Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Campaign 2012 in a Nutshell: Wrong Ideas vs. No Ideas
Charlotte, N.C. -- Going by the conventional rules of American politics, the Democratic Convention this week was an unmitigated disaster. And, going by the same rules, GOP convention was a disaster, too. So, either the rules of American politics have fundamentally changed, or at least one of the parties is taking an enormous gamble. Since the Nixon years, the GOP has enjoyed a marked advantage over the Democrats at the presidential level. Cultural issues -- race, religion, abortion, patriotism -- have worked to the Republicans' advantage. Until Barack Obama's election in 2008, no Democrat has won the presidency without aggressively adapting to that fact.
Twilight Zone Week
The Democratic National Convention is an elaborate effort to sanitize a failed record that cannot be rehabilitated, even by the glib sophistry of former President Bill Clinton. President Obama has often lamented that it is not that his performance has been inferior but that he has failed to fully explain the wonders of it all in terms we bitter clingers can grasp. It's not that his policies are misguided or that they've yielded objectively horrendous results; it's that he just hasn't figured out a way to condescend far enough to our level to make us understand. The convention gives his team one last chance to put his theory to the test and change our misperceptions.
The Democratic Mask Slips on Israel
Were you shocked when at least 50 percent of the delegates to the Democratic Convention appeared to vote "nay" on recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital and reinserting God into the platform? Admittedly, it was high drama -- a truly unscripted moment that laid bare the raw hostility toward Israel that has gradually achieved mainstream status within the Democratic Party. But a surprise? Not really. A Gallup poll released earlier this year showed that 78 percent of Republicans supported Israel over the Palestinians, whereas only 53 percent of Democrats agreed. For the past 12 years, Democratic support for Israel has been declining, Gallup reports. The left, which is increasingly coterminous with the Democrats, has been hostile to Israel for much longer. Seen an Occupy demonstration lately? Noticed "Israel Apartheid Week" at your local campus?
The Empathy Gap
WASHINGTON -- Given the state of the economy, by any historical standard, Barack Obama should be 15 points behind Mitt Romney. Why is he tied? The empathy gap. On "caring about average people," Obama wins by 22 points. Maintaining that gap was a principal goal of the Democratic convention. It's the party's only hope of winning in November. George H.W. Bush, Romney-like in aloofness, was once famously handed a staff cue card that read: "Message: I care." That was supposed to be speech guidance. Bush read the card. Out loud. Not surprisingly, he lost to Bill Clinton, a man who lives to care, who feels your pain better than you do -- or at least makes you think so. In politics, that's a trivial distinction.
The First Term of Obama Has Been a Failure ... of America
The first term of the Obama administration has been a complete failure -- a complete failure of Americans to deserve the great president they elected. President Obama has done everything for you. He spent billions to create you dozens of new green jobs. He's given you amazing new health care laws. He even wore a flag pin a couple of times, though that had to disgust him. And his poor wife has done all she can to put up with the sight of your fat children waddling around everywhere. And yet you shout and shake your fat fists at him like *he's* done something wrong. It reminds me of the end of that one *Twilight Zone* episode where everyone screams when they see the beautiful woman, because they all have pig faces, and she's different from them. Well, Obama is the delicate beauty, and you're all the ugly, pig-faced idiots whose sight should repulse and terrify him.
The Left's Lost Generation
Big government solutions to the nation's ills wreak havoc on American youth.
Hush, Hush Sweet Charlotte
I am not one to whine about the Liberal bias of the national political press corps. It's there. You know it. I know it. THEY know it. The GOP can either rail against the media gods or design a game plan to get around it; something Republicans have gotten pretty good at going all the way back to Richard Nixon's "silent majority." However. There were two numbers released yesterday that, if this were a convention to re-nominate a Republican President, would have been on every commentator's lips -- from Fox to MSNBC: 4.5 million and 46.7 million.
Economic Recovery in Name Only
So how's the economic recovery treating you? For many Americans, the answer is, not well. In fact, some may ask: What recovery? With good reason. There are many ways to measure a nation's fiscal health, but people naturally tend to focus on the jobs numbers. Low unemployment means a strong economy, high unemployment a weak one. Unemployment was up when President Obama came into office, and according to him, "stimulus" spending was the answer. Government would pump hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars into the economy, thereby "creating" or "saving" millions of jobs.
Four More Years of Failure?
It's not Obama vs. Romney in 2012. It's really Obama vs. Obama. The president has to run against himself. His own record on the economy has been so pitiful he can't defend it or run on it. He has to run away from it. Instead of comparing his performance as president to what Romney-Ryan might do, Obama has to pretend like it's been someone else who's been mismanaging the economic recovery for the last 3 1/2 years.
Matthews a Few Race Cards Short of a Full Deck
Apparently, Monday, Aug. 27, was opening day for Hysterical Liberal Sanctimony About Imagined Republican Racism. During this first round, The New York Times, The Atlantic and the TV networks each put in a splendid showing. I'd need a book to cover it all. HOLD ON! I HAVE ONE -- Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama available in fine bookstores near you Sept. 25, 2012. Today, we will focus on the outstanding individual performance of the man who, since the departure of Contessa Brewer, is widely regarded by his colleagues as the stupidest on-air personality at MSNBC. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Chris Matthews.
Would Stopping Iran's Bomb Make Us 'Complicit?'
Team Obama is desperate to shore up support for their man in the American Jewish community. They are so desperate, in fact, that they are showing Israeli President Shimon Peres' video to their convention delegates in Charlotte, N.C. Israel's president is a largely ceremonial office, lacking real power. But Peres is Israel's most famous dove. Like Mr. Obama, he won the Nobel Peace Prize. Like Mr. Obama, many people today ask: Where's the Peace? Mr. Peres tells convention goers that Barack Obama is "the best president for Israel."
Dealers in Hope
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Columnist Leonard Pitts wrote a story for the front page of last Sunday's Charlotte Observer indicting both parties for failing to speak up for the poor. He inspired this column. I could be writing the expected narrative from a conservative at the Democratic National Convention, but have chosen instead to acknowledge that Pitts, though a lefty, is right. If the Democrats and Republicans aren't talking about the greater goal of helping the poor become un-poor (rather than just sending them a check to sustain them in their poverty), is anyone doing something to help them? At least one person is -- and within sight of the Democratic National Convention
The Five 'Reasons' to Re-elect Obama
Mark Alexander is traveling this week. Enjoy this week's guest column from Larry Elder. The case for re-electing President Barack Obama rests on five arguments, the most important of which is that Romney/Ryan represent sexism, racism, homophobia and fascism.
Obama Hobbled by Record, Slumping Democratic Brand
"One question, Mr. President," read the words on the front cover of this week's Economist, behind a silhouette of the back of Barack Obama's head, "just what would you do with another four years?" It's a good question, and one that's still open as Barack Obama prepares to deliver his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention in rainstorm-plagued Charlotte Thursday night. Other presidents seeking re-election have usually provided a more or less convincing answer. George W. Bush said he would try to reform Social Security and advance energy independence. Bill Clinton said he would provide "a bridge to the twenty-first century," which turned out to include significant tax cuts and a lunge toward Medicare reform.
Obama: The Real Radical
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- Four years ago, Barack Obama was America's Rorschach test upon whom voters could project their disparate yearnings. To govern, however, is to choose, and now his choices have clarified him. He is a conviction politician determined to complete the progressive project of emancipating government from the Founders' constraining premises, a project Woodrow Wilson embarked on 100 Novembers ago. As such, Obama has earned what he now receives, the tribute of a serious intellectual exegesis by a distinguished political philosopher. In "I Am the Change: Barack Obama and the Crisis of Liberalism," Charles Kesler of Claremont McKenna College rightly says Obama is "playing a long, high-stakes game." Concerning the stakes, Obama practices prudent reticence, not specifying America's displeasing features that are fundamental. Shortly before the 2008 election, he said only: "We are five days away from fundamentally transforming" America. Tonight, consider Obama's acceptance speech in the context that Kesler gives it in the American political tradition.
The Democrats in Convention Assembled
WASHINGTON -- At this Democratic National Convention, I am going to be particularly interested in the crowds on the floor. Who cares about what Bill Clinton says? He does not mean it anyway. In the 1990s, he governed like a Republican after saying that "the age of Big Government is over." Incidentally, he governed pretty well. He would have made a good moderate Republican, so long as he had good conservative majorities in the House and the Senate to keep him -- you will excuse the word -- honest. Now, of course, he has committed another of his episodic tergiversations, writing a book in praise of behemoth government, as though the 1990s never happened.
Obama Sells Old Ideas as New
CHARLOTTE -- A few years ago, it was fashionable for Democrats to describe themselves as "members of the reality-based community." These days, it seems the foreclosure crisis has hit them so hard they've been forced to move to another neighborhood. Metaphorically, at least, they've set up a refugee camp here this week. In this political Brigadoon, things are going well in America, so well in fact that President Obama obviously deserves a second term because Americans are better off than they were four years ago, and that the Republican Party is little more than a haven for old-fashioned robber barons who think like Klansmen but dress like Mr. Monopoly.
Dealing With Email
A few years ago, most of the email I received from strangers involved Nigerians who wanted nothing out of life except to shower me with money. These days, I am besieged by politicians of both parties who want me to share those Nigerian dollars with them, but I also apparently embody every woman's sexual fantasy, be she Russian, Hispanic or just happen to reside within my zip code. Who would have guessed that so many women were just aching to get it on with a short, bald, 72 year old, happily-married, Jewish guy? When hair began to sprout in my nose, my ears and on my back, I assumed it would be the ultimate turnoff, but apparently I am exactly what these hotties are looking for. So perhaps a decent sense of humor does count for more than height, good looks and money in the bank. Who would have guessed it?
The Obama Hare and Romney the Tortoise
The 2012 race has turned into one of Aesop's classic fables. After each new media blitz against the no-frills Mitt Romney, a far cooler President Obama races ahead three or four points in the polls -- only to fall back to about even as the attention fades. Meanwhile, the Romney tortoise, head down on the campaign trail, keeps lumbering along toward the November finish. There is nothing fancy day in and day out -- only the steady plod of a good enough convention, workmanlike speeches that pass muster, a Midwestern vice president nominee who is informed and reliable, and the standard conservative correctives offered to liberal excesses.
News Media Need to Own Their Biases
Wrapping up two years as public editor of The New York Times, veteran journalist Arthur Brisbane last week reflected on the liberal slant that often pervades the news coverage of what is still the most influential brand in American newspapers. "The hive on Eighth Avenue," he wrote, referring to the headquarters of the New York Times Company (which owns the Boston Globe), "is powerfully shaped by a culture of like minds -- a phenomenon, I believe, that is more easily recognized from without than from within." He credited the papers' editors and reporters with trying to enforce "fairness and balance" in their presidential campaign coverage. But by and large, what appears in the Times "virtually bleeds" with "political and cultural progressivism." The result is that "developments like the Occupy movement and gay marriage seem almost to erupt in the Times ... more like causes than news subjects."