Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Friday, January 27, 2012
Romney Should be Proud
It's as predictable as vultures at a carcass. When a wealthy Republican is running for office, the press will make his wealth a handicap. Recall that when George H. W. Bush was running in 1988, he was derided as a "preppy." George W. Bush was the undeserving scion of the ruling class. We were told never mind that he had succeeded in business on his own. Though John McCain had been a fixture on the national stage since 1980, no one had paid much attention to his wealth until he was the Republican nominee, at which point his many houses suddenly became a matter of profound national importance. Democrats, of course, are permitted to be rich without fear of undue scrutiny. John F. Kennedy was wealthier than Mitt Romney, or would have been had he lived to collect his inheritance. Lyndon B. Johnson was born poor and died very rich. He didn't earn his money in the private sector. He used political influence to first purchase and then maintain monopolistic radio licenses in his wife's name.
Obama's Misstatements on the Union
Only a president long shielded from criticism and accountability could make the kind of State of the Union speech President Obama did Tuesday night. It's hard to know where to begin, given his repetition of tired ideas from his previous SOTUs, his taking credit for successful policies he resisted and omitting failed ones he promoted, his numerous misrepresentations on issues big and small, and his glaring refusal to address the main issues that threaten the nation. Let me touch on just a few highlights in this brief space. Excessive spending is the primary threat to our nation's and Americans' financial future, yet Obama glossed over it and distorted his record.
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Defiant Joy: Why We Still Need Chesterton
To read Kevin Belmonte's recent book Defiant Joy: The Remarkable Life & Impact of G. K. Chesterton, is to feel a powerful sense of longing. Chesterton, as many of you may know, was the twentieth-century writer of Orthodoxy, The Everlasting Man, the Father Brown mysteries, and other important works. His stalwart faith influenced great numbers of people in his own time and afterwards, including C. S. Lewis and Dorothy Sayers. Chesterton's time, in the early part of the century, was in many ways as religiously and politically polarized as our own. Yet Chesterton transcended the rhetoric and the propaganda with his genial good nature and wonderful sense of humor. He fought hard for his beliefs and principles; seldom has there been a Christian who defended the faith more valiantly.
A Presidential Rerun
Summertime is usually when TV networks air repeats of shows we've already seen. In his State of the Union Address Tuesday night, the president got a five-month jump on the summer season by re-running a class-envy video he has broadcast more times than local stations have shown episodes of "The Andy Griffith Show." Instead of a credible assessment of the state of the union, which is not good, the president delivered a slightly toned down campaign speech. We heard more of the same about how "the rich" aren't paying their "fair share" in taxes.
Is Anybody Serious?
The Republican candidates' circular firing squad now seems to be using machine guns. Whoever the eventual "last man standing" turns out to be, he may not be standing very tall or very steadily on his feet -- and he may be a pushover for Barack Obama in the general election, thanks to fellow Republicans. Whether you are a Democrat, a Republican or an independent, this is a very serious and historically crucial time for the United States of America. What Mitt Romney did or did not do when he was with Bain Capital, or what Newt Gingrich did or did not say to his ex-wife, are things that should be left for the tabloids.
Shut Up, They Explained
For sheer antidemocratic gall, it is hard to top the so-called "People's Pledge" signed on Monday by US Senator Scott Brown and Harvard law professor Elizabeth Warren. The agreement is designed to keep third-party advertising from playing a role in their closely-watched race for the seat that Brown won in a special election in 2010. Of course there is not the slightest chance the deal will actually keep independent ads off the airwaves or the internet between now and November's election. Yet Brown and Warren claim to be sincere in their determination to keep third parties from trying to influence this year's campaign. If so, shame on them.
Unlike Obama, GOP Candidates Talk Seriously About Governing
You know politicians are serious when they move from campaigning to governing. Something like that may be happening on the Republican campaign trail -- but, unfortunately, not at the Obama White House. Campaigning clearly carried the day for Newt Gingrich in South Carolina, where he beat Mitt Romney by a 40 percent to 28 percent margin. It's generally agreed that Gingrich clinched the race when he reacted angrily to questions by Fox News's Juan Williams and CNN's John King. Both times Gingrich got standing ovations. But not for how he'd govern. His platform can be summed up in a bumper sticker a Washington lawyer printed to buck up George H.W. Bush's hapless 1992 campaign: "Annoy the media -- vote for Bush." It was fun but didn't win many votes.
Re-Elect Obama: Vote Newt!
To talk with Gingrich supporters is to enter a world where words have no meaning. They denounce Mitt Romney as a candidate being pushed on them by "the Establishment" -- with "the Establishment" defined as anyone who supports Romney or doesn't support Newt. Gingrich may have spent his entire life in Washington and be so much of an insider that, as Jon Stewart says, "when Washington gets its prostate checked, it tickles [Newt]," but he is deemed the rebellious outsider challenging "the Establishment" -- because, again, "the Establishment" is anyone who opposes Newt.
Newt Gingrich: Our Bill Clinton
WASHINGTON -- How long have I been saying it? At least for 15 years, but in private, I have been aware of it longer. Newt Gingrich is conservatism's Bill Clinton, but without the charm. He has acquired wit, but he has all the charm of barbed wire. Newt and Bill are, of course, 1960s-generation narcissists, and they share the same problems: waywardness and deviancy. Newt, like Bill, has a proclivity for girl-hopping. It's not as egregious as Bill's, but then Newt is not as drop-dead beautiful. His public record is already besmeared with tawdry divorces, and there are private encounters with the fair sex that doubtless will come out. If I have heard of some, you can be sure the Democrats have heard of more.
Fidelity and the Presidency
The news media seem obsessed with the serial affairs of a younger Newt Gingrich back in the last century. The anger of his second of three wives mysteriously became national news on ABC's "Nightline" on the eve of the South Carolina primary. Millions watched Mrs. Gingrich II complain that Newt and the present Mrs. Gingrich III had done to her (while ill) just about the same thing that she and Newt had earlier done to Mrs. Gingrich I (while ill). Do these marital dramas involving our leaders matter that much? At some point, does long-ago adultery earn a statute of limitations? Do we forgive a few, but not serial, transgressions? Do we really care to learn the back-and-forth, he said/she said details? And do leaders have to be exceptionally talented to atone for extremely poor marital behavior?
Mining Fool's Gold
While I was on a recent vacation, I watched Fox News more than usual. Mainly what I noticed is that while Alan Colmes, Juan Williams, Leslie Marshall, Bob Beckel and Geraldo Rivera, are the five most annoying things to be found on the network, rounding out the top 10 are the commercials for the gold merchants, Merit Financial, Lear Capital, Goldline, Discount Gold Brokers and Rosland. The worst of the lot is Rosland, which day after day, enables three of the least appealing guys in America, Ben Ferguson, dentist Larry Pickard and Jeffrey Nichols, to enter our living rooms. For sheer gall, it's hard to top the moment when young Ferguson asks Mr. Nichols why he purchases his gold from Rosland, while Nichols is simultaneously identified on screen as the senior financial advisor for the company!
Newt Declares War on Media
The Republican re-embrace of former Speaker Newt Gingrich says a lot about whom he sees as his opponent -- and it isn't just President Barack Obama. It's the media. If not for major media's embrace, Obama would still be sitting in the Senate, perhaps mulling another run for the presidency. A UCLA economist-political scientist recently tried to measure how the liberal media bias influences the way people vote. He concluded that this bias gives the Democrat candidate 8 to 10 percentage points.
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
The Euphemisms of 'Pro-Choice' Evil
This week marked the 39th anniversary of the greatest American moral tragedy of the 20th century: Roe v. Wade. And yet the left cheered this anniversary with the enthusiasm of an intoxicated teenager stumbling on a free copy of Penthouse. Planned Parenthood, which rakes in millions each year by performing abortions, asked via Twitter, "How has #Roe changed your life?" The sample answers were horrifically fascinating. "Because of Roe, I have grown up knowing that my girlfriends won't die from back-alley abortions," one young man wrote. The young man might as well have written, "Because of Roe, I don't have to use condoms." It's certainly easier to sleep after a night of unprotected sex knowing that the girl you just impregnated can always have her uterus scraped. One young woman wrote, "Because of Roe, I get to go to college, instead of bearing a child who wouldn't." And, as we all know, a child who won't go to college isn't worthy of life. The true value of human life can only be justified by attending a Modern Dance in Lesbian Thought course taught by an otherwise unemployable 45-year-old harpy.
The Real State of the Union
Has Barack Obama learned nothing in three years? Last night, during his State of the Union address, he promised "a blueprint for an economy." But economies are crushed by blueprints. An economy is really nothing more than people participating in an unfathomably complex spontaneous network of exchanges aimed at improving their material circumstances. It can't even be diagrammed, much less planned. And any attempt at it will come to grief. Politicians like Obama believe they are the best judges of how we should conduct our lives. Of course a word like "blueprint" would occur to the president. He, like most who want his job, aspires to be the architect of a new society.
A Brass Age?
This may be the golden age of presumptuous ignorance. The most recent demonstrations of that are the Occupy Wall Street mobs. It is doubtful how many of these semi-literate sloganizers could tell the difference between a stock and a bond. Yet there they are, mouthing off about Wall Street on television, cheered on by politicians and the media. If this is not a golden age of presumptuous ignorance, perhaps it should be called a brass age. No one has more brass than the President of the United States, though his brass may be more polished than that of the Occupy Wall Street mobs. When Barack Obama speaks loftily about "investing in the industries of the future," does anyone ask: What in the world would qualify him to know what are the industries of the future?
Schools of Education
Larry Sand's article "No Wonder Johnny (Still) Can't Read" -- written for The John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy, based in Raleigh, N.C. -- blames schools of education for the decline in America's education. Education professors drum into students that they should not "drill and kill" or be the "sage on the stage" but instead be the "guide on the side" who "facilitates student discovery." This kind of harebrained thinking, coupled with multicultural nonsense, explains today's education. During his teacher education, Sand says, "teachers-to-be were forced to learn about this ethnic group, that impoverished group, this sexually anomalous group, that under-represented group, etc. -- all under the rubric of 'Culturally Responsive Education.'"
GPS Tracking and Other New Surveillance Technologies Threaten Privacy
"If you win this case," Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer told Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben during oral argument in U.S. v. Jones last fall, "there is nothing to prevent the police or the government from monitoring 24 hours a day the public movement of every citizen of the United States." That prospect, Breyer said, "sounds like '1984.'" Fortunately, the government did not win the case. But the court's unanimous decision, announced on Monday, may not delay Breyer's '1984' scenario for long. Unless the court moves more boldly to restrain government use of new surveillance technologies, the Framers' notion of a private sphere protected from "unreasonable searches and seizures" will become increasingly quaint.
Obama's Green Robber Barons
Had enough of fat cat Barack Obama, his jet-setting wife and his multi-millionaire Chicago consigliere/real-estate mogul Valerie Jarrett attacking the "rich"? Well, brace yourselves. You'll be hearing much more from the White House about the "wealthy few" who aren't paying their "fair share" as Obama's re-election campaign doubles down on class-war demagoguery. As usual, there's always a set of immunity charms for the privileged friends and family of the ruling class. When it comes to all the Green Robber Barons who've reaped an obscenely unfair share of billions of tax dollars from the Obama administration, the envy trumpeteers will be quieter than a nest of mute church mice.
Newtzilla Conquers All?
Newtzilla is back. Six weeks ago, during the last Newt Gingrich surge, I wrote here that "conventional weapons are useless against Newtzilla. ... Everything bad about Gingrich -- the flip-flops, the wives, the ego -- is known. Once voters have convinced themselves they can overlook that stuff, it's hard to change their minds simply by repeating it." For a while, it looked like I was wrong. The relentless artillery fire from Mitt Romney's "super PAC" seemed to have felled the gray-maned leviathan in the cornfields of Iowa. But as anyone who has studied the oeuvre of Toho Studios (makers of more than 25 Godzilla films) knows, this is what usually happens to the heroic creature in the second act.
Obama Creates Unconstitutional Monster at Fed
Did President Barack Obama's appointment of Richard Cordray to be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau without a Senate confirmation vote violate the Constitution? The answer is plainly yes. Article 2, Section 2 of the Constitution says the president "shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint ... Officers of the United States ... but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone (and) ... The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session."