solemn national rite. That Beyonce apparently lip-synched her beautiful rendition of the national anthem is a triviality. It's cold on the steps of the Capitol and even the greatest singer might have trouble sounding good in those conditions. Kelly Clarkson apparently sang live (and perhaps paid a price in quality). Four years ago, at Obama's first inauguration, a quartet consisting of Yo-Yo Ma, Yitzhak Perlman, Gabriela Montero and Anthony McGill (it sounds as if they were chosen by a diversity committee, but they're all great classical musicians) also used a recording and only pretended to play their instruments in the January chill. String instruments get out of tune quickly in cold, dry weather. You can tune up a cello just before playing it, but it isn't practical to do that with a piano.
Doctored Videotapes Are Peanuts
Many have rightly condemned MSNBC's serpentine editing of a video to make it appear that certain gun rights activists heckled the father of a 6-year-old victim of the Sandy Hook shooting massacre, but let's not pretend this was a one-off event. The liberal media long ago forfeited their respected role as watchdog over the government and have voluntary descended to the status of a public relations arm of the Democratic Party and various liberal causes. It doesn't do it justice to call them cheerleaders, for they are active participants, every bit as much involved in bringing about the events as the party with which they collude. They no longer merely report the news. They deliberately influence it to advance the liberal political agenda. So while they engage in plenty of deceptions on the micro level, they daily engage in a category of sin that far exceeds the despicable doctoring of videos.
Thursday, January 31, 2013
Widespread Dryness: Been There, Done That, Naturally
I have been on national television several times over the past six years saying we would go into a pattern similar to the 1950s with drought and heat centered over the nations midsection with enhanced hurricane threats on the East Coast. The reason is simple: We have the same type of natural cyclical pattern we had then, with the Pacific going into its cold stage (cold PDO) while the Atlantic is in its warm stage (warm AMO). The warm AMO is also responsible for the Arctic ice cap being smaller than it used to be when the AMO was cold. But debunking one climate change myth at a time is all I am going to do here, so let's take a look at the well forecasted drought by students of natural climate cycles, that the AGW (now climate change, climate extremes, etc.) crowd is playing up.
Detroit Public Schools: Bankrupting Minority Students' Futures
Exposing the racial injustice of Democrat-controlled education.
Arrogance Isn't the Answer
I'm getting tired of President Obama blaming Republicans for everything. This week it was immigration. In Las Vegas the president called for a policy that would provide a clear path to citizenship for illegal residents who pay their taxes, learn English and abide by the law. He warned that if bipartisan talks in Congress break down in bickering, he'll use his bully pulpit and present an immigration bill based on his ideas -- ideas that barely mention the need to secure the border as the first order of business. The president and his liberal friends in the media like to make everyone think it's Republicans who've been thwarting comprehensive immigration reform all these years.
Rubio's Amnesty: A Path to Oblivion for the GOP
Apart from finding out that Barack Obama did far worse in his re-election than nearly any other incumbent who won re-election, the only thing that perked me up after Nov. 6 was coming across a Time magazine published after the 2004 election, when George W. Bush won a second term. In the mirror image of all the 2012 post-election analyses, the Democrats were said to be finished, out of ideas, hopelessly unpopular. It's like watching MSNBC, with the word "Democrats" replaced with "Republicans." Democrats had thrown everything they had into beating Bush, crushing the Howard Dean wing of their party and running a moderate -- a Vietnam veteran, no less! They had George Soros, Michael Moore and Code Pink working like fiends to topple Bush.
The Spending Sequester Will Grow the Private Economy -- Don't Back Off
Yesterday's report of a 0.1 percent gross domestic product decline for the fourth quarter came as a surprise to most forecasters. But it actually masks considerable strength in the *private* economy. Namely, housing investment in the fourth quarter jumped 15.3 percent annually, business equipment and software spiked 12.4 percent, and real private final sales rose 2.6 percent. All in all, the domestic private sector of the economy increased 3.4 percent annually -- a very respectable gain. And here's one for the record books: Working ahead of year-end tax hikes, individuals shifted so much money to the fourth quarter at the 35 percent top rate that personal income grew by 7.9 percent annually -- a huge number. And there's more: In order to beat the taxman, dividend income rose *85.2 percent annually.* You think tax incentives don't matter? Guess again.
History Lesson: Under 'Fascist' Bush, Democrats Feared Tyranny
Once upon a time, a group of people known as the "Democrats" expressed great fear of tyranny by government. This was a time long, long ago, when a man from a place called Texas, representing a people known as the Republicans, occupied the White House. Leaders of the Democrats feared tyranny by the Republicans and called the man from Texas racist, oppressive and tyrannical. To refresh your recollection, we offer a few examples from the distant past: Billionaire Democratic contributor George Soros. He said the George W. Bush White House displayed the "supremacist ideology of Nazi Germany" and that Bush's administration used rhetoric that echoed his childhood in occupied Hungary. "When I hear Bush say, 'You're either with us or against us,'" Soros said, "it reminds me of the Germans." Soros later said: "The Bush administration and the Nazi and communist regimes all engaged in the politics of fear. ... Indeed, the Bush administration has been able to improve on the techniques used by the Nazi and communist propaganda machines."
'60 Minutes'' Missed Opportunity
In the days of the late Mike Wallace, "60 Minutes" was known for hard-hitting, aggressive journalism that asked the questions viewers wanted answered and held the powerful accountable. The Jan. 27 program on which Steve Kroft interviewed President Obama (at his request, no less) and outgoing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton fell far short of that high standard. It was the kind of softball toss you might have expected if Oprah Winfrey or Barbara Walters had conducted the interview. The president said of Clinton, "...a lot of the successes we've had internationally have been because of her hard work." Kroft should have asked if one of those successes included Russia, a nation with which Clinton promised to push the "reset button." Yet, as the Washington Post reports, "A poisonous unraveling of U.S. relations with Russia in recent months represents more than the failure of President Obama's first-term attempt to "reset" badly frayed bilateral relations. It threatens pillars of Obama's second-term foreign policy agenda as well." And how about the Middle East, which is not exactly headed toward peace and stability?