Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Creating a Risk-Free World
A child leaving home alone for the first time takes a risk. So does the entrepreneur who opens a new business. I no more want government to prevent us from doing these things than I want it to keep us in padded cells. Everyone has a different tolerance for risk. One person takes out a second mortgage to start a business. Another thinks that sounds nerve-racking, if not insane. Neither person is wrong. Government cannot know each person's preferences, or odds of success.
It's Not Obama's Fault
For a campaign that has been up-and-running since just about January 21, 2009, the Obama crowd did not have a good "official" first week. Last weekend, Barack Obama officially launched his campaign for re-election at a rally on the campus of Ohio State University. A couple of things were wrong with the event. About 14,000 people showed up, but the arena holds many more and the traveling press made much of the empty seats. That's not Obama's fault. It's the fault of the advance team and the campaign, but there you are.
Smear Attack Against Israel Defenders at UC San Diego
The University of California San Diego (UCSD) is the latest campus where false charges have been leveled at Israel defenders in order to advance the genocidal campaign against the Jewish State. A UCSD pro-Muslim student association, Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), orchestrated what could be a potentially libelous campaign of false charges against a campus-wide elected member of the student government, Ashton Shahyad Cohen, and pro-Israeli professor, Shlomo Dubnov. What animated the campaign? Despite SJP attempts to obfuscate the issue, both men were targeted because they voted against an SJP-sponsored resolution demanding that UCSD divest itself of holdings in companies that do business with Israel. The resolution was brought before the UCSD Student Council on February 29, 2012. After seven hours of debate, it was defeated 20-13. Shortly after, both men came under attack.
The Moral Infrastructure
The "Occupy" movement, which the Obama administration and much of the media have embraced, has implications that reach far beyond the passing sensation it has created. The unwillingness of authorities to put a stop to their organized disruptions of other people's lives, their trespassing, vandalism and violence is a de facto suspension, if not repeal, of the 14th Amendment's requirement that the government provide "equal protection of the laws" to all its citizens.
Conservatives and Gays
In addition to labeling conservatives and Republicans "anti-woman" (for opposing government-mandated free contraception), "anti-black" and "anti-Hispanic" (for advocating photo identification for voting), and "anti-science" (for skepticism regarding the belief that man-made carbon emissions will destroy much of the planet), Democrats now regularly label Republicans "anti-gay" (for opposing same-sex marriage). All these charges are demagogic. But when it comes to the "anti-gay" charge, conservatives need to clarify to themselves as much as to the general public where they stand.
Truth Is Major Obstacle to Obama's Re-election
President Obama formally kicked off his re-election campaign in Richmond, Va., and Columbus, Ohio, Saturday, and his theme was certainly not, shall we say, "it's morning again in America" -- President Ronald Reagan's optimistic re-election slogan in 1984. Obama's central message was more like: "Hey, I realize things look bad, and I'm not going to pretend you want four more years of this. But just think how much worse it would have been without me and how much worse it's going to get if you get rid of me."
The Truth When It Hurts
What Barack Obama has going for him in 2012 is, well, put it this way: human nature. Witness the French. Witness the Greeks. Part of being human is wanting all you can get without paying any more for it than absolutely necessary. In the context of 21st century governance, this translates into a popular plaint heard throughout Europe and the United States: Namely, suffering is for the birds!
Extremism in Defense of the Welfare State
The theme song of a popular TV show from the last decade featured the lyric "I worry all the time. If you paid attention, you'd be worried, too." It's a wise posture when analyzing the slow-motion crisis that is Europe. European governments are toppling like clock towers in an earthquake. The Dutch government fell on April 23, when it failed to agree with the opposition on an austerity plan. On May 6, Socialist Francois Hollande defeated France's Nicolas Sarkozy. Greece's ruling coalition has been shattered -- the vote splintered among dozens of small parties.
Finding Your Roots
"Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr." is another of the Harvard professor's wonderful television series for PBS. This is "must-see TV" and a more than worthy sequel to three previous projects Gates has hosted about how some of us came to be what and who we are. In this latest 10-part series, Gates explores the genealogical and genetic history of a diverse group of people, from entertainer Harry Connick Jr. and Pastor Rick Warren to former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Brown University President Ruth Simmons. There are less famous people, but the famous get you hooked for the rest.
Behind 'Fakegate'
What could be more American than encouraging a robust debate on one of the most controversial issues of the day? The answer -- for some on the left, anyway -- is: lie about your opponents and make a pathetic effort to discredit them. That, at least, is what an activist named Peter Gleick decided to do in a backwards attempt to promote his view that global warming is unquestionably and primarily a man-made phenomenon -- one that will cause calamitous changes in the environment.
'The Defining Issue of Our Time'? Hardly
There is nothing new under the sun, including politicians who seek to win votes by milking the gap between rich and poor. Today it's Barack Obama, demanding a "Buffett rule" and decrying the harm caused when "the gap between those at the very, very top and everybody else keeps growing wider and wider and wider and wider." Not so long ago it was John Edwards, intent on riding his "Two Americas" stump speech ("One America does the work while another America reaps the reward") all the way to the White House. Earlier still it was FDR, lambasting the wealthy who "did not want to pay a fair share" and boasting that he'd "increased still further the taxes paid by individuals in the highest brackets" because that was "the American thing to do."
Surveying the Survey
First off, I would like to thank all of you who took part in the first annual Prelutsky Survey. I am pleased to report that I received responses from 43 states, plus Puerto Rico. In addition, I heard from France, the Philippines, Canada, Norway, the Virgin Islands and the United Kingdom. Actually, I heard from two readers in the U.K. and three from Canada. The seven states that weren't represented were Alaska, Hawaii, Wyoming, North Dakota, New Hampshire, Kansas and Rhode Island.
Racial Preferences: Unfair and Ridiculous
Washington Post editorial writer and liberal blogger Jonathan Capehart is puzzled. Why does the "non-issue" of Harvard Law professor and Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren's Native American ancestry "require so much attention?" he asked last week. When Warren was teaching at Pennsylvania, Texas and Houston law schools, she identified herself as Indian -- or, to be politically correct, Native American. Then she was hired at Harvard and dropped the Native American from her biographical description. Harvard Law today says it has one faculty member of Native American heritage. But it won't say which one.
Jetez les Vauriens
I have no idea whether that translates to "Throw the Rascals Out" but that's what happened around Europe in elections held yesterday. In France, President Nicolas Sarkozy got beaten in his re-election try by Socialist François Hollande. According to the International Herald Tribune (the global edition of the New York Times) Hollande is "seen as a challenge to the German-dominated policy of economic austerity in the Euro Zone, which is suffering from recession and record unemployment."
'Julia'
It's not often that a man can have two important women in his life -- besides his wife. But then again, president Barack Obama is not an ordinary man. He is a man whose narcissism is so overwhelming that he can't imagine how genuinely creepy -- and utterly dishonest -- these two women make him appear. Who are these women? Only one has a name: Julia. The other woman? Let's call her exactly who she is: Ms. Composite Girlfriend (CG).
An HHS Pork Mandate?
What will come next? Will the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issue a Pork Mandate as part of ObamaCare? Will this be the next shoe to drop? Sound ridiculous? But, wait. Here's what the pork industry says about pork, "the other white meat."
Taking a Scythe to the Bill of Rights
Controversies can be wonderfully clarified when people follow the logic of illogical premises to perverse conclusions. For example, two academics recently wrote in the British Journal of Medical Ethics that "after-birth abortions" -- killing newborn babies -- are matters of moral indifference because newborns, like fetuses, "do not have the same moral status as actual persons" and "the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant."
Liberal Dummies on Parade
One of the nicest things about being a conservative is that you don't have to say really stupid things just to establish your bona fides the way that liberals do. For instance, ever since 1987, when Al Sharpton came to prominence by trashing the NYPD on behalf of teenage liar extraordinaire Tawana Brawley, he has spent a quarter of a century shaking down corporations just like his pal Jesse Jackson, threatening boycotts if he isn't paid the customary 30 pieces of silver; neglecting to pay his income taxes; and inciting violence which, on more than one occasion, has led to black mobs killing New York Jews. But, during a recent appearance on The Factor, Geraldo Rivera insisted that Sharpton is a great civil rights leader.
John Yoo Vindicated
On Wednesday, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously dismissed the case against former Bush administration lawyer John Yoo, filed by convicted terrorist Jose Padilla. "We agree with the plaintiffs that the unconstitutionality of torturing a U.S. citizen was 'beyond debate' by 2001," wrote Judge Raymond Fisher for the unanimous three-judge panel. "Yoo is entitled to qualified immunity, however, because it was not clearly established in 2001-03 that the treatment to which Padilla says he was subjected amounted to torture." Thus, Yoo cannot be held personally liable for what Padilla characterized as "gross physical and psychological abuse" he allegedly suffered during three-plus years of military detention prior to his conviction on other terror charges in 2007. "I am glad that the Ninth Circuit agrees that Padilla and other convicted terrorists shouldn't be allowed to use our own legal system to continue fighting against the United States," Yoo said.
Israel's Gathering Storm
Israel's Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, briefed Christian supporters of the Jewish state this morning. He told a hushed audience crowded into his Embassy's Jerusalem Auditorium of a recent visit by U.S. intelligence specialists. They had asked Dr. Oren the historian to compare Israel's situation today with other critical periods in the nation's past. Without hesitation, he answered: In the best case scenario, it's May, 1967. In the worst case, it's May, 1948.