Right Opinion

Doing More By Doing Less

Stop Obama's Attack on Christianity

President Obama wants Israel to revert to the pre-1967 borders. That would mean handing some of Christianity's most sacred sites over to the Palestinian government, which for all intents is controlled by one of the world's most radical terrorist organizations, Hamas. Do you want them to control some of the most sacred sites of our Christian history? I didn't think so.

Forgotten Stars

Three recent sports biographies -- two about baseball stars Stan Musial and Hank Greenberg, and another about boxing great Joe Louis -- are not only interesting in themselves, but also recall an era that now seems as irretrievably past as the Roman Empire. They also raise questions about who is remembered and why. The St. Louis Cardinals' great hitter Stan Musial was one of those stars who dominated his era in the 1940s and 1950s, and yet is almost forgotten today, even among baseball fans. Mention baseball in the 1940s and 1950s, and the names that come to mind immediately are Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio.

Shovel-Ready in the Middle East?

Osama bin Laden famously said that people in his region always follow the strong horse. President Obama sent bin Laden to sleep with the sturgeons earlier this year in a move widely hailed. No one but the michaelmoores complained that bin Laden hadn't been given a Miranda warning or carped that our faithful friends, the Pakistanis, hadn't been tipped off first.

Send in the Clowns

Recently, Jon Stewart found himself in the unenviable position of having people questioning whether or not he's a racist. The truth is, he had nobody to blame but himself because, employing an accent unheard since the days of "Amos 'n' Andy," he mocked Herman Cain. I'm proud to say that I wasn't one of those who questioned him. That's because I believed the answer was self-evident. He's a liberal, after all. Therefore, he promotes affirmative action, proving that, like the political party to which he pledges allegiance, he regards blacks as mentally inferior, incapable of competing academically with Caucasians and Asians. If that's not racism, what is?

From The Comedy Store

The Wall Street Journal reported that American kids failed a recent U.S. history test given nationwide. It's appalling. Three-fourths of American kids knew that we gained our independence from Great Britain but no one knew the date we lost our independence to China.

TLC'S Lobbying Show

Some "reality shows" are designed to advertise wanton misbehavior and stupidity for its own sake. There's no "life lesson," just an exercise in how you can grade your own moral worth on a "Jersey Shore" curve. That is not the case with TLC's "Sister Wives." For TLC (The Learning Channel, a misnomer demanding initials only), it was the usual slam-dunk oddball premise: Won't people be curious to see how four wives -- married to the same man -- get along in the same house? The show's stars, Kody Brown and his wives, want much more than fame and fortune. They want to make polygamy respectable, even legalized. The show was a surprise hit for TLC, drawing an average of 2.2 million viewers over Season 1 last fall. The polygamists have recognized the power of pop culture -- particularly television -- and are pouncing to normalize this abhorrent behavior.

Republican Courtship of the Jews

"The Merchant of Venice" is back and plays for relevance, just in time for 2012. The Shakespeare drama is staged in the nation's capital, set in a troubled America struggling with cultural extravagance in New York City before the Great Depression. Al Pacino stars in a movie version, inviting reflection on the ambiguities of prejudice and greed, as familiar in 21st century Washington as 16th century Venice. There's enough corruption depicted in the play to indict an entire wasteful society. The famous "pound of flesh" is but a metaphor for all kinds of excesses of thinking and action. Anti-Semitism is only a part of it.

Republican Show-and-Tell

A lot of conservatives are having fun at President Obama's expense after his latest gaffe. In the midst of testy debt-limit negotiations, Obama told House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, "Don't call my bluff." The first rule in bluffing is to keep it a secret that you're bluffing. So, technically speaking, that's like a con man saying, "Don't give any weight to the fact that I'm lying." And while I do think Obama is not telling the truth about a great number of things, conservatives should look closer to home if they want to criticize impolitic truth-telling.

Call His Bluff

WASHINGTON -- President Obama is demanding a big long-term budget deal. He won't sign anything less, he warns, asking, "If not now, when?" How about last December, when he ignored his own debt commission's recommendations? How about February, when he presented a budget that increases debt by $10 trillion over the next decade? How about April, when he sought a debt-ceiling increase with zero debt reduction attached?

GOP: Please Do Call His Bluff and Man Your Battle Stations

Ordinarily, I'd have difficulty grasping the magnitude of arrogance driving President Obama in budget negotiations that could determine the survival of our nation, but after several painful years of observation, I've come to expect it from him. Obama's personality type does not well handle opposition, so when House Majority Leader Eric Cantor refused to budge on Obama's unreasonable demand that the GOP agree to raise taxes during these economic hard times, which would not raise revenues, Obama blew up and "stormed out of the room."

'It's What We Do'

WASHINGTON -- Few of us ever will meet a Medal of Honor recipient. Fewer still ever will have the opportunity to be of assistance to one. In part, that's because "The Medal" -- our nation's highest military decoration, awarded for "conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of life above and beyond the call of duty" -- is worn by just 85 living Americans. Since we were attacked on 9/11, the Medal of Honor has been awarded only nine times to the more than 2 million Americans who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq. Army Sgt. 1st Class Paul Smith, Marine Cpl. Jason Dunham, Navy SEALs Lt. Michael Murphy and Petty Officer 2nd Class Michael Monsoor, Army Spc. Ross McGinnis, Army Sgt. 1st Class Jared Monti and Army Staff Sgt. Robert Miller all received the recognition posthumously.

The Expanding Catalogue of Obamacare Fables

Is there a health insurance horror story disseminated by the White House and its allies that ever turned out to be true? Obamacare advocates have exercised more artistic license than a convention of Photoshoppers. Now, a prominent sob story shilled by President Obama himself about his own mother is in doubt. It's high past time to call their bluffs. The tall-tale-teller-in-chief cited mom Stanley Ann Dunham's deathbed fight with her insurer several times over the years to support his successful push to ban pre-existing condition exclusions by insurers. In a typical recounting, Obama shared his personalized trauma during a 2008 debate: "For my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they're saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don't have to pay her treatment, there's something fundamentally wrong about that."

Who's Irresponsible?

Count on it: In the coming days and weeks, Republicans will be accused -- not just by Democrats, but by the chattering class that includes some self-styled conservatives -- of wild irresponsibility regarding the nation's fiscal health. It isn't that Republicans are models of rectitude on the subject -- see the Bush deficits. And it's true that some Republicans, like Americans for Tax Reform's Grover Norquist, have fetishized their opposition to taxes to the point where they defend pot-valiantly even tax subsidies such as those for ethanol. It's enough to make you think they're drinking the stuff. Still, when it comes to chaperoning America toward bankruptcy, the Democrats have no peers.

Drop in Illegal Immigration Opens Door for Real Reform

With unemployment rising and a U.S. debt-crisis looming, Americans haven't had much good news lately. But there is one bright spot on the policy front: Illegal immigration from Mexico has virtually stopped. Less than a decade ago, a half-million Mexicans were coming to the U.S. illegally every year, accounting for 60 percent of all illegal immigration. But last year, fewer than 100,000 Mexicans crossed the border illegally or overstayed their visas. And it appears that an even greater number of Mexican illegal immigrants left the U.S., resulting in a net reduction in the number of Mexican illegal immigrants living here.

New Reality Emerging on Illegal Immigration

The United States is a country that has been peopled largely by vast surges of migration -- from the British Isles in the 18th century, from Ireland and Germany in the 19th century, from Eastern and Southern Europe in the early 20th century, and from Latin America and Asia in the last three decades. Going back in history, almost no one predicted that these surges of migration would begin -- and almost no one predicted that they would stop when they did.

One President Left Behind: McConnell Schools Obama on Debt

Democrats don't want to cut any government spending programs, not now, not ever. The country is on a high-speed bullet train to bankruptcy (the only kind of bullets liberals approve of), and the Democrats' motto is: Spend! Spend! Spend! Democrats are at an advantage in the "should the U.S. go bankrupt or not?" debate because, based on their economic policies so far, they obviously favor bankruptcy.

Republicans Must Vote Against Raising Debt Ceiling or Face Political Annihilation

The Republicans surged to majority status in the U.S. House of Representatives in November 2010 thanks in large part to the support of many independent voters who shifted their allegiance to the GOP. But the party's candidates risk losing that support, and also losing the voter intensity and enthusiasm they would otherwise likely enjoy in November 2012, if congressional Republicans sign on to any legislative scheme that raises the federal debt ceiling. It's just that simple.

Ten Reasons Why Even American Liberals Should Root for the GOP

1) Incredibly weak recovery: President Barack Obama's tax/spend/regulation policy -- "stimulus"; continuation of TARP; bank, insurance company and auto industry bailouts; "quantitative easing" (aka the printing of money); cash for clunkers; minimum wage hikes; new regulatory rules on businesses; tripling of the deficit; addition of $4 trillion to the debt -- failed miserably to produce jobs and grow the economy at the historical rate expected after a deep recession. 2) ObamaCare: President Barack Obama promised it would "bend the cost curve" and that "if you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you will be able to keep your health care plan." The chief Medicare actuary said neither of those claims is true. Two-thirds of doctors believe that ObamaCare will lower the quality of health care.

Obama's Debt Ceiling 'Grand Bargain' No Such Thing

President Barack Obama has billed his "grand bargain" as the adult compromise because it has something for everyone to hate. The package would raise the $14 trillion debt ceiling (which the public hates), raise taxes by $1 trillion (which Republicans hate) and cut spending by $3 trillion (which Democrats hate) over 10 years. As the president argued in Monday's news conference, it's time for Washington to eat its peas. The administration is under the gun to raise the debt ceiling before Wall Street gets spooked, ratings agencies downgrade the nation's credit rating and interest rates go up. Thus, there is a problem with the Obama approach. Sure, it scores well in Washington's 24/7 blame game. But in a town where measures need a majority vote to pass, it's usually a lot harder to pass a measure that raises taxes.