Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Running on Empty
WASHINGTON -- Born during what is mistakenly called the debt-ceiling "debacle" last summer, the supercommittee may die without sending Congress a 10-year $1.2 trillion (at least) deficit-reduction plan. This is not properly labeled a failure. Committee Democrats demanded more revenues; Republicans offered $500 billion; Democrats responded with the one-syllable distillation of liberalism: "More!" So the committee has been a clarifying event that presages a larger one -- next November's elections. The messiness surrounding the debt-ceiling increase was what democracy looks like when belatedly confronting big problems. Remember, Barack Obama demanded, until doing so became politically untenable, a "clean" ceiling increase -- no supercommittee or other threat to his spending torrent.
Obama Has a Knack for Ticking off America's Friends
The election of Barack Obama, we were told, would bring new respect and friendship for America in the world. No longer would we be led by a Texas cowboy ignorant of and indifferent to world opinion. Instead, we would have a visionary leader sympathetic to the governments and peoples of the world. But Obama's best moments in foreign policy have been when he follows the leads of predecessors. In his twice-postponed trip to Australia this week, he will reportedly announce that a U.S. Navy base will be opened there.
Meet the New Newt Gingrich
While I poll and analyze the 2012 presidential race straight down the middle, an equal opportunity offender, I am in a unique position to explain who "the new" Newt Gingrich is, and why he is starting to race up to the top of national and various state polls. Having known Newt since I was 19, serving as a youthful debate advisor in 1980, a lawyer in recount elections, his campaign chairman from 1992 until he resigned from office and a client of his consulting group in his early years in business, I cover virtually every aspect of his adult life. I've known his daughters, his wives and his closest friends for nearly 32 years.
Puerto Rico's Revival
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- Since the congressional super committee appears unable, or unwilling, to take a lesson from Indiana or Virginia -- where Republican governors have made spending cuts and delivered budget surpluses without damaging the social safety net -- members might wish to consider Puerto Rico and what its governor, Luis Fortuno is doing. Fortuno is Puerto Rico's first Republican governor in 42 years. In 2009 when he took office, the U.S. territory had a $3.3 billion budget deficit. Three years earlier, Moody's Investors Service downgraded the commonwealth's bond rating to junk status while in deep recession.
Why Does America Defend the Weak and Small?
Recently, an open mic caught French President Nicolas Sarkozy and American President Barack Obama jointly trashing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Sarkozy scoffed, "I cannot stand him. He's a liar." Obama trumped that with, "You're fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day." In one of the most bizarre op-eds published by the New York Times in recent memory, Paul Kane suggested that the United States could literally sell out its support for democratic Taiwan for about a $1 trillion. He argued that the Chinese might be so thankful to us for letting them get their hands on the island that they might forgive much of what we owe them.
Handicapping the Contenders
I have now sat through all of the GOP debates and have come to a few conclusions. First, they should not be called debates. They are actually Meet the Candidates events. As such, they serve a useful purpose. But they are not debates. If they were, Newt Gingrich would have the nomination sewn up by this time. Unfortunately for the former Speaker of the House, the ability to speak quickly and coherently on a number of issues isn't enough.
A Little Hardball With Chris Matthews About John Kennedy
I just interviewed MSNBC "Hardball" host Chris Matthews about his new book, "Jack Kennedy: Elusive Hero." You know things didn't go well when, a few minutes after the interview concludes, Matthews' booker emails my producer: "I wish you would've let me know that Larry was planning on attacking Chris. Chris is always up for a good, healthy debate, but that was really not professional or cool."
Who Was Fred Ikle?
WASHINGTON -- The death of Fred Iklé last week inspires me to prophesy. Thus far, only the redoubtable Wall Street Journal has remarked on Fred's passing. That he was a formidable mind during the Cold War and important to the peaceful settlement of that decades-long struggle is remembered thanks to the Journal. Yet, to the rest of the media, he is a minor figure -- perhaps a menacing figure. We shall see what they say, but I am not holding my breath. This is the way liberalism creates the Kultursmog, which is to say, the politicized culture that surrounds us.
FDA Kills Smokers
"The FDA is responsible for protecting the public health." That's what the Food and Drug Administration tells us on its website. My intuition makes me grateful that the FDA is there to protect me -- to make sure that every drug is proven both safe and effective -- but "protection" kills people. Last week, I discussed how the FDA kills by keeping useful medical devices off the market. Now, we learn the FDA threatens the health of cigarette smokers who want to quit.
Poverty in America?
According to CBS News, "the number of people in the U.S. living in poverty in 2010 rose for the fourth year in a row, representing the largest number of Americans in poverty in the 52 years since such estimates have been published by the U.S. Census Bureau." MSNBC said, "The U.S. poverty rate remains among the highest in the developed world." Let's look at a few poverty facts.
NPR Versus 'Minstrel' Cain
National Public Radio proved a long time ago it disdains black conservatives. Remember when NPR's Nina Totenberg launched the unproven sexual harassment charges against Clarence Thomas? NPR doesn't even like black liberals who appear on Fox News: They canned Juan Williams. The sexual harassment charges against Herman Cain aren't ruining him as quickly as the media hoped, so on Nov. 11, NPR viciously attacked Cain for being an enemy of blacks and a "minstrel" to white conservatives. Reporter Karen Grigsby Bates began with Harvard Professor Randall Kennedy. "Black people know that if Herman Cain had his way, their lives would be diminished," he announced. "And they intuit that Herman Cain's policies are against their interests."
An Important New Book
A just released book, "Bowing to Beijing" by Brett M. Decker and William C. Triplett II, will change forever the way you think about China -- even if, like me, you already have the deepest worries about the Chinese threat. As I opened the book, I was expecting to find many useful examples of Chinese military and industrial efforts to get the better of the United States and the West. Indeed, there are 100 pages of examples of the most remorseless Chinese successes at stealing the military and industrial secrets of the West and converting them into a growing menace -- soon to be a leviathan -- bent on domination and defeat of America. The authors itemize the sheer, unprecedented magnitude of this effort. But the opening chapters dealt with human rights abuses, and my first thought as I started reading was that I wanted to get right to the military and industrial examples.
Upholding the Insurance Mandate Would Encourage Endless Meddling
A couple of months ago, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Beth Brinkmann was standing before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, defending the federal law requiring Americans to buy government-approved health insurance, when Judge Laurence Silberman asked her about broccoli. Specifically, he wanted to know whether a law requiring Americans to buy broccoli would exceed the federal government's authority to regulate interstate commerce. "No," Brinkmann said. "It depends," she added.
Under GOP House, Federal Debt Has Increased $6,766 Per Household
Since March 4, federal spending has no longer been a Democrat-only responsibility -- as it essentially was in the previous Congress. Since March 4, federal spending has been the result of a Republican-Democrat partnership.
Penn State: the Banality of Collaborative Evil
When the Israeli government captured Nazi mass murderer Adolf Eichmann, journalist Hannah Arendt was struck by the fact that Eichmann appeared to be a nondescript accountant type. He was not highly intelligent, and he did not appear to be particularly vicious. This led Arendt to the conclusion that anyone could, under the right ideological circumstances, become evil. Evil, she said, was banal. This was an exaggeration of the case. Eichmann was a willing executioner of Hitler's orders; he identified deeply with Hitler's anti-Semitism. He was not just a cog in the system, he was an active system-maker.
Is America Past Its Prime?
Are you glum about the nation's prospects? If so, you've got lots of company. According to a recent poll for The Hill, a Washington-based daily, 69 percent of American voters say the US is declining, and 83 percent of voters describe themselves as worried (49 percent say very worried) about the country's future. Worldwide, the Pew Research Center finds in a separate poll, "many now see the financially-strapped US as a great power in decline." Among respondents in 18 countries, 47 percent expect China to replace the United States as the world's leading power. Only 36 percent disagree.
In Debates, Newt Gingrich's Real Target Is Obama
He's baaack! Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich is back in the saddle after falling off his horse at the starting line. At least according to one poll (Public Policy Polling), Gingrich is actually the GOP front-runner. Many say it's simply Gingrich's turn to be the not-Mitt contender, now that Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain have had their chances.
Obama's Half-Billion-Dollar Crony Drug Deal
What do you get when you mix Democratic fat-cat donations, Big Labor favors, pharmaceutical lobbying and Beltway business as usual? Answer: another toxic half-billion-dollar Barack Obama-approved crony deal. Move over, Solyndra. Here comes Siga-Gate. This latest Chicago-style payoff on your dime involves a dubious smallpox drug backed by a liberal billionaire investor, along with a former union boss who was one of the White House's most frequent visitors. They're the "1 percent" with 100 percent immunity from the selectively outraged Occupier mobs that purport to oppose partisan government bailouts and handouts to privileged corporations.
Does a Full-Time Homemaker Swap Her Mind for a Mop?
I periodically write and regularly broadcast about male-female issues because I want to help men and women, especially husbands and wives, get along better. But I have developed a secondary reason: to elicit left-wing reactions. They reveal an enormous amount about how the left thinks. For example, one of the biggest left-wing websites (Daily Kos) wrote that "Dennis Prager advocates marital rape." Why? Because I wrote a column in which I suggested that if a woman loves her husband, and if he is a loving and good man, she might not want to be guided solely by "mood" in deciding whether and when to have sex with him.
The High Court and Obamacare
As anticipated, the U. S. Supreme Court will join 300 million fellow Americans in rendering judgment on Obamacare. But with this difference: The high court's judgment, expected next June, will be the judgment that sticks.