December 2009

The Washington Post reported on Tuesday, Dec. 29: "Abdulmutallab remains in a Detroit area prison and has restricted his cooperation since securing a defense attorney, according to federal officials. Authorities are holding out hope that he will change his mind and cooperate with the inquiry, the…

The road to power in Berlin starts in Kabul. This, in essence, appears to be the German left-wing SPD party's new political maxim just three months after they lost the Bundestag elections and were kicked out of Chancellor Merkel's Grand Coalition government. With the SPD in opposition for the first…

Yesterday the Washington Post reported, three paragraphs from the end of a piece on the intelligence failures that led to the Christmas Day attack, that Abdulmutallab remains in a Detroit area prison and, after initial debriefings by the FBI, has restricted his cooperation since securing a defense…

Did the Obama administration, by releasing Qais and Laith Qazali and more than 100 members of the Iranian-backed Asaib al Haq, violate an executive order put in place by President Ronald Reagan to prevent negotiations with hostage takers? Senators Jeff Sessions and Jon Kyl asked that very question…

Anyone who reads Tom Joscelyn's work here on the blog or in the magazine knows that he has a freakish, Beautiful Mind-like ability to connect the terrorist dots and recall the most bizarre details of any one terrorist's dossier. So when ABC posted a major scoop that that the Christmas Day bomber…

The WSJ covers taxes and incentives. The death tax is going to die tonight, so family members and sick patients are trying hard to stay alive until Jan. 1. What will this story look like next year? "Just because I don't want my kids paying off national debts for their entire lives doesn't mean I'm…

The British are all smiles over the release of Peter Moore, a British citizen who was held hostage by an Iranian-backed Shia terror group in Iraq. But there is little talk about the price paid to secure Moore's release. The US military has freed Qais Qazali, the leader of the Asaib al Haq, or…

A Republican hasn't won a Massachusetts Senate race since 1972, but Sean Trende writes at Real Clear Politics that GOP State Sen. Scott Brown has a better chance of pulling off an upset in the January 19 special election than you'd think. Trende takes the average swing in the Virginia and New…

CBS news correspondent Bob Orr spoke with Harry Smith on Wednesday. Here is part of their exchange (emphasis added): Smith: We are starting to learn a lot more about this radical imam, Awlaki, who is actually born in the United States. Tell us. 

Orr: It's actually frightening, Harry. U.S.…

Patrick Ruffini, who is always worth reading, has a trenchant post today on the upcoming special election in Massachusetts to fill Ted Kennedy's seat. (Disclosure: As Ruffini points out, his company "provides some online services" for the Brown campaign.) Ruffini's bottom line: "If Brown wins,…

On Monday I posted a question from a friend and suggested Scott Rasmussen might want to put that question to the American public. Here's the question as it was emailed to me: Do you think most Americans prefer that this guy is A) Watching cable tv is a warm cell funded by taxpayers and enjoying his…

Obama doesn't like to challenge the legitimacy of despots, thus the repeated calls for a relationship with Iran based on "mutual respect" and the use of the regime's preferred name, the Islamic Republic. But Ray Takeyh, who served in the Obama State Department as an aide to Dennis Ross on Iran…

President Obama and his players have spent six months praying for the nascent revolution in Iran to go away, pursuing what Fouad Ajami describes today as a cold-blooded foreign policy. Some of them who should know better have likely admitted the truth to themselves during 2 AM night-sweat sessions:…

White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer writes, "POLITICO reported that, before it even becomes law, opponents of health care reform - including former House Speaker Newt Gingrich - are already talking about repealing it. Certainly there is a fundamental disagreement here, since many…

An intriguing name has surfaced in the worldwide investigation into Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's life. That name is Moazzam Begg, and it is a name that is well known to those left-wing journalists and human rights lawyers who take everything former Gitmo detainees say at face…

A couple of weeks ago, amidst the prolonged drama surrounding Senate passage of the Democrats' health care bill, House Democrats unveiled another major policy initiative for 2010--a renewed effort to pass comprehensive immigration reform.

I'm home in northwestern Wisconsin (aka Real America) this week. When I've talked with friends and family (even Obama-voting ones) about the failed Christmas Day terrorist attack, the security failure most astounding to them is that although Abdulmutallab was on the terrorist watch list because his…

The AP's "analysis" pieces are the most feared pieces in Washington -- for good reason. Ambassador Huntsman sucks up to Obama in an interview with the New Yorker. If "reset" means resurrecting an arms race, I guess hitting the reset button has worked. Marc Thiessen beats up on Josh Marshall. Andy…

That's the way things seem to be headed. As we pointed out last night, administration officials have been saying (on background, of course) that the president "intends to demand accountability at the highest levels." Presumably, accountability means someone is going to get fired. And if someone got…

Rasmussen's health-care polling results since Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid orchestrated the Christmas Eve vote are full of undeniably bad news for Democrats. In roughly ascending order of bad news (if one is a Democrat)... Likely voters oppose Obamacare by more than the (18-point) margin by…

All of a sudden everyone is matter-of-factly pointing out that Gitmo detainees shouldn't be sent back to Yemen anytime soon, but nothing has changed in Yemen because of al Qaeda's Christmas Day attack. The attack has just highlighted what was already obvious to people who knew better but ignored…

The Obama apologists are pushing back at the cascade of justified criticism by attacking Republican Senator Jim DeMint for placing a hold on Obama's nominee to head TSA, Erroll Southers. DeMint is concerned Southers would support the unionization of TSA screeners. There's no evidence that having…

For a few Bundestag members who were visiting Washington earlier this month, whether they were on Capitol Hill or at the State Department, the question they heard most often was whether or not Germany would be increasing its troop strength in Afghanistan. "It's understandable," said Stephan Mayer,…

On Sunday the administration told us "the system worked." On Monday, the president said it merely failed to prevent an "isolated extremist." By Tuesday, though, the president acknowledged a "systemic failure" and two administration officials told CNN that this was a conspiracy so vast we were…

Unable to defend themselves on the merits, the administration and Democratic leaders are trying to change the topic to blaming Bush and Republicans. This is pathetic. First of all, Obama is president. He has been for almost a year. Whatever mistakes Bush did or didn't make, Obama is in charge --…

Michelle Cottle makes a pretty strong case here that the president's golf habit is starting to get in the way of his job. Marc Ambinder wrote a ludicrous post over the weekend, now coming in for some much deserved ridicule, titled "Why the President Went Golfing Today." In it Ambinder defended,…

The AP reports: A man tried to board a commercial airliner in Mogadishu last month carrying powdered chemicals, liquid and a syringe that could have caused an explosion in a case bearing chilling similarities to the terrorist plot to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner, officials told The Associated…

Josh Rogin has the story at the Cable: Jide Zeitlin, the Obama administration's nominee to be America's point man for financial reform at the United Nations, has withdrawn himself from consideration for the job, an administration official tells The Cable. Zeitlin, a former Goldman Sachs executive…

The White House/DNC pushback against the mounting criticism of Obama's handling of the al Qaeda Christmas attack focuses on Shoe Bomber Richard Reid, and of course Bush, and how Bush got it easier than Obama and how come Bush didn't get raked over the coals for this, etc. etc. etc. Last night Keep…

Buried three paragraphs from the end of the report in today's Washington Post comes what ought to be the lede: Abdulmutallab remains in a Detroit area prison and, after initial debriefings by the FBI, has restricted his cooperation since securing a defense attorney, according to federal officials.…

It's worth reading (don't worry, it's short) Janet Napolitano's op-ed in USA Today. As if to confirm Dick Cheney's claim that the Obama administration doesn't understand we're at war, Napolitano never uses the word...war. Nor does she mention Islam, Yemen or Nigeria -- nor any of the details of the…

With President Barack Obama's year-end deadline to Iran just one day away, the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler reports that the Obama administration is preparing "targeted sanctions" on Iran. But with an asterisk. Ten months after President Obama set a year-end deadline for Iran to engage with…

Coming on the heels of a joint statement from Senators Lieberman, McCain, and Graham, this is another serious blow to the administration's plan to overcome a key hurdle to closing Gitmo, i.e. what to do with all the Yemenis who can't be tried and can't be resettled anywhere else than their home…

No sense wasting too much of this year-end report on what you already know. The financial sector is back from the brink; the largest banks are able to raise capital and earnings sufficiently to repay their government bail-out loans and have enough left over for generous bonuses. Share prices have…

As soon as Obama came out for that second press conference, you knew that there were going to be some new revelations. Now the avalanche begins -- and so do the questions... "It now appears that weeks ago this information was passed to a component of our intelligence community but was not…

Press reports have hinted at it for several days, but now the media has just come out and reported it: The same al Qaeda cleric who advised the Fort Hood shooter also counseled Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab - the Christmas Day bomber.   Here is Victor Morton in the Washington Times: The Nigerian…

So say the Iranians. Of course, they'd probably say anything right now to try and get back just a little bit of the international legitimacy that the regime has been bleeding with each video of Iranian protesters being murdered in the streets. Still, ever since Josh Rogin first floated the rumor…

John Yoo's interview with the New York Times is full of good one-liners. After explaining that he's never met either Bush or Cheney, the interviewer seems to think she's got the upper hand. "So you're saying you were just one notch above an intern, you and Monica Lewinsky?" Yoo's response, "She was…

Yes, he is a marginal figure even within his own party, and yes he's announced he's retiring in 2010 and will not seek another term, but this al Jazeera interview with Rep. Brian Baird (D-WA) is another reminder that what anti-Israel sentiment exists in Congress is confined largely to the…

obama bow emperor.jpg

Steyn: Government can't just annex "one-sixth of the U.S. economy" (i.e., the equivalent of annexing the entire British or French economy or annexing the entire Indian economy twice over) and then just say: "OK, what's next? On to cap-and-trade." Nations that governmentalize health care soon find…

AFP reports: Mr Obama began his golf round after a press conference earlier in the day, when he vowed an all-out pursuit of plotters of a failed Christmas Day bombing of a US-bound airliner, vowing "we will not rest" until they are captured and tried. HT: Keep America Safe

Politico's Carol E. Lee has an interesting story today on President Obama's "by-now familiar pattern...for dealing with unexpected problems." As best we can figure, the Obama damage control strategy consists of these 5 easy steps: Step 1: Deny seriousness of issue. Step 2: Deny any admin…

Rasmussen reports: The good news for Senator Ben Nelson is that he doesn't have to face Nebraska voters until 2012. If Governor Dave Heineman challenges Nelson for the Senate job, a new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey shows the Republican would get 61% of the vote while Nelson would get just…

I don't know why this "senior administration official" needed to say it on background if the administration is so committed to closing GItmo, and if the official really believes what he's saying: Closing the Guantanamo Bay detention facility remains "a national security imperative" despite a news…

Max Boot argues in the Washington Post today against what is fast becoming one of the most controversial restrictions on international forces in Afghanistan -- the 96 hour limit on holding prisoners before being forced to transfer them to Afghan custody. Boot says allied forces should opt-out of…

Gabe Schoenfeld writes in the Los Angeles Times: The case of the alleged Christmas bomber, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, is being called a massive intelligence failure. And the evidence thus far does suggest a possible lapse in the government's management of terrorist watch lists. But if so, the blame…

The quote of the day, from Democrat Diane Feinstein: "I'd rather, in the interest of protecting people, overreact rather than underreact." An amused veteran of the Bush administration emails: Interesting--sounds like a pithy summary of the Bush approach to the War on Terror. I don't recall hearing…

Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has now claimed responsibility for the Christmas Day terrorist attack on a Detroit-bound airliner. This is yet another indication, on top of the would-be bomber's own admissions and other evidence linking him to al Qaeda operatives in Yemen, that al Qaeda…

Earlier today, the President emerged from his Hawaii vacation to discuss the failed terror attack last week.  He also raised the protests that occurred in recent days in Iran, saying: "The United States joins with the international community in strongly condemning the violent and unjust…

After three days of radio silence from our Nobel laureate president on al Qaeda's attempted Christmas Day Massacre, President Obama finally felt compelled to get off the beach and make a statement. Nearly two hours before that, the White House issued a statement responding to an hours old news…

A friend emails a question Scott Rasmussen might want to poll: Do you think most Americans prefer that this guy is A) Watching cable tv is a warm cell funded by taxpayers and enjoying his right to remain silent (i.e, BHO reality); or B) At an undisclosed location being waterboarded to learn about…

Iran and terrorists on the docket for 3 p.m. Eastern: "This morning, soon after 10:00 a.m. HST, the President will address the public on the attempted terrorist attack on Christmas Day. He will describe the immediate steps the government has taken to ensure the safety of the traveling public. He…

I didn't get too worked up about the ridiculous appointment of Hannah Rosenthal to serve as the Obama administration's anti-Semitism czar because, frankly, nobody cares what the anti-Semitism czar says or does (unless they say or do something stupid, and of course Rosenthal has now done just that).…

chris-dodd.jpg Welcome home, Senator! Dodd is facing a tough re-election bid and at least one man at Bradley International Airport let him know just how tough it will be. "You're not gonna get re-elected," the man said. "Nice. Merry Christmas," Dodd responded. Indeed, is it so much to ask that the…

CBS reports: CBS News has learned the State Department system designed to keep track of active U.S. visas twice failed to reveal Nigerian terror suspect Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab had been issued an active visa allowing him multiple entries into the United States. According to a law enforcement…

With three terrorist attacks against the homeland over the last year that trace back, at least partly, to Yemen, this recent report by Richard Fontaine and Andrew Exum at the Center for a New American Security is a must-read. Fontaine until recently was Senator John McCain's foreign policy adviser…

Nope, Tom Friedman, cap-and-trade is not like insurance: "Presumably, Friedman assumes that the proposed palliatives of cap'n'tax or carbon taxes meet that criterion, but he doesn't do the calculations for us, because he can't. Warm mongers like him propose to spend trillions of dollars now to…

Between authoritarian brutality in Iran, and a dysfunctional homeland security bureaucracy that punishes passengers after failing to prevent an attempted terrorist plot, America needs a laugh. Luckily, we have Dave Barry. Be sure to read his annual year in review. Sample: With public support for…

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded the obvious this morning: "WASHINGTON (AP) - Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded Monday that the aviation security system failed when a young man on a watchlist with a U.S. visa in his pocket and a powerful explosive hidden on…

Less than two weeks after the Fort Hood shooting, a man who was identified as Anwar al Awlaki spoke through an intermediary with the Washington Post. Awlaki, of course, has been tied to Major Nidal Malik Hasan. Numerous published reports have cited Awlaki's emails with Hasan in the months prior to…

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano on CNN yesterday: "One thing I'd like to point out is that the system worked." And then with some slight modification on ABC: "[O]nce the incident occurred, the system worked." Well, perhaps Napolitano was told that if she'd like her direct deposit…

The Washington Post reported yesterday that "Abdulmutallab was charged Saturday in U.S. District Court for Eastern Michigan with attempting to destroy an aircraft and with placing a destructive device onboard a plane, each of which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. U.S. District Judge Paul…

Reappraising the Right

If you're any kind of writer--if you're any kind of reader, for that matter--you know there are things that words want to do. Oh, we speak with them and write with them and read with them, often enough, using them as clumsy rocks to hammer out the rough meanings and crude messages we need for…

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Like cancer, ideas can metastasize. In 2007, John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt--the former a professor at the University of Chicago, the latter at Harvard--came out with The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. A "situation [that] has no equal in American history" had arisen, they wrote in the…

Man Ray, African Art, and the Modernist Lens

Last spring, in an interview with 60 Minutes, Barack Obama criticized his predecessor over the detainees at Guantánamo Bay. That wasn't new. What was surprising was one of the arguments the president made. When Steve Kroft pointed out that some of those released had been working to recruit others…

Charles Darwin

In the past year, exposure of significant jihadist recruitment inside the United States has left Americans worried that "homegrown terrorism" may become a serious threat. Eight years after the atrocities of September 11, 2001, media and government appear stunned by the upsurge of jihad incidents in…

This year marked the 250th anniversary of the death of George Frideric Handel (1685-1759), and musical hallelujahs rang out around the world, as choral societies, professional and amateur, trotted out the warhorse oratorios, and opera houses not only presented the now-standard works (Alcina,…

This month's issue of The Wrestler magazine features a long, engaging interview with "Ivan Koloff" (born Jim Perras). Ten years ago Mr. Koloff figured prominently in a WEEKLY STANDARD cover story, Paul Cantor's "Pro Wrestling and the End of History" (October 4, 1999). Describing wrestling's…

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive--at least if you were Valéry Marie René Georges Giscard d'Estaing. The one-term president of France was awarded the job in 2002 of chairing the convention responsible for designing a constitution for the European Union. He compared his fellow delegates--a…

Midland, Michigan

The climate campaign, built step-by-step over the last 20 years, has reached its Waterloo. The Copenhagen conference that ended Friday was an exercise in political theater. It not only failed to produce a binding agreement, but the potential emissions curbs it endorsed fall far below what climate…

The Iranian people are once again in what, at least to the outside world, seems just short of full-scale revolt. Some dramatic video out of Iran today, none more so than this violent four-minute clip showing a crowd of people cutting down three men that are being hanged in the street by some kind…

We've noticed some fairly bizarre twitterings from the official feed for the U.S. Army's Africa Command. Among them is a tweet sending @USArmyAfrica followers to an article on the website of truther in chief Alex Jones titled "Foiled Terrorist Bombing in Detroit: An Excuse to Expand the Bogus War…

On CNN this morning, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said that prior to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's attempt to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day, "the system worked." As recounted by Politico's Jonathan Martin, she then added that there was "no suggestion that…

The would-be bomber of Delta flight 253, Abdul Farouk Umar Abdulmutallab, appears to have been acting in concert with al Qaeda elements in Yemen. The Obama administration's plan to close Gitmo hinges on sending some 100 Yemeni terrorists back to their country of origin where they will be…

From the article now up on the Washington Post website: "But authorities are -- for now -- operating on the theory that he acted alone, according to an American law enforcement source. "'At this point, there's nothing to suggest that he was part of a wider conspiracy involving others,' said the…

We are still in the early hours of the investigation into an attempted terrorist attack on a Detroit-bound flight leaving Amsterdam. So, any analysis at this point is by definition preliminary. Be that as it may, here are some initial observations and questions. The first question that will be…

About a month and a half ago we noted that President Obama's choice to serve as the administration's "anti-Semitism czar" was Hannah Rosenthal, a J Street board member who had herself been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League. Being rebuked by the ADL (and being a J Streeter) did not bode well…

TPM reports: With Democratic senators united on the health care bill today, their campaign arm has settled on an attack plan for 2010: Republicans would "repeal" it if they win control. The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, aggressively challenging incumbent GOP senators and vying for open…

In the generous and forgiving spirit of Christmas, let me recommend an article from The Huffington Post. It's an interesting piece by Miles Mogulescu, on "The Democrats' Authoritarian Health 'Reform' Bill and the Ascendency of Corporatism in the Democratic Party," and suggests an increasing degree…

From the Washington Post: Yemeni forces killed at least 30 suspected militants in an air strike early Thursday morning on an alleged al-Qaeda hide-out in southeastern Yemen, the second such assault in the past week, according to Yemeni security and government sources. The strike appeared to target…

Democratic Rep. Parker Griffith of Alabama handed Republicans an early Christmas present this week, announcing on Tuesday he was switching parties and joining the GOP. And while President Obama's holiday wish list is still a state secret, hidden somewhere deep in the Oval Office, Mr. Parker's…

The Washington Independent's David Weigel writes: There is a right way to cover Sarah Palin and her PR strategy. Greg Sargent, Ben Smith and Matt Gertz double-check Palin's claim (made on Facebook) that her infamous "death panel" post was a "metaphor" for how health care would be denied to the old…

Remember when the left went hysterical, er, became more hysterical than usual, when Sarah Palin used the phrase "real America"? Harry Reid's office just sent out his remarks with the subject line: REID: REAL PEOPLE UNDERSTAND THE URGENCY FOR HEALTH REFORM So, according to Harry Reid, only 36…

Is Rep. Louise Slaughter serious, or is she just trying to get some leverage so she can get her own kickbacks? "Supporters of the weak Senate bill say 'just pass it -- any bill is better than no bill,'" Slaughter wrote. "I strongly disagree -- a conference report is unlikely to sufficiently bridge…

Robert J. Lieber and Amatzia Baram in Foreign Policy, on the Iranian threat: "Contrary to the assessments of those who foresee a best case scenario of stable deterrence, a nuclear-armed Iran will usher in a new era of instability in the Middle East -- with consequences that nobody can accurately…

In remarks on Monday, President Obama said: The Congressional Budget Office now reports that this bill will reduce our deficit by $132 billion over the first decade, and by as much as $1.3 trillion in the decade after that. So I just want to be clear, for all those who are continually carping about…

Last week a federal judge in Georgia ruled that legally carrying a concealed firearm is grounds for being detained by police. 

In the case in question, Christopher Raissi, who has a concealed carry license, was spotted by police holstering a firearm as he exited his car and headed toward a…

Save a "specialist in sustainable living" or the dog? No contest. Even if it turned out to be not the usual ginned-up bogus climate pre-apocalypticism being peddled as science by the world's eco-terrorists (in this case, two sustainable-living specialists from New Zealand), but rather a true fact…

The New York Times reports: Rebuffed this month by skeptical lawmakers when it sought finances to buy a prison in rural Illinois, the Obama administration is struggling to come up with the money to replace the Guantánamo Bay prison. As a result, officials now believe that they are unlikely to close…

Sarah Palin takes aim at the health care bill's provision to make it out of order for future Congresses to repeal or amend the section creating the Independent Medicare Advisory Board, which, writes Palin "is a panel of bureaucrats charged with cutting health care costs on the backs of patients -…

A TWS reader e-mails: "Hey Mr. Kristol, is there some supersecret plot to ignore the Massachusetts Senatorial election scheduled for JANUARY 19, where an actual REPUBLICAN has a chance to become the 41ST member of the Republican caucus, which might find it in its interest to...persuade a certain…

On Wednesday morning, Beijing time -- Tuesday evening EST -- Liu Xiaobo, the writer and activist, will be put on trial for "inciting state subversion." The trial date was announced last weekend and the timing is not accidental. Many top envoys from democratic countries are away observing the…

Senate leaders Reid and McConnell have agreed that the first order of business when they get back will be to take up, on January 20th, the debt limit increase needed for next year (they'll pass a small-$290 billion!-increase Thursday to tide them over for a month). The agreement allows for several…

Nidal Hasan's lawyer complains his client's religious rights are being violated by a requirement that "all communication during visits be in English or be delayed until an interpreter is present." The Fort Hood jihadi was engaging in an Arabic prayer session over the phone--something we assume (or…

What becomes of the end-of-year sanctions deadline, set down--together with all of brave UN-ified Europe--by Mr. Obama's towering foreign-policy geniuses to incentivize the Iranians to lay down their arms, now that that country's illegitimate president has thrown down the gauntlet instead? "We told…

Gregg Easterbrook: Only in Washington could you have one guy calling the running plays (Sherman Smith), another guy calling the passing plays (Sherman Lewis) and a third guy calling the fourth-down plays (Jim Zorn). Maybe what the Redskins need is an even more top-heavy coaching staff -- a guy who…

Cost writes: Bottom line: while we shouldn't expect any MSM pundit discussions about how Griffith's departure is a sign of the "narrowing" of the Democratic Party, this is still a noteworthy development. Just as the Republican Party's rightward and Southern shift has placed a burden on moderate…

Virginia Governor Tim Kaine took a surprise call on WTOP this morning:

CBN's David Brody has the transcript of President Obama talking on Monday to schoolchildren at The Boys and Girls Club in Washington D.C.: THE PRESIDENT: I think one thing that's important to remember is that, even though there's a lot of fun at Christmas, you know, you got -- especially when it's…

Two Miami-based members of Congress revoke their endorsements: Lincoln and Mario Diaz-Balart have pulled their endorsement of Gov. Charlie Crist for the U.S. Senate. Lincoln offered few details as to why, just that Crist had "left us no alternative and he knows why."

Via Ed Morrissey, this is why Obama, Pelosi, and Reid have to lie and say there's no taxpayer-funding of abortion in the health care bill: As the Senate prepares to vote on health care reform, American voters "mostly disapprove" of the plan 53 - 36 percent and disapprove 56 - 38 percent of…

A Senate aide writes in an email that it appears that Harry Reid slipped in the provision to make it out of order for future Congresses to amend or repeal the Medicare cutting legislation after the bill was passed by the Finance Committee: The Independent Advisory Board for Medicare was under…

Politico has the scoop: POLITICO has learned that Rep. Parker Griffith, a freshman Democrat from Alabama, will announce today that he's switching parties to become a Republican. According to two senior GOP aides familiar with the decision, the announcement will take place this afternoon in…

The Senate continues to advance its version of health care reform. Final Passage is expected by Christmas Eve. The American Medical Association endorsed the Senate bill. Meanwhile, a new Quinnipiac poll shows voters disapproving of health care reform by 53 percent to 36 percent. Maybe that's why…

I've assumed for the last couple of days that the Democrats would succeed in passing the health care bill, and that our job was to make sure it turned out to be a Pyrrhic victory. Now I'm not so sure the legislation can't still be derailed. Two reasons: First: the reaction to the deal-making. One…

In a blow to Republicans, Rudy Giuliani announced today that he won't run for the Senate seat currently held by Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand. This, despite polls showing Giuliani defeating Gillibrand. Giuliani's decision doesn't mean the Republicans have no chance of taking the seat once held by…

At least one industry is thriving these days.

Backlash: a strong or violent reaction, as to some social or political change.

Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) pointed out some rather astounding language in the Senate health care bill during floor remarks tonight. First, he noted that there are a number of changes to Senate rules in the bill--and it's supposed to take a 2/3 vote to change the rules. And then he pointed out that…

Senator Roland Burris is claiming credit for a provision in Harry Reid's "manager's amendment," unveiled Saturday morning, that could funnel money to ACORN through the health care bill. On December 9, Burris, an Illinois Democrat, pledged that he would filibuster a health care bill without a public…

Save us from Obamacare, Gov. Hoeven, you're our only hope! Incumbent Democratic Senator Byron Dorgan may have a serious problem on his hands if Republicans recruit Governor John Hoeven to run for the U.S. Senate in North Dakota next year. The first Rasmussen Reports Election 2010 telephone survey…

Okay, not really. But overheard at last week's Aerospace Industries Association Year-End Review & Forecast Luncheon: Julian Hellebrand, chief of staff for Cobham (whose guest I was), excitedly told me about his company's myriad accomplishments this past year and the upcoming year's challenges. But…

Another important note about the Obama administration's transfer of Gitmo detainee Abdullahi Sudi Arale to Somaliland: In June 2007, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman called Arale a "high-value detainee." That phrase was reserved for less than twenty detainees. As far as I know, the U.S. has never…

If Mike Pence doesn't run against Evan Bayh, maybe Mitch Daniels should. A statement from the Indiana governor: "I'm discouraged, dispirited, and disappointed. Discouraged that such a backwards, anti-taxpayer disaster of a bill is this close to passage. Dispirited at a gross process of vote-buying…

On June 6, 2007, the Department of Defense announced the transfer of Abdullahi Sudi Arale (also known as Ismail Mahmoud Muhammad) to the detention facilities at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. At the time, the U.S. military released a brief press release saying that Arale's capture "exemplifies the genuine…

Jay Cost writes on the reaction to the Democrats' health care overhaul: We might be on the verge of another Jacksonian moment: a time when the people awake from their slumber, angrily exercise their sovereign authority, and mercilessly fire the leaders who have for too long catered to the elites…

Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana has issued an excellent statement on the health care bill. He calls it "Washington at its worst," and especially urges "Senators with the privilege of representing the great state of Indiana, to give special consideration to Hoosier families and their values and reject…

Early this morning, around 1 a.m., the Senate took a major step toward passing Harry Reid's roughly 2,400-page, $871 billion health care reform compromise. The strictly partisan vote was 60 to 40. Sen. Kennedy's widow Victoria looked on from the Senate gallery as the senators voted from their…

On Sunday, Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform said Senators Ben Nelson and Arlen Specter would violate their signed pledges not to raise taxes by voting for the health care bill, which includes $500 billion in tax increases between now and 2019. Asked before voting on cloture last night if…

In a letter to President Obama Friday, Congressman Frank Wolf (R-VA) called on the Obama administration to release the DIA's latest study on freed Guantanamo detainees who have returned to terrorism. In addition to objecting to the transfer of six Yemeni detainees from Guantanamo to their native…

The Department of Justice announced Sunday that 12 detainees from Guantanamo Bay would be repatriated to Afghanistan, Yemen, and Somaliland. That we are sending these people back to largely-lawless Afghanistan and terrorist-hotbed Yemen is bad, bad news. However, it's the third country mentioned…

Speaking to reporters in the reception room off the Senate floor after the 1:00 AM cloture vote, Senator Ben Nelson said the issue of federal funding of abortion in the Indian Services Act is going to "have to be addressed in the conference." The manager's amendment, unveiled by Harry Reid…

"No bill's perfect," "I think we created a bill that was far better than it was in the beginning." "No, they just need to go back and read it; I've read it. It says marginal tax rates." "That's gonna have to be addressed in the conference." … "I don't know. We're going to have to take a look at…

Washington Post: Senate Democrats won a milestone victory early Monday in the health-care debate, approving a procedural motion to move the reform legislation to final passage later this week, and without a single vote to spare. The 60-40 tally, taken shortly after 1 a.m., followed 12 hours of…

Given the challenges that President Obama faces in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, China, and elsewhere, the fact that he has thus far neglected Latin America is hardly surprising or scandalous. Obama has committed several unforced errors in the Americas, however, most notably in…

The campaign for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination offered a glimpse into the soul of Joe Biden. Asked by a prospective voter where he went to law school, Biden responded with a tirade that, had the claims been true, would have been bizarre. But as most of them were outright lies, it…

'I liked what he said. I talked too in my book about the fallen nature of man and why war is necessary at times.'

Ever since it was carved by treaty out of the Dutch, French, and German borderlands after the Napoleonic wars, Belgium has been an odd kind of country--short on space, sunlight, and national identity. It was a shotgun marriage of two peoples, the Dutch-speaking Flemings in Flanders and the…

Even before she became the swing vote that forced consideration of Obamacare onto the Senate floor, two-term Arkansas senator Blanche Lambert Lincoln had a dubious distinction: "For 2010, she may be the most endangered Democratic senator in the country," says Public Policy Polling head Dean Debnam.

Thrift

California tops the list of states in budgetary crisis, but the grim headlines forecasting the Golden State's collapse only make me think back to the vibrant scenes of my childhood in the San Joaquin Valley.

In his Nobel acceptance speech last week, President Obama spoke eloquently on what he called a "just peace"--a peace that is not possible without the recognition of basic human rights. Where human rights are not protected, "peace is a hollow promise," he said.

Every writer, when young, expects to achieve greatness and notoriety. We hear our names taught in undergraduate classrooms and see our works--even before we've written them--bound in "classic" editions long after we're gone. The melancholy fact that success in writing is rarer than success in…

THE SCRAPBOOK has been patiently awaiting it, and it finally arrived last week: Senator Harry Reid's December 7 declaration that Republicans who have spoken out against the nationalization of American medicine--otherwise known as "health care reform"--are akin to those Americans of yesteryear who…

The Blind Side

American Stories

U.S. Grant

The triumph of Reaganism, as represented by the passage of the Kemp-Roth tax cuts in 1981, was a declaration of intellectual independence by conservatives and Republicans who decided to no longer be "tax collectors for the welfare state." Equally, the current battle to defeat plans for a national…

Neither Beast Nor God

It's the Yuletide season, and Democrats are in a giving mood. Nancy Pelosi says the House's tax-raising, Medicare-cutting, trillion-dollar-spending health bill is her "Christmas present to the American people." In the Senate, Harry Reid is desperate to pass his version of health care reform before…

Democratic senators and congressmen have been trying to convince each other, particularly their more conservative colleagues, that they'll all be better off in the 2010 elections--and will avoid a repeat of their 1994 debacle--if they pass Obama-care. Bill Clinton, half of the central duo in the…

In early November, Democratic representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida accused House Republicans of giving women "back-of-the-hand treatment" during a parliamentary dust-up over a health care debate.

According to the CBO, Nelson got $100 million for Nebraska in Medicaid funding--20 percent of what Massachusetts got: The provision, which Republicans have derided as the "Cornhusker Kickback," actually provides Nebraska the least of the three states. Vermont will receive $600 million over 10…

Senior White House Advisor David Axelrod said today that supporters of Obamacare are "right on the one-yard line." It is interesting that he said this less than 24 hours after Fresno State, in this season's first college football bowl game, also was on the 1-yard line very late in the game. At that…

A D.C. area friend--tired of shoveling snow--called today to chat, and to say he agreed with the notion that 2010 looked to be shaping up as a populist, anti-establishment, and anti-incumbent year. And he called my attention to last week's polls on the Florida Senate race. Everyone noticed the…

C.K. MacLeod writes at Hot Air: Dismantling, impeding, nullifying, and, in the end, fully repealing this bill does not require 60 Republicans or 60 conservatives: Greater legal, legislative, and historical minds than mine must already be studying the precedents and gaming the scenarios, but we can…

Are there enough votes in the House to pass a health care bill very close to the one the Senate is preparing to pass? Bart Stupak says the Senate bill's abortion language is "unacceptable" and has pledged to lead a group of pro-life Democrats to vote against final passage if the issue isn't…

As noted this morning, Ben Nelson apparently sold out in exchange for the federal government's picking up the tab of new Medicaid patients in Nebraska added through Obamacare. For a piddling "$45 million over the first decade," Ben Nelson really is--as he proudly said Thursday--a "cheap date." If…

With President Barack Obama's year-end deadline to Iran just one day away, the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler reports that the Obama administration is preparing "targeted sanctions" on Iran. But there's an asterisk. Ten months after President Obama set a year-end deadline for Iran to engage with…

Trying to persuade usually pro-life Democratic Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson to back Obamacare, Pennsylvania Democratic Senator Bob Casey offered a so-called compromise on abortion funding that Nelson initially rejected. But liberal evangelicals and Catholics who profess to be pro-life publicly…

On Saturday, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri traveled to Damascus for a meeting with Syrian president Bashar Asad, the man widely believed to have ordered the assassination of his father, former Lebanese premier Rafiq Hariri. The 2005 murder sparked the Cedar Revolution, a mass protest movement…

Sean Trende has an excellent piece pushing back against the conventional wisdom that passing something is better than nothing: Health reform is shuffling toward its endgame, and even though the bill's popularity resembles George Bush's circa 2007, Democrats seem determined to push the bill through.…

With Obamacare, you get the good, the bad, and the ugly -- except for the first part. The Congressional Budget Office's score is in for the final Senate health bill, and it's amazing how little Americans would get for so much. The Democrats are irresponsibly and disingenuously claiming that the…

There are lots of embarrassing little things to mock in the Senate bill (e.g., the special provision for Nebraska), and lots of bad provisions to attack (the tax hikes and federal funding for abortion, to mention two). But Republicans shouldn't lose sight of a core point, embodied in this passage…

Last March the interior ministry of the Kingdom of Sand and Oil convicted a destitute 75-year-old widow, Khamisa Sawadi, of "prohibited mingling," which is to say, she was caught by the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice "mingling" with two men young enough to be her…

Reality bites. Well, not quite bites. Bares its teeth. And is ignored. During this holiday season President Obama and his Democratic congress feel entitled to an extra glass or two of the bubbly now that health care "reform" seems ever more likely to pass, the threat of financial collapse is past,…

James C. Capretta and Yuval Levin write on the homepage: In a radio interview on Thursday, Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson boasted that, compared to some of his colleagues, he was a "cheap date," holding out as he was as a matter of principle and not for some outlandish dropping of federal largesse in…

The boss has a special editorial on the homepage.

In a radio interview on Thursday, Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson boasted that, compared to some of his colleagues, he was a "cheap date," holding out as he was as a matter of principle and not for some outlandish dropping of federal largesse in Nebraska.

Ben Smith reports that pro-life Democrat Bart "Stupak, in an interview with POLITICO, called the Senate's bill's abortion position unacceptable." Stupak expresses hope that the issue can be resolved in conference, but the Stupak amendment was the compromise. He had already conceded as much as he…

NOW and pro-lifers finally agree on something. NOW's leader: "The so-called health care reform bill now before the Senate, with the addition of Majority Leader Harry Reid's Manager's Amendment, amounts to a health insurance bill for half the population and a sweeping anti-abortion law for the rest…

Americans for Tax Reform has it all here.

When a fellow conservative tried to cheer me up this morning by assuring me that the Senate Democrats' victory on health care was going to be a Pyrrhic one, I realized I didn't remember much about Pyrrhus.

The Hill's Mike O'Brien reports: Where the first version of the bill called for a 0.5 percent additional tax on high-earning Americans' FICA and SECA taxes, the manager's amendment increases the levy to a 0.9 percent rate. The tax, which would begin in 2013, would apply to incomes in excess of…

Can be found here. Expect this sentence to get a lot of play: "CBO and JCT estimate that the direct spending and revenue effects of enacting the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act incorporating the manager's amendment would yield a net reduction in federal deficits of $132 billion over the…

Politico reports: Sen. Mary Landrieu got the "Louisiana Purchase." Sen. Ben Nelson got the federal government to pick up most his state's future Medicaid tab -- forever. As part of the deal to win Nelson's support, the federal government will fund Nebraska's new Medicaid recipients. It's a…

The text of Harry Reid's manager's amendment, the first legislative step toward final passage, can be found here. The Senate clerk is reading the text aloud now.

Harry Reid has released the manager's amendment that Ben Nelson has reportedly agreed to vote for, meaning that the Senate bill has 60 votes. The abortion language includes the phony segregation of funding language that was rejected in the House. It would allow individual states to opt out of the…

From The Washington Post: Sen. Ben Nelson (Neb.), the final Democratic holdout on health care, was prepared to announce to his caucus Saturday morning that he would support the Senate reform bill, clearing the way for final passage by Christmas. "We're there," said Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), as he…

You could probably count on one hand the number of conservatives who expected President Obama to give the address he did in accepting the Nobel Peace Prize. After all, up until then, his major speeches had been built around such themes as nuclear disarmament, Muslim-American relations,…

David M. Herszenhorn: "Top White House officials, including a deputy chief of staff, Jim Messina, and a senior adviser, Pete Rouse, are at the Capitol now trying to win the support of Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, who may be the last big Democratic hold-out." This should go on into the…

From the National Right to Life Committee: Dear Senator Casey: We have reviewed certain legislative language that you have proposed to add to Senator Reid's pending health care bill, the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," by having it incorporated into a "manager's amendment" that…

A recent referendum banning the construction of new minarets in Switzerland triggered outrage in the Muslim world. Government leaders from countries such as Iran, Turkey, and Pakistan strongly condemned the move, arguing that the measure was discriminatory in nature and violated the right of…

By the end of the first week the climate confabulation was in Marx Brothers territory. Today, as it comes to an end, it sounds more like the hellscape of eternal damnation in the right-hand triptych of Hieronymus Bosch's Garden of Earthly Delights. And this despite the arrival of the young anointed…

The great wit Paul Krugman writes: A message to progressives: By all means, hang Senator Joe Lieberman in effigy. Declare that you're disappointed in and/or disgusted with President Obama. Demand a change in Senate rules that, combined with the Republican strategy of total obstructionism, are in…

In a floor speech today, Sen. Mitch McConnell used Obama's own precipice imagery against him (although he was kind of working against himself already with "precipice"): "There's a good chance [Dems] will not be able to get their members to lock arms & walk off a cliff." McConnell and McCain also…

You heard it here first! On Dec. 9, Matt Continetti wondered if Burris might be the health-care wildcard. Looks like he remains undecided: Burris, you'll recall, is one of the junior-most senators, having landed in the Senate shrouded in suspicion after being appointed by disgraced governor Rod…

Celebrate 25 years of Charles Krauthammer by revisiting some of his best essays for the WEEKLY STANDARD. May I recommend: "Arms Control: The End of an Illusion", November 1, 1999. "On to Mars", January 31, 2000. "The Bush Doctrine", June 4, 2001. "The Real New World Order", November 12, 2001. "Year…

With the defense appropriations bill set for passage on Saturday, Harry Reid has cleared the way to focus on health care until -- and perhaps during -- Christmas. But he still doesn't have 60 votes. Ben Nelson is holding out. So is Bernie Sanders. Meanwhile, before departing for Copenhagen,…

There's a really big snowstorm coming to D.C.tonight. It would be unsafe to ask all the staffers and Hill employees who'd be needed at the Capitol if Congress stays open all hours this weekend, as Harry Reid intends, to drive to and from work--especially since many will have to do so at night, and…

Everyone hates the individual mandate. Barack Obama has brought us together! David Axelrod counting on the fact that the health-care bill, once implemented, will be so awesome, everyone will change their minds: They also believe -- as senior adviser David Axelrod's unsolicited call to "Morning Joe"…

Washington Post: The Obama administration is planning to repatriate six Yemenis held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, a transfer that could be a prelude to the release of dozens more detainees to Yemen, according to sources with independent knowledge of the matter. The release…

While the U.S.-China tiff at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen was grabbing headlines last week, the conference hosts quietly issued a diplomatic note stating that Denmark "attaches great importance to the view of the Chinese government" on Tibet-related issues, "takes seriously the…

Yo ho ho and an RPG: Piracy investor Sahra Ibrahim, a 22-year-old divorcee, was lined up with others waiting for her cut of a ransom pay-out after one of the gangs freed a Spanish tuna fishing vessel. "I am waiting for my share after I contributed a rocket-propelled grenade for the operation," she…

Time's Joe Klein calls me "odious," but he can do better. I much preferred when he described me as a "Niagara of ignorance." In any case, he stands by his claim that "The Israelis have been difficult, as always: whenever [Middle East envoy George] Mitchell raises East Jerusalem in talks with the…

Joe Klein writes: immoderate "moderates" like Nelson and Lieberman have been holding their votes hostage for reasons of extreme ideology, personal pique and showboat narcissism. If Ben Nelson scuttles this bill merely because he wants more extreme anti-abortion language than currently exists--the…

Less than a quarter of Democrats have a "very positive" of the Democratic party. "An already-enormous security breach is even larger than previously thought." "Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, b-button, a-button." Could Obama be a friend to Israel? Meg is in the driver's seat. The…

And of course, stories that Joe Klein makes up get recycled in Palestinian propaganda. Ben Smith reports: U.S. and Israeli officials are dismissing an eyebrow-raising claim from a prominent Palestinian activist and official, Mustafa Barghouti, in today's International Herald Tribune. "The Israeli…

You know what really wouldn't help Harry Reid meet his Christmas deadline for passing health care? Two to three feet of snow in Washington, DC. The forecast from THE WEEKLY STANDARD Weather Center...

Mr. Gore has sported many hats throughout his three-score-some: As congressman, as senator, vice president, and Nobel laureate. Now, as Andrew Malcolm tells us, he can wear versificator of climatic dread beret upon his balding pate. His output is elegiac, his set of seven haiku may be read as…

Iran's nuclear program is spread throughout a variety of experimental laboratories, hardened enrichment facilities, heavy water manufacturing plants, and two plutonium reactors currently under development (Bushehr could come online within a few months). That far exceeds what's needed to turn on the…

Isn't dissent patriotic? It was when Republicans were in charge. Now, though, Republicans are claiming that Democratic leaders are using the tactics of junior high school cliques to keep Republicans from sharing their views on climate change. Ahead of President Barack Obama's trip to Copenhagen,…

In an interview with a Nebraska radio station this morning, Sen. Ben Nelson splashed some more cold water on Harry Reid's ambitions. (Listen to the whole interview, here.) If the abortion issue were solved to your satisfaction, would that enough for you to vote for you to go along with the bill?…

Jeffrey H. Anderson nails it: "For after nearly a year's worth of debate, Obamacare has now been boiled down to its essence: a mandate that Americans pay trillions of dollars, funneled through Washington, to private insurers." The left dislikes the mandate because it will benefit private insurers.…

From Andrew Kohut at Pew: "What's really exceptional at this stage of Obama's presidency is the extent to which the public has moved in a conservative direction on a range of issues." And Kohut goes on: "Even more notable, however, is the extent to which liberals appear to be dozing as the country…

Gallup is out with a new poll showing a modest increase in Sarah Palin's favorability rating, from 40 to 44 percent. That's within the maximum margin of error, according to Gallup. The Gallup results track with those of a recent CNN poll. To compare, the public still views Obama more favorably than…

I'm a little late coming in on the latest Iranian missile salvo, but there a few salient points still worth mentioning. First, the Sajjil-2 is a solid fuel rocket. That's the type of power source that we use in our own Minuteman III rockets, as solid fuel is stable in flight and requires no…

Drudge is touting this floor statement by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell: ‘And here's the most outrageous part: at the end of this rush, they want us to vote on a bill that no one outside the Majority Leader's conference room has even seen. That's right. The final bill we'll vote on isn't…

TEXT TEXT We must not buy federally-mandated insurance, if this cheesy counterfeit of reform is all we can buy. No single payer? No sale. No public option? No sale. No Medicare buy-in? No sale. I am one of the self-insured, albeit by choice. And I hereby pledge that I will not buy this perversion…

scarecrow.jpg Scott Stanzel nominates the hardest-working man in politics this year: Straw Man should be the person of the year. He's been employed by President Obama so much this year that he is certainly the busiest person in Washington...Most of the time he is referred to by his nicknames "some…

For all the talk of rampant divisions in the GOP, it's worth noting just how divided the Democrats are quickly becoming. The division is apparent in the debate over the Afghanistan surge, but it is especially striking when it comes to health care reform. A quick stop at the Huffington Post tells…

From the Mercatus Center and the Examiner comes some new insight into how stimulus money was distributed, and it seems to have had little to do with the economic condition of its recipients: "You would think that if the stimulus money was actually spent to create jobs, there would be more stimulus…

Rudy Giuliani continues to lead New York Democratic senator Kirsten Gillibrand, says a new poll from Siena Research Institute. Giuliani tops Gillibrand by seven points in the Siena poll. In a December 15 Quinnipiac poll, moreover, Giuliani tops Gillibrand by 10 points. Rudy's favorable rating is at…

Superwonk Keith Hennessey has updated his health care reform projections. "I am lowering from 50 percent to 35 percent my prediction for the success of comprehensive health care reform," he writes. "I now think the most likely outcome is a much more limited bill becomes law." That probably won't…

Washington: Sounding a more centrist note, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Wednesday there is a "fierce determination" to reduce the deficit..."We have got to send a message about our concern for the deficit," said Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.). Copenhagen: Danish hosts re-launched U.N. climate talks on…

Harry Reid has his eyes on Nebraska's Ben Nelson, who's holding out support for the health care bill until he's satisfied that tax dollars won't be used to pay for abortions. According to the Times, Reid has asked Pennsylvania senator Bob Casey to draft language to appease Nelson. Casey delivered…

Karl Rove: The President is makin' history. Bad history. Pawlenty in N.H.: "President Obama was here in New Hampshire on New Hampshire primary night and said he was going to fix health care by bringing Republicans and Democrats together," he said. "Well, here we are in New Hampshire and now what we…

Many believe partisanship is a toxic compound--sludge that fouls the gears of legislative progress in Congress. Around this time of the year in Washington--when to-do lists are long and remaining legislative calendar days short--overheated congressional sprockets (and tempers) start to smoke.

A small splash is being made by accounts of a recent Office of Naval Intelligence report claiming that Iran has achieved the capability of "easily" closing off the Straits of Hormuz in wartime. Supposedly, the Iranian navy has sufficient surface and subsurface vessels, along with advanced missile…

Twenty Republican senators have requested that the Senate Armed Services Committee launch an investigation into reports that the Obama White House threatened to close Nebraska's Offutt Air Force base unless Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson fell into line on health care. Those reports first appeared on…

The big news out of the Florida Senate Republican primary today was a Rasmussen poll that showed Gov. Charlie Crist and former state House speaker Marco Rubio tied at 43 percent to 43 percent. Tonight Rasmussen released new numbers showing that Rubio is more electable than Charlie Crist: The latest…

Yesterday, the House passed the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act, sponsored by Rep. Howard Berman (D-Calif.), which imposes sanctions on companies that sell refined petroleum to Iran or support Iran's refining sector. This comes as President Obama's self-imposed year-end deadline for progress…

Clarification: two-thirds of Americans oppose closing Gitmo; Gallup's sample did not include Nobel committee members: Support is 8% among Republicans, 28% among independents, and 50% among Democrats gallup.gif

Human Events pulls some big news out of a heavily Democrat-leaning community board meeting in Lower Manhattan last night. An unannounced surprise guest, Democratic Speaker of the New York State Assembly Sheldon Silver, showed up and took a fervent stand against Eric Holder's decision to bring…

A poll conducted by the Tarrance Group over the past two days helps explain why Senator Ben Nelson is nervous about supporting even a modified Harry Reid-version of health care reform. The poll interviewed 500 registered "likely voters" in Nebraska and asked for their views on a range of issues,…

Gibbs, at the press briefing today: "I don't think any rational person would say killing a bill is better at this point." Today's NBC/WSJ poll: Just 32 percent say it's a good idea, versus 47 percent who say it's a bad idea. In addition, for the first time in the survey, a plurality prefers the…

President Obama has written a letter to the Dear Leader, aka the Tiny Tyrant. Could it be an invitation to the White House? Time is running out.... QUESTION: In 1982, Anwar Sadat traveled to Israel, a trip that resulted in a peace agreement that has lasted ever since. In the spirit of that type of…

Schumer was apparently under the impression that the rule is no one can use their Blackberries during take-off and landing except super-important people. Sen. Chuck Schumer called a flight attendant an obscenity aboard a recent U.S. Airways flight, Politico.com reported. The New York Democrat…

In response to multilateral condemnation of its nuclear program, Iran has announced its intent to expand massively its uranium enrichment facilities. Once again, the White House press spokesman has announced gravely that Iran has chosen to "isolate itself." Once again, the UN Security Council will…

Professional libs have begun bolting from the health-care reservation, but what about the cultural leftists who joined onto the Obama bandwagon first, and Obama's policy agenda second? During the campaign, one of Obama's most prolific artist-supporters was Ray Noland, aka CRO. Of the many bits of…

U.S. relations with Syria are "more normal than before, and on more than one level," declares Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman, by which presumably he means to say that we and they have emerged from Eight Years of Darkness (EYD) to forge new ties in a new spirit…

AP: MILWAUKEE - Cities around the country that have installed energy-efficient traffic lights are discovering a hazardous downside: The bulbs don't burn hot enough to melt snow and can become crusted over in a storm - a problem blamed for dozens of accidents and at least one death. snowtraffic.jpg…

In 2003, Allen West was facing a possible court martial hearing that could have put him in prison.

Haaretz has a hard to believe report claiming that "the United States and Egypt, along with France, are planning a joint move to restart Israeli-Palestinian talks on the basis of the June 4, 1967, borders, territorial exchanges and a complete freeze of construction beyond the Green Line, including…

The Hill reports: House leaders on Tuesday unveiled a $75 billion measure to fund new infrastructure projects to create jobs and provide fiscal aid to state and local governments hoping to avoid the laying-off of public workers. House Democrats wanted the measure to be attached to $636 billion…

From Salam's Agenda blog: Krugman's rhetorical strategy increasingly relies on bullying. He is a brilliant thinker with a legion of decidedly less-brilliant epigones who has turned a large swathe of the economics blogosphere into a "slagosphere" not unlike the lit blogs that punish and torment…

The Democratic ducks are lining up to support the emerging health care compromise. After eliminating the public option and Medicare buy-in, Lieberman has signaled that he's ready to vote for cloture. Landrieu did the same thing after the Democratic caucus met with the president yesterday. Keep your…

The Senate Democrats' legislation is a Medicare-cutting, tax-hiking, no-real-reform, 2,000-page monstrosity opposed by the majority of the American people. The only winners would be Big Government, Big Pharma, and Big Insurance. Big Government would grow in immeasurable ways and would gradually…

On "Morning Joe," he had this to say: "We are moving toward 60 - we think we'll have it by next week," Durbin said during an appearance on MSNBC. "There's so many positive things in this bill, I think we see our way to pass it and make things significantly better for most families." He gives the…

The Senate Democrats' legislation is a Medicare-cutting, tax-hiking, no-real-reform 2,000 page monstrosity opposed by the majority of the American people. The only winners would be Big Government (which would grow in immeasurable ways, and would gradually assume ever more responsibility for our…

Lieberman says yes. Sherrod Brown: "I'm going to vote for it. I can't imagine I wouldn't. There's too much at stake." Roland Burris is still a no. And, the American people say, "Not no, but hell no." Milblogs go silent today in support of C.J. Grisham. Chuck Todd: Napolitano to SCOTUS? It was…

In two recent speeches, the president and the secretary of state have tried to answer criticisms that Obama administration foreign policy neglects democracy and human rights. Neither however offered much to suggest a change in the priority given to these objectives, or a hint that there would be…

As Jim Capretta writes over at NRO, now that the government-run "public option" has been stripped out of the Senate's proposed health-care legislation, Obamacare is left as this: a mandate that Americans funnel huge sums in new taxes, through the federal government, to private insurers. Were you…

It was with an odd statement that Obama announced the progress he had made in meetings with Senate Democrats today on the health-care bill he's desperate to pass by Christmas, no matter what's in it. "We are on the precipice of an achievement that has eluded Congresses and presidents for…

Now that Joe Lieberman killed the public option and Medicare buy-in, he seems to be moving toward a vote for health care reform. All eyes thus turn to Ben Nelson, who has been threatened and cajoled into a Yes vote, as well. Say the threats don't work, and Harry Reid has to appease Nelson just as…

Let's say the health care debate is resolved, one way or another, by the end of the year. Which issues will dominate 2010? The top candidates at the moment are jobs and the deficit. On jobs, President Obama laid out his thoughts in a speech last week to the Brookings Institution. On the deficit, it…

Senator Nelson should call Rahm Emanuel's bluff. Offutt Air Force Base is one of the nation's most critical command and control nodes, second to only to the National Military Command Center in the Pentagon. The base's hardened facilities, designed to withstand a nuclear blast, are so optimized to…

Greg Sargent reports that today Howard Dean will call upon the Senate to kill the Reid bill now that it no longer includes a public option or Medicare buy-in. Dean follows lefty Internet guru Kos, who wrote on his Twitter feed last night: "Insurance companies win. Time to kill this monstrosity…

Jonathan Martin gets the quote from a "Lieberman ally": "They won't say it, but Joe is preventing them from taking a series of tough votes," said this Lieberman ally. "If I'm Blanche Lincoln, I'd consider converting to Judaisim just to thank Joe Lieberman for what he did for me."

For parents concerned about the "sexting" phenomenon and wondering how much of it is media hype, the Pew Research Center has some answers. According to its Internet & American Life Project, a mere 4 percent of teens between 12 and 17 years of age say they have sent explicit photos of themselves…

Appearing on Good Morning America today, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he didn't support the current Democratic health care bills, even though he supports reform in principle. He also cautioned that a deal on health care shouldn't be more important than the content. (The White House apparently…

Republicans on the Hill are circulating this memo on Obama's decision to move Gitmo detainees to a prison in Illinois: Having failed to bring the Olympics to Illinois, President Obama will give Illinois an odd replacement gift just in time for the Holidays-al Qaeda terrorists from the Guantanamo…

According to Politico's Mike Allen and Carrie Budoff Brown, the president will tell the Senate Democratic caucus that if health care reform "fails now, no other president will attempt it, aides said." Hmm. Something tells me that, no matter what happens in the current health care debate, liberal…

After causing Senate Democrats reportedly to drop the public option and the Medicare buy-in, Sen. Lieberman released a statement today saying he senses that "we are now taking significant steps forward to obtain 60 votes on the Senate floor." Meanwhile, President Obama plans to meet with Senate…

While the Democrats appease Senator Lieberman, they still have to worry about other recalcitrant Democrats including Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson. Though Lieberman has been out front in the fight against the public option and the Medicare buy-in, Nelson was critical of both. Now that those…

Bart Gordon of Tennessee says no thanks to next year's political environment: Another senior Democratic congressman from a competitive district said Monday he would retire, heightening pressure on party leaders seeking to avoid a 1994-style election defeat that would change control of the House.…

This morning on MSNBC's Morning Joe, Vice President Biden said that U.S. troops would rapidly withdraw from Afghanistan. "You're going to see that [troop numbers] chart coming down as rapidly over the next two years," Biden said after looking at a chart showing troop numbers surging from 33,000 at…

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) gave us a rare moment of honesty about monstrous health-care reform legislation from the floor of the House yesterday: "Can I sit up here or stand here with a straight face and say, we have got strong cost-containment provisions in this legislation? That if you're an…

Neat: Stephen King pays almost $13,000 for Maine troops to come home for Christmas before shipping out for Afghanistan. Video: The Nobel after party featured Will Smith, Wyclef Jean, and Toby Keith? Obama's approval level hits lowest ever (46%) for a first-year president in December. Why are Dems…

From the halls of the Senate to left-wing blogs and the Washington Post, Democrats have been busy the past day viciously attacking Joe Lieberman for saying that he'll filibuster a bill with a Medicare buy-in provision. An anonymous senior Senate aide says that Lieberman double-crossed Harry Reid;…

It would look like this: First, there'd be a mile-long line to get in. Once everybody was inside, the Group of 77, a coalition of "developing" countries, would walk out in protest over "the slow pace of negotiations." Then they'd come back. But the Group of 77 would actually be made up of 130…

Not only is Finnish-born conductor-composer Esa-pekka Salonen the music world's It Boy Of The Moment, conducting his farewell as Music Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and his debut at the Metropolitan Opera to raves of ecstasy, he is also something of a maven of greenitudinousness. And it…

Over the weekend, Adam Gadahn, the American traitor who serves as a chief propagandist al Qaeda, released a videotape titled 'The Mujahideen Do Not Target Muslims.' Gadahn and al Qaeda are overly defensive about recent reports that the terror group primarily kills Muslims, and not Westerners.…

SCOTUS blog reports: The Court's denial of review of Rasul, et al., v. Myers, et al. (09-227) leaves intact a federal appeals court ruling that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and ten military officers are legally immune to claims of torture and religious bias against inmates who were at…

According to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, 43 percent of those interviewed now have an unfavorable view of Tiger Woods versus 42 percent who still view him favorably. In addition, "Men tilt favorably toward Woods, while women lean negative. (Men are 46 percent favorable, 41 percent…

Andrew Breitbart's Big Government puts two and two together: Today, the Obama White House announced the nomination of Mari Del Carmen Aponte as U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador. It is not Ms. Aponte's first brush with an ambassadorship. In 1998, President Clinton nominated her to be Ambassador to the…

That's the grade the president awards himself for his first year in office. His constituents, the American people, beg to differ. They've given him a D- today, according to Rasmussen. obama_approval_index_december_14_2009.jpg

Tennessee Rep. Bart Gordon announced he's not going to run in 2010, the fourth such announcement this month. And so another safe Dem seat now looks likely to flip. Dave Weigel writes: There are going to be a number of deep red areas where, in 2010, prospective presidential candidates can happily…

It turns out that insurgent, populist Conservatives are scoring victories Down Under as well as in America -- and Tea Partiers and Palinistas here in the States would do well to watch conservative Aussie leader Tony Abbott very closely. Abbott became leader of the right-wing Liberal party two weeks…

President Obama faces the unprecedented challenge of being a war president in charge of a peace party. His emergence in this new role less than a week before he picks up his Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo has been some time in coming. It was one thing for Obama to speak of Afghanistan as the good war…

Get Real

General Sherman's Christmas

The Making of Americans

President Obama is a master of the "narrative." That's the fancy new word in the political lexicon for a storyline that makes a politician look good. Last year, Obama was the candidate of hope and change who would cure Washington of its bad habits. Now he has a presidential narrative. It goes like…

Renaissance Faces

Why Are Jews Liberals?

The Big Rich

Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, the Swiss justice minister, took to the airwaves as soon as her fellow citizens voted by a landslide majority to write a ban on minarets into their constitution. She wanted to make clear to the world that this was "not a vote against Islam." Her government issued a press…

You've Come a Long Way, Maybe

Woodrow Wilson

Christianity in Action

President Obama has ordered sufficient reinforcements to Afghanistan to execute a war strategy that can succeed. We applaud this decision. And we urge everyone to rally round the effort to defeat our enemies and accomplish objectives vital to America's national security.

Bogotá

The city of Washington has been collectively aghast at the spectacle of Michaela and Tareq Salahi, the fun couple from Virginia wine country who seem to have talked their way into the first state dinner of the Obama administration.

The case of Terri Schiavo--who died five years ago next March, deprived for nearly two weeks of food and water, even the balm of ice chips--continues to prick consciences. That may be one reason the case of Rom Houben, a Belgian man who was misdiagnosed for 23 years as being in a persistent…

Surely there are worse PR gigs than flacking for the Libyan government, but I can't think of many. It's not that there's never good news emanating from the province of Colonel Muammar Qaddafi, who's displayed humility throughout his 40-year dictatorial reign by never promoting himself to…

The Golf Book

The Washington Post's Ezra Klein asserts that Joe Lieberman is "willing to directly cause the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in order to settle an old electoral score."

On Face The Nation, Sens. Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson made it pretty clear they weren't inclined to support the Reid "compromise" featuring a Medicare buy-in. Nelson said he thought such a buy-in is a bad idea, and Lieberman noted that on "the so-called Medicare buy-in -- the opposition to it has…

In a bit of macabre news, the body of the late president of Cyprus, Tassos Papadopoulos, has been stolen from its grave. According to the BBC, "The theft was reported by a former bodyguard who visited the tomb and found piles of earth by the graveside and an empty coffin." No motive has yet been…

Rasmussen reports that 51 percent of voters in Illinois oppose the Obama administration's apparent plan to move the detainees now being held at Gitmo to the Thomson Correctional Facility in Western Illinois. Just 39 percent of the state's voters support the plan. It's yet another item on the Obama…

It took the Obama administration less than a year to reduce the United States from the country with a currency that is considered a safe haven when international storms threaten, to one that is warned by a rating agency that unless it mends its profligate ways it will lose the triple-A credit…

Breaking news: White House seems to toughen stance on Iran in a new statement. Could the boss be right--see advance copy of next week's editorial, just posted--that Obama's Nobel speech could be a pivot point with respect to Iran policy? Is military action next year out of the question?

Two symbolic dates in Iran spurred anti-regime demonstrations across the country in the past five weeks. The most recent of these protests occurred this Monday on National Students Day--Iran's commemoration of the death of three students who protested against the 1953 visit of then-U.S. Vice…

A letter from 10 senators, led by Senators Nelson and Collins and ranging from Senator Feingold to Senator Inohfe, sharply rebukes the Turkish government for the "downward trend of relations between Turkey and Israel this past year." The senators point in particular to the Turkish government's…

ABC reports that the high-level al Qaeda operative killed in Tuesday's drone strike in Pakistan was Saleh al-Somali. According to ABC, U.S. officials believe al-Somali "was responsible for al Qaeda's operations outside of the Afghanistan-Pakistan region and formed part of al Qaeda's senior…

Politico reports: The "time has come" for the world to condemn Iran's nuclear program, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in a taped interview with Al Jazeera English. .... "We have spent time listening and working hard to create this common ground and these common interests, and we've done it…

The Foreign Policy Initiative is looking for a communications director and interns.

The Senate agreed to take a break from the health care debate to work on other things like the budget. But that hasn't stopped the rest of us from debating the merits of Reid's compromise plan. Republicans are on full offensive mode, pointing to a recent survey by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid…

In light of USA Today's bombshell report on the explosive growth in salaries among federal employees over the last 18 months (i.e. the 18 months in which the U.S. economy saw its worst collapse since the Great Depression), it's perhaps worth a flashback to January 21, 2009, when President Obama…

The new Airbus A400M--Europe's ambitious response to the rapidly-increasing demand for strategic airlift capabilities in support of military crisis-management operations around the world--received a major boost this morning when the four-engined turboprop aircraft made its first flight from an…

Keep America Safe has produced a video of the rally in New York last weekend to protest the Obama administration's decision to try the 9/11 killers in a federal civilian court in NYC rather than in a military tribunal:

Barker Davis, a sportswriter for the Washington Times, confirms to the Georgetown Voice that as part of the massive ongoing purge, the Sports section will definitely be disappearing by February: As of Feb. 2 at the absolute latest, the Times won't be covering ANY local sports, not Redskins, Caps,…

light display.jpg Just in time for the President's big speech, as it turns out. MOSCOW - The failure of a new Russian intercontinental ballistic missile during testing was the cause of spectacular spiraling blue lights in the skies over northern Norway, analysts said Thursday. Russia's defense…

Yesterday the Washington Post editorialized that "The irony of this late-breaking Medicare proposal is that it could be a bigger step toward a single-payer system than the milquetoast public option plans rejected by Senate moderates as too disruptive of the private market." Today, the Wall Street…

"When your neighbor loses her job, it's a recession. When you lose your job, it's a depression. And when federal workers not only keep their jobs but see their pay rise during a recession, it's something else altogtether."

The Pakistani government has denied that Mullah Omar and the "Quetta Shura" -- his executive ruling council for Afghanistan -- was based in Pakistan. That is until Pakistan's defense minister said the Quetta Shura is indeed in Pakistan. But rest assured it is not a threat. From Dawn News reports:…

"When your neighbor loses her job, it's a recession. When you lose your job, it's a depression. And when federal workers not only keep their jobs but see their pay rise during a recession, it's something else altogtether."

This is the video that was shown at the opening ceremonies in Copenhagen, commissioned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark specifically for this high-profile, international gathering. Spanning a mere four minutes, it nonetheless hits every fear-mongering point of the climate alarmists…

Angelina Jolie skeptical of Obama's engagement on Darfur: "There will be pressure on the United States and its partners to bring stability to Sudan, even at the expense of criminal accountability. Regardless of the rationale, the end would be the same: victims left without justice while…

Zaytuna College, which plans to be the first accredited Muslim college in the United States, is set to open next fall in Berkeley, California. The college has been hailed as a victory for moderate Islam, a place to promote religious understanding by "blending traditional Islam and American culture…

There are a lot of positive things to be said about President Obama's speech accepting the Nobel Peace Prize. As others have pointed out, it makes sound arguments about the need to use force at times for the purpose of maintaining peace, the limits of non-violence for dealing with the world's worst…

Eamon Javers at Politico writes: President Barack Obama's Nobel Peace Prize speech Thursday is drawing praise from some unlikely quarters - conservative Republicans - who likened Obama's defense of "just wars" to the worldview of his predecessor, Republican George W. Bush. It's already being called…

David Frum wrote in the CNN column linked below that "Rubio has suggested that he would have refused the federal stimulus dollars and instead cut up to $6 billion out of the $65 billion state budget." But Rubio does not say in the YouTube video linked in the CNN column--as Frum suggests--that as…

Before J Street's inaugural conference, the group's director, Jeremy Ben-Ami, gave an interview to Jeffrey Goldberg in which he stated flatly that U.S. aid to Israel should not be used as leverage in peace negotiations. "Military aid should not be on the table -- this is an absolutely essential…

Appearing on Neal Cavuto's show just now, Sen. Lieberman said he has "increasing concerns" about the Reid bill, but he wouldn't say whether or not he plans to vote for cloture. "It ain't over," Lieberman told Cavuto, adding that he's worried a Medicare buy-in would add costs to a program whose…

Buried eight paragraphs down in a New York Times report on Eric Holder's trip to New York to brief officials there on arrangements that they must now make to accommodate KSM and his fellow 9/11 plotters comes this startling revelation: While the entire operation will be similar to the deployment…

She tells USA Today: "'I liked what he said,' Palin told us in a phone interview. 'I talked too in my book about the fallen nature of man and why war is necessary at times.'" Over at Shadow Government, Peter Feaver says Obama's Nobel lecture was maybe "his least partisan speech ever." UPDATE, 3:14…

I recently received a brochure from my alma mater, Georgetown University, entitled "Around the World by Private Jet: An Exploration of the World's Greatest Treasures & Legendary Places" running from September 28 to October 19, 2010. The 22-day journey includes visits to Machu Picchu, Easter Island,…

The New America Foundation released a new poll today, conducted by J Street founding VP Jim Gerstein, that found -- surprise! -- Israelis are suddenly much better inclined toward President Obama than previous polls have shown. Noah Pollak explains how this happened: I was always skeptical of the…

The latest CNN poll finds 61 percent of respondents against the Reid plan, Republicans neck-and-neck with Democrats when it comes to which party the public would like to see in control of Congress, and large majorities thinking that health care reform will raise taxes and the deficit. What's…

Greg Sargent reports: In yet another sign that the writing is on the wall for the public option, Nancy Pelosi repeatedly refused to say today that a bill without one could not pass the House, backing away from a marker she'd laid down in the past. Asked directly at a presser about the current…

Adam Smith reports: We've struggled lately to get a clear answer from Marco Rubio on whether as governor he would have accepted money from the federal stimulus package about which he is so critical. Keith Cate on Tampa Bay's NBC affiliate got a clearer answer: "Ultimately I would have accepted…

President Obama: The world must remember that it was not simply international institutions -- not just treaties and declarations -- that brought stability to a post-World War II world. Whatever mistakes we have made, the plain fact is this: The United States of America has helped underwrite global…

When Michael Oren declined an invitation to appear at J Street's conference in October, the Israeli embassy put out a statement explaining the move as a response to J Street policies that "might impair Israel's interests." It was a devastating statement, but compared to the ambassador's latest…

Recently, Time magazine had a cover story that claimed the past 10 years have been "the worst decade ever." Seriously. I guess the headline writers at Time must have missed the Black Death, the 1930s, etc. Granted, there's some hedging involved. "Bookended by 9/11 at the start and a financial…

Harry Reid met with the Democratic caucus last night but, according to the Times, he wasn't exactly forthcoming when it came to revealing the details of the Gang of Ten's compromise health bill. Reid discussed "general concepts," Ben Nelson of Nebraska told the paper, "but nothing very specific at…

You know what the problem is? The "noise machine of the climate deniers." Yep, that's the problem. Gore spoke to Slate yesterday, dismissing the ClimateGate correspondence as "private exchanges" (which, by the way, he hasn't read) from more than "10 years ago," taken "wildly out of context." Q: How…

A very important Washington Post editorial today: THE ONLY THING more unsettling than watching legislative sausage being made is watching it being made on the fly. The 11th-hour "compromise" on health-care reform and the public option supposedly includes an expansion of Medicare to let people ages…

Over at the Washington Post's PostPartisan blog, the boss notices some similarities between Obama's Nobel speech and one delivered by his predecessor.

AP Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Distinguished Members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, citizens of America, and citizens of the world: I receive this honor with deep gratitude and great humility. It is an award that speaks to our highest aspirations - that for all the cruelty and…

Megan McArdle on ClimateGate: The data doesn't have to be faked to be wrong. George goes to GMA. Of course he will: "Obama to personally push bank CEOs to lend more" What do you mean, "you people?" Thomas the Tank Engine is an insidious example of right-wing classism and sexism being taught to your…

Drenched in crocodile tears, many in the pundit class now portray the GOP as hopelessly divided by fringe groups and internal dissensions.

There has been some talk that when he accepts his Nobel Peace Prize, President Obama should mention Neda Agha-Soltan, the young Iranian woman whose death came to symbolize opposition to the Ahmedinejad/Khamenei regime, or Rebiya Kadeer, the inspirational Uighur leader. There are two more people…

Video via Allahpundit, who writes: the post accompanying this clip at TPM giggles merrily at Grayson's "signature wit" even though (a) recycling a 15-year-old Internet acronym for lowest-common-denominator shock value is neither witty nor signature, and (b) TPM would surely have had itself a…

Another great video from Reason.TV on the true story of a Canadian woman who had to fly to Oklahoma City to get a hip replacement after she was denied care by health care bureaucrats up North: But surely this could never happen in America. Obamacare isn't single-payer. And to argue that one of the…

Politico's Josh Kraushaar reports that Democrat Brian Baird of Southwest Washington will retire: Baird's retirement plans follow similar announcements from Reps. John Tanner (D-Tenn.) and Dennis Moore (D-Kan.), and all three openings have created strong pickup opportunities for Republicans.…

RCP's Mike Memoli highlights a new Rasmussen poll of likely voters that shows Republican challenger John Kasich leading Ohio's Democratic governor Ted Strickland 48% to 39%. Obama's job approval numbers are in the tank with 46% approving and 53% disapproving.

To appease Red China, Obama passes on $4 billion foreign stimulus for high-tech and union workers in America. Noah Pollak expects the Obama administration is gearing up for a major effort to contain and deter...Israel. Obama really likes to threaten unilateral action when dealing with a…

Minxin Pei on Chinese power: If China is so strong, why doesn't it show more leadership in addressing global problems? While Chinese officials show up at almost every important gathering of world leaders, and their opinions and support are eagerly solicited, they consistently maintain a low…

The dogged Phil Klein takes a look at the Medicare "buy in" proposal: Expanding Medicare would go further to advance the original aims of liberals than the watered down version of the public option. By definition, the Medicare option (which would eventually be offered on the exchange to those over…

Word is that Harry Reid will unveil his compromise plan to the Senate Democrats this evening, and that he hopes to hold a cloture vote before Obama departs for Copenhagen next week. President Obama likes the deal. But the left is anxious, and Bernie Sanders and Roland Burris may yet cause trouble.…

reidsnuggie2.jpg A Tennessee mayor has apologized for saying on this Facebook page that the president intentionally pre-empted the Charlie Brown Christmas Special with his Afghanistan speech. In what looks like it amounted to a very bad and badly delivered joke, the mayor also accused him of being…

Yes, from our moral and intellectual betters at the New York Times comes the culmination of diversity awareness-the separate but equal holiday gift guide. Mediaite reports: What I would like to know is who thought this was a good idea? In this year's NYT's Annual Holiday Gift Guide there is a…

With news spreading today that Democrats may abandon the "public option" in the health care reform bill, Senate Republicans issued this analysis suggesting the new "cure" may be worse than the disease. Here's the text of a memo issued by the Senate Republican Policy Committee earlier this…

An amusing release from Brad Dayspring in Eric Cantor's office notes the gradual, almost minutes-long evolution of the Obama administration's views on playing the blame game: 1:56 PM: "The American people have watched for decades people playing the blame game. If the blame game put people to work,…

The AP Fact Check takes a rather skeptical view of the president's speech yesterday. The vaunted news organization finds that (gasp!), the young president wants it both ways: In President Barack Obama's hands, the $700 billion financial rescue fund offers a bit of bookkeeping magic: an opportunity…

Last night Harry Reid announced that Senate Democrats had reached an agreement on a health care bill. "It is a consensus that includes a public option," Reid said in his statement. But subsequent reporting indicates the "public option" may not be part of Reid's "consensus" after all. The option may…

The result from the most recent Public Policy Polling Survey that's getting all the attention is that only 50% of voters now say the prefer having Barack Obama with 44% preferring Geroge W. Bush. But more interesting to me are these results: On health care, only 39% approve of Obama's health care…

NP_315125_DAMA_bpdog_97055d.jpg Photo: St. Petersburg Times The Nanny State will not be moved by reason nor public uproar nor puppy-dog eyes in its mission to keep Slim Jims sanitary: Cody, a chocolate Labrador, has for months greeted customers at the Clearwater BP gas station and convenience store…

Here's the lede, you decide: Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (Conn.) has once again inserted himself into the middle of an inflamed partisan debate, raising questions about his motives, his ego and his fickle allegiance to the Democratic Party, which forgave him after he supported Sen. John McCain…

Ben Smith reports on the recent reversals in the fight for "marriage equality": "It is a historical inevitability, if for no other reason than the old people will eventually die, and the young people are overwhelmingly in favor of it," said David Mixner, a veteran gay rights activist. To which I…

Sarah Palin's Washington Post op-ed today, calling on President Obama to boycott the Copenhagen climate summit, has elicited a predictable response from the left. Foreign Policy's Annie Lowrey blogs: "I wouldn't recommend reading it." Joe Klein seems worried that "The Washington Post devotes…

Ben Smith reports on the recent reversals in the fight for "marriage equality": "It is a historical inevitability, if for no other reason than the old people will eventually die, and the young people are overwhelmingly in favor of it," said David Mixner, a veteran gay rights activist. To which I…

Harry Reid says his Gang of 10 has reached a deal on health care reform. No one knows exactly what's in the deal, since Reid is keeping it close to the vest as he waits for the CBO to score his manager's amendment. Meanwhile, the Senate is poised to consider Byron Dorgan's amendment to allow drug…

That "broad agreement" on health reform announced by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has one especially striking feature. It isn't very broad. In fact, it's breathtakingly narrow. As my colleague William Kristol noted, it lacks the 60 votes needed to pass the Senate. That means Reid can't get 60…

Former NRCC hand and Romney campaign staffer Carl Forti's Blackrock Group is sending around a poll today purporting to show that "Palin Faces Skeptical Republicans in Granite State." The poll, according to Forti's release, was conducted by CrossTarget, a "strategic research firm based in…

The Hill's Alexander Bolton reports: Nearly $6 million in stimulus money was paid to two firms run by Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton's pollster in 2008. Federal records show that $5.97 million from the $787 billion stimulus helped preserve three jobs at Burson-Marsteller, the global public-relations…

The much hyped (if utterly incoherent) deal that Harry Reid is touting doesn't look as if it's doing the trick -- the trick being to cobble together anything (and I mean anything) that can get 60 votes in the Senate, introduce it as a manager's amendment later this week, and jam it through. And…

On Monday, an environmental reporter for Mother Jones magazine reported on Twitter that EPA Administration Lisa Jackson linked the EPA "endangerment" finding to the Climate Change conference in Copenhagen. Kate Sheppard wrote: Lisa Jackson on yesterday's endangerment finding: "We tried to make sure…

In the race no one cared about, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley got the Democratic nod yesterday and Republican Sen. Scott Brown will be the Republican nominee. Top Republicans and Democrats congratulated the respective winners of the seat long occupied by Kennedy, a fixture in…

The NYT dismisses Climategate, but seems to go all "denier" in this paragraph: "Science is about probability, not certainty. And the persisting uncertainties in climate science leave room for argument. What is a realistic estimate of how much temperatures will rise? How severe will the effects be?…

The assassination of State University of New York-Binghamton Middle East anthropology professor emeritus Richard Antoun, on Friday, December 4, in which a Saudi Arabian graduate student named Abdulsalam Al-Zahrani has been charged, once again highlights the issue: how to distinguish between…

The People's Governor has a strong op-ed in the Washington Post calling for Obama to boycott Copenhagen -- complete with link to YouTube of Obama promising to make your energy prices skyrocket. Joseph Abrams catches the UN lying about how many bureaucrats and hangers-on will be attending: U.N.…

I seemed to have missed the news that in Russia's state schools, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago is now required reading--a monumental step for a country that continues to grapple with the darker moments of its history. (I know, tell me which part of Russian history is not dark?) To wit,…

The Senate voted 54 to 45 this afternoon to kill the Nelson amendment, which would prevent taxpayer funding of abortion through Obamacare. Thirty-eight Republicans were joined by seven Democrats in favor of Nelson's amendment: Kent Conrad (N.D.), Byron Dorgan (N.D.), Ted Kaufman (Del.), Ben Nelson…

Gallup's poll putting Obama's job approval at 47 percent got a lot of attention today, but Gallup's demographic breakouts from Monday are at least as interesting because they show a lot of week-to-week movement during November and the first week of December. Highlights: * Obama is doing poorly…

When he's not getting in fights with reporters asking questions about the social secretary, Robert Gibbs is now getting in fights with...poll numbers. Gibbs had this to say about Gallup, whose daily tracking poll found Obama at his lowest point yet yesterday-47 percent: "If I was a heart patient…

RCP's Tom Bevan highlights a new Quinnipiac poll. Obama has benefited from his surge decision; it's interesting that support for the mission in Afghanistan remains 12 points higher than support for Obama's handling of the war in Afghanistan: Public support for the war in Afghanistan is up nine…

Help Wanted: The Foreign Policy Initiative is looking for a communications director.

No, really, Rahm Emanuel has a great idea about health care reform: "That is essentially what Rahm Emanuel has said: Just give us anything and we will declare victory," said [Democratic cognressman John] Conyers. TEXT

Favorite Shatner line (so far!): "He has nothing to look on, except a dignified cow." The interview is both hysterical and informative. I nominate Shatner to replace Larry King. Watch it all:

Memo to Congress: Read David Brooks's column today for an excellent rundown on sensible domestic policy thinking. Key quote: Let's not get carried away with the malaise. The U.S. remains the world's most competitive economy, the leader in information technology, biotechnology and nearly every…

Democrats want to use "leftover" TARP money to pay for a "second stimulus." Obama outlined his proposals in a speech today to the Brookings Institution. There will be a debate over the merits and demerits of the president's various policy preferences. But it looks like there will be debate over the…

The AP puts out this video under the headline "Marines 'inspired, Informed' by Mullen's Speech," which seems like a pretty generous description of the attitude of these Marines as they leave Mullen's speech. Mullen says "there's no deadline, there's no end date, there's no exit strategy," but some…

When you read this New York magazine round-up of reactions to the proposal to lower the age of eligibility for Medicare, it becomes clear how much liberals like the idea. It's "smart," they write, since the whole purpose of the public option was to create a single-payer, Medicare-like alternative…

Some people will believe anything, as Blake Hounshell shows: Percentage of Americans who believe in angels: 55 Percentage of Americans who believe in evolution: 39 Percentage of Americans who believe in anthropogenic global warming: 36 Percentage of Americans who believe in ghosts: 34 Percentage of…

In man-bites-dog news, pomo literary theorist and New York Times online columnist Stanley Fish has read Sarah Palin's memoir ... and thinks it works! Here's Fish: The message is clear. America can't be stopped. I can't be stopped. I've stumbled and fallen, but I always get up and run again. Her…

A vote on Sen. Nelson's abortion amendment could come as early as today. David M. Herszenhorn reports: The liberals believe that as many as nine senators in the 60-member Democratic caucus, including Mr. Nelson, will support the amendment, leaving exactly 51 Democrats in favor of tabling the…

Well, the Conyerses never are shy about speaking their minds. Tension has been rising between the Michigan Democrat and Obama, who reportedly called Conyers last week to ask him to stop "demeaning" him. Obama's decision to challenge Conyers highlights a sensitivity to criticism the president has…

A six-and-a-half foot statue of President Obama as a 10-year-old boy has been commissioned in Jakarta, Xinhua reports. Presumably, the inscription will read: "Didn't you know I would be in my Father's house?" I do want to take issue, briefly, with one sentence of the ABC report: The president spent…

As expected, the Left is not happy about what it heard from Clinton, Gates, and Petraeus this Sunday. "There is no deadline." "We're not talking about an exit strategy or a drop dead deadline.""There's no timeline, no ramp, nothing like that." Now in Afghanistan, Sec. of Defense Robert Gates is…

AP081112038757.jpg AP The fail is epic. Unprecedentedly epic, as the president might say: BLOOMINGTON, Minn. (FOX 9) - A man was arrested for throwing tomatoes at Sarah Palin during her book signing on Monday at the Mall of America. Jeremy Olson, 33, allegedly threw two tomatoes from the second…

Fewer than 500,000 expected to vote in primary for Ted Kennedy's seat. Coakley leads Capuano by double digits. Is it a bad sign for Democratic enthusiasm that you probably didn't even remember this was happening today? Gallup: Obama hits new approval low, at 47 percent. Hey, how about we overhaul…

As Christmas grows closer, the hopes of thousands of D.C. schoolchildren and their families are appearing dimmer and dimmer, and no one is celebrating more than the teachers' unions.

Obama's approval rating at 47 percent in a new Gallup poll. Palin's favorable rating at 46 percent in a new CNN poll. Gen. Petraeus says Obama thinks the Iraq surge worked. $246,436 per simulus job. Steven Hayward has more on Climategate; read his cover story in the latest issue of THE WEEKLY…

In the past, Senator Mary Landrieu (D-La.) has voted against federal funding of abortion even though she supports legalized abortion and the Roe v. Wade decision. But Landrieu's spokesman Aaron Saunders told THE WEEKLY STANDARD tonight: "We expect her to oppose" Senator Ben Nelson's amendment to…

For a primer on why the European Union is likely doomed to shrivel on its own very sorry vine, you will not do better than this amazing piece of weekend analysis from Deutsche Welle. After a delay of five years owing to the objections of some member states to forging a partnership with the…

Spencer Ackerman interviews J Street chief Jeremy Ben-Ami on that group's announcement that it will now back sanctions to cut Iran off from its supply of refined petroleum products. Earlier today Ackerman offered one possible explanation for the move: "The attacks on J Street have worked." I think…

The left is having a hathos-moment, giddily pointing out that Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann are scheduled to meet today in the Twin Cities. "Rep. Michele Bachmann is set to meet tonight for the first time with Sarah Palin," writes Josh Marshall. Sorry, guys. Palin and Bachmann have met before.…

Reihan Salam's Forbes column today runs the gamut from science fiction to Arnold Kling to Chinese-dictator-in-waiting Xi Jinping. Highly recommended. The column ends with this interesting observation: The real value of the work of Kling and Macey isn't to offer detailed blueprints for reform.…

Over at e21, former Bush economic official Chuck Blahous notes an unhappy first for Social Security: Data recently made public by the Social Security Administration confirm that in October, 2009, the program reached a grim milestone: six consecutive months of operating cash deficits. This is the…

Phil Klein points us to a Huffington Post report that among the various "public option compromises" under consideration in the Senate is a proposal to "lower the age of eligibility for Medicare from 65 to 55, though an age limit of 60 has also been suggested." What a ludicrous idea. The coming…

RIA Novosti reports: Vietnam could become a key importer of Russian weaponry if several contracts on the purchase of diesel submarines and aircraft are signed in the near future, a Russian newspaper said. According to the Vedomosti business daily, Moscow and Hanoi are close to sign deals on the…

Paul Krugman writes: "President Obama now plans to address the conference on its last day, which suggests that the White House expects real progress." Sure. The same way his last trip to Copenhagen was a sign that America was making a strong push for having the Olympics in Chicago.

Classic Rock aficionados, still suffering from the transformation of the Beatles into a video game, can now look forward to REO Speedwagon: Find Your Own Way Home. Yes, a video game based on the 1970s-80s band REO Speedwagon has been developed. According to the New York Times, "The game is intended…

An entertaining smear of Teddy Roosevelt on the New York Times op-ed page this weekend makes for fun Pearl Harbor Day reading. Historian James Bradley blames TR for the attack on Pearl -- because it's always America's fault if you go back far enough. Bradley actually makes a pretty compelling case,…

There's no better day than Monday to read a thought-provoking treatise on capitalism by University of Texas scholar and Critical Review editor Jeffrey Friedman. The article covers a lot of ground, but here's my favorite part: In addition to their unfortunate romanticizing of capitalists,…

The Senate Democratic leadership is scrambling for 60 votes as the battle over amendments to the Reid bill continues. On Sunday, Obama visited Capitol Hill to encourage Democrats to pass his legislation. I've noticed that some media are calling Obama's trip to the Capitol "rare." But how "rare" is…

Editor's note: In honor of the anniversary of Pearl Harbor, we are sharing this 2009 piece about Lt. John William Finn, the longest surviving Medal of Honor recipient from that battle. Finn passed away in 2010 at the age of 100.

An Army Colonel writes in response to this post over the weekend: This is an incredibly important battle that will bust up a HUGE Taliban supply base which is at the end of a Taliban infiltration. This route that starts in Pakistan and makes its way north to Now Zad. I served in this region back in…

Sarah Palin had a good weekend. On Saturday, she drew 2,000 people to a book signing in Fair Lakes, Virginia. "The lines stretched down the sidewalk outside BJ's and continued across the street into the parking lot. That part of the line zig zagged multiple times giving the appearance of everyone…

If you read one thing on health care today, make sure it's Jay Cost's excellent post on the subject. Cost breaks down the potential benefits and costs of Obamacare. Here's his list: POSSIBLE BENEFITS: "(1) Reduction in premiums. (2) More security in retaining health coverage." POSSIBLE COSTS: "(1)…

I'm very confused this morning -- I wake up to find out that J Street, the pro-Israel, pro-peace, pro-Palestine, anti-sanctions organization, is now supporting the sanctions legislation making its way through the House. The White House recently asked that that sanctions bill, sponsored by Rep.…

In a Washington Post column this past weekend, sports author extraordinaire John Feinstein takes on the Tiger Woods controversy. And while there's an argument to be made that the man should be left alone -- what business is it of ours to know why he crashed into a hydrant and a tree? -- Feinstein…

We've heard from the Obama White House that July 2011 is "etched in stone" for beginning of withdrawal from Afghanistan. At the time that statement was released, I took comfort in the fact that an Obama stone usually operates like an Etch-a-Sketch, so there would remain a chance at changed strategy…

The country is experiencing a dire shortage of Eggo waffles after two complications at Kellogg's Atlanta plant halted production for months. When the Georgia Department of Agriculture found a bacteria problem in the factory in September, Kellogg went to work correcting that. Just as the plant was…

Now, I'm not always a huge fan of the White House press corps, to be sure, but must the president make excuses for himself by making things up about them? At the end of Obama's jobs summit Thursday, Barack Obama put the press corps on the long list of adversaries who are standing in the way of the…

How much does Sarbanes Oxley cost? "Section 404 is still consuming more than $2.3 million each year in direct compliance costs at the average company. The SEC's survey shows the long-term burden on small companies is more than seven times that imposed on large firms relative to their assets. Are…

Next time you run into a group of Democrats, offer to splash water on their faces. They've spent 2009 in a dream state, and it's time they wake up. They're convinced that they can subsidize health insurance for millions of people while also "bending the cost curve" of health care spending. They…

Dennis Blair was confirmed by the Senate to be Obama's director of national intelligence (DNI) within days of the inauguration. Other than his failed attempt to appoint Charles Freeman to head up the office which produces national intelligence estimates, Blair's only other newsworthy achievement…

Damien Hirst

The Princess and the Frog

Last week the Washington Post reported an odd bit of news from Mountain View, Calif.: Google was issuing an apology for one of its search results.

The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR) is in the news again, for the first time since then-chairman Mary Frances Berry tried to prevent seating a George W. Bush appointee. This time, though, it is challenging liberal civil rights orthodoxies, and Democrats and left-leaning civil rights groups…

President Obama will receive his Nobel Peace Prize on December 10 in Oslo, Norway. This is a problem for Obama, and maybe for the rest of us as well.

On November 18, Iran's foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki rejected a proposal that his country should export some 70 percent of its low-enriched uranium for further processing abroad. On November 20, the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council plus Germany met in Brussels and urged…

The acute pain in my right foot extends from the inside arch over the instep to my ankle. It's a sharp, intense twinge when I walk or just press the accelerator in my car. When I sit, it throbs. When I focus on it, I imagine that inside my shoe my foot is actually pulsating, cartoon-style.

The Obama approach to world politics--engage, apologize, avoid friction, be humble, reach out to previously scorned tyrannical regimes--is being criticized nowadays on pragmatic grounds. A record of 10 months shows this modest approach has brought modest if any returns. Low costs, the president's…

Warsaw

Harold Macmillan

Like many whodunit fans, I made a fatal error at the outset of my reading career. I devoured Edgar Allan Poe, Sherlock Holmes, the Father Brown stories, the best of Agatha Christie, and scores of books featuring Georges Simenon's indefatigable Inspector Maigret. By the age of 30, I had polished off…

The Modern Papacy

The Metamorphoses of Tintin

Eight years after the atrocities of 9/11, Americans need to know what public school textbooks are teaching about Islam, radical Islam, and terrorism. The big three textbook states--those that set standards for content because publishers aim to capture their large sales, California, Texas, and…

From the very beginning, the Obama White House has been obsessed with the process by which national security decisions are made -- and with getting the press to treat that obsession as evidence that this White House is somehow more serious about national security decisions than its predecessor.…

Manhattan Despite near freezing temperatures and steady rain, a spirited crowd of 9/11 families, first responders, and their supporters rallied this afternoon outside a federal courthouse in Manhattan to protest Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to give Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other 9/11…

The new numbers from Pew have support for torture at a 5 year high, with 19 percent saying torture is "often" justified when interrogating terror suspects and 35 percent saying it is "sometimes" justified. That's a majority of Americans who, unlike the president, understand that there are very real…

Today's Wall Street Journal has an amazing and -- if you enjoy the occasional gaming experience -- thoroughly engrossing feature story on Terrance Watanabe, who this year ran up a gambling debt of $127 million -- supposedly the biggest losing streak in Vegas history. Harrah's casino claims Mr.…

The AP reports: U.S. Marines and Afghan troops have killed at least seven Taliban fighters during the first U.S.-led offensive since President Barack Obama announced a new American war plan this week, Afghan officials said Saturday. American and Afghan troops have met little resistance since…

"Modestly", "moderately", and "jobs" are the three words that cover just about everything that is going on in the U.S. political economy. The latest summary of economic conditions prepared by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York reports that "economic conditions have generally improved modestly;…

Tomorrow at noon, family members of the victims of the 9/11 attacks will join with first responders and others holding a rally in Manhattan to protest AG Eric Holder's decision -- made without consulting the President of the United States, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Mayor of New York…

Tomorrow at noon, family members of the victims of the 9/11 attacks will join with first responders and others holding a rally in Manhattan to protest AG Eric Holder's decision -- made without consulting the President of the United States, the Secretary of Homeland Security, the Mayor of New York…

Fifty-nine percent of voters think it was a bad idea for Obama to announce a timeline for withdrawal. Obama will not legalize hookers and blow to stimulate the economy. David Harsanyi on Climategate. Ramesh Ponnuru on the Center for American Progress's update to the Catechism of the Catholic…

Barron YoungSmith and TNR keep up their (admirable) assault on Sudan envoy Scott Gration: Chairman Donald Payne, who originally convinced Congress to declare the situation in Darfur a "genocide," said that "for some, our policy is too focused on punitive measures. I beg to differ." He complained…

Laura Rozen reports: But almost a year later, neither Holbrooke nor Mitchell is looking as confident about his status in the administration or prospects for success. Holbrooke, who once seemed to relish his access to both Obama and Clinton and built a staff of more than two dozen aides while…

Greg Sargent pulls some fascinating numbers out of a new CNN poll, which finds support for Obama's surge at 61 percent. The administration can thank Republicans -- the loyal opposition -- for that impressive number. Without the support of nearly every major figure in Republican politics, surely…

The latest Mason/Dixon poll shows Harry Reid trailing Republican challenger Sue Lowden by 10 points. Reid's disapproval number is at 49 percent. His approval is at 38 percent. Not very encouraging. Reid campaign manager Brandon Hall tells the Vegas Review-Journal: "We've always said we will run an…

The Bureau of Labor Statistics is out with the latest job numbers. In November the unemployment rate fell to 10 percent. So at least the number is headed in the right direction. For more commentary, here's Megan McArdle: "It's very solidly good news: the labor force participation rate was basically…

There'll be enough gas in the conference room to float a climate balloon over Copenhagen next week, but just in case the Scandinavian winter still proves too chill for them, global warmers will have the chance to get heated up during the breaks: The Copenhagen prostitutes' union, up in arms after…

A new USA Today/Gallup poll shows that 56 percent of Americans support sending more troops to Afghanistan (38 percent say the 30,000 Obama's sending is "about right," while 16 percent say that number is "too low"); 36 percent say that number of troops is "too high." Fifty-one percent support…

That's the takeaway from this interesting Tevi Troy commentary in Politico. Here's Troy: Even if the Democrats succeed in the next couple of months in passing a health care overhaul, Congress will quite likely have to reopen the issue anyway. The Senate Democratic bill carries a high cost - $848…

Today's battle in the Senate, according to David Herszenhorn, will center on proposed cuts to the Medicare Advantage program: Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, has proposed an amendment to block the cuts, which would reduce spending on Medicare Advantage plans by about $120 billion over…

Americans Tax Reform's president Grover Norquist wrote in 2007: "Speaker Rubio's proposal is a net tax cut, thus a vote for the proposal would not constitute a violation of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge for."

A source on the Hill informs THE WEEKLY STANDARD that the US government Export-Import Bank is fighting the Banking Committee Iran Sanctions bill, passed out of committee last month on a unanimous vote and which is now sitting on the Senate calendar while supporters push for it to be approved by…

It isn't often that the before, during, and after images of a suicide attack are caught an camera. Al Jazeera inadvertently did just that yesterday when it captured a Shabaab suicide attack in the Somali capital of Mogadishu. The target was several Somali ministers attending a graduation ceremony…

The Marine Corps Times reports: A North Carolina-based infantry battalion will be the first U.S. unit to deploy to Afghanistan as part of an additional 30,000 troops who will be sent into combat during the next six months, said a Marine official overseeing the unit. Camp Lejeune's 1st Battalion,…

There were only two stories this week about famous people showing up on packages of illicit drugs. One was Edward, the stoic vampire of "Twilight" fame, played by tween sensation Robert Pattison. The other was Barack Obama. As a wise ad once said, "He's the biggest celebrity in the world."

Hat tip: Jonah Goldberg

December 3: The president hosts a jobs summit. December 4: The Department of Labor announces that unemployment dropped to 10 percent in November. Those sounds you hear are champagne corks popping in the West Wing.

Cal Thomas interviews Virginia's governor-elect Bob McDonnell: Q. I want to ask you the Katie Couric/Sarah Palin question with a twist. What do you read for information and inspiration? A. Information. I read a series of daily news clips, the Richmond Times Dispatch, a lot of Internet searches. I…

Absent the Camelot "aura," the nation has been relieved of its obligation to care deeply about the senate seat in Massachusetts, and it has responded enthusiastically with an utter lack of enthusiasm: But the race to replace the late Sen. Edward Kennedy has become anything but a battle royal.…

Polanksi begins house arrest in Swiss ski chalet. Hollywood may be able to stop weeping briefly, now.

The last frontier in idiotic home owner's association rules? 90-year-old Medal of Honor recipient can't put a flag in his yard. Noonan on Obama's redeclaration of war: "The Democrats for eight years had been removed from daily national responsibility-the party out of power always is-and in any case…

Over at the Corner, Andy McCarthy points out that Louay Safi, a top official at the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), has been brought into Fort Hood to teach our troops about Islam. There's just one problem. As McCarthy and others have reminded us, ISNA has a variety of disturbing ties to…

Over at the Corner, Andy McCarthy points out that Louay Safi, a top official at the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), has been brought into Fort Hood to teach our troops about Islam. There's just one problem. As McCarthy and others have reminded us, ISNA has a variety of disturbing ties to…

The scoring is in on the health-care bills, and it's hard to see what the Democrats' proposed health-care overhaul would achieve apart from centralizing and consolidating power in Washington. During the campaign, then-Senator Obama said, "I am committed to signing a universal health care plan into…

That's the theme of Peter Beinart's latest essay in Time: The best precedent for all this is what Nixon did in the late Vietnam years. For roughly two decades, the U.S. had been trying to contain "communism" - another ominous, elastic noun that encompassed a multitude of movements and regimes. But…

According to press accounts, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates told a Senate hearing today that the Obama administration has identified 116 Guantanamo detainees (out of the remaining 211) who can be transferred. That's an incredibly high number - much higher than the numbers that were reported…

By a 61 to 39 vote, the Senate approved Barbara Mikulski's amendment to require health insurers to provide free mammograms and other preventive screenings for women. The cost amounts to around $1 billion over the next decade. Among the No votes was Wisconsin's noted liberal Russ Feingold. Why did…

TPM's Brian Beutler reports on Sen. Ben Nelson's statement to reporters today on what he'd do if the Senate does not approve his anti-abortion funding amendment, which mirrors the amendment offered by Bart Stupak in the House: "I will not vote to take it off the floor," said Nelson (D-NE). "Now I…

Jess Bachman has released his updated graphic representation of the federal budget, which he calls "Death and Taxes." You can order them here. A preview:

In the Delaware Senate race, Republican congressman Mike Castle leads prospective Democratic candidate Beau Biden, the state's attorney general and the VP's son, 45 percent to 39 percent in a new poll by the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling. The poll's most remarkable finding is that--by a 46…

Fresh off the triumph of their humiliation of President Obama during his Asian trip, this week the Chinese decided to stomp on America's Hat. I am, of course, referring to Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's public dressing down of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper during their joint appearance in…

It's among the pro-growth items in his op-ed for USA Today. For further reading, check out NRO's virtual jobs summit. Here are two choice cuts: "Unspent stimulus money meant for states and cities should go only to state and cities that use the funds to credibly cut their long-term spending. It's…

Boxer: Hackers should face criminal probe over 'Climategate': Leaked e-mails allegedly undermining climate change science should be treated as a criminal matter, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) said Wednesday afternoon. Boxer, the top Democrat on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee,…

Yuval Levin announces: On December 15, the Hudson Institute in Washington will host a panel discussion of a very important but under-examined element of the contribution the late Irving Kristol made to American life: his involvement in shaping and guiding private philanthropic giving related to…

New Hampshire Republican senator Judd Gregg has sent a memo to his co-partisans outlining the tools the minority can use to impede passage of Harry Reid's health care bill. From the memo: I think that we can all agree that the Democrats' bill is the wrong choice for our nation. It will impact…

The amendments to Harry Reid's health care bill continue to pile up. Some of the more important: (1) The McCain amendment to strip the bill of its Medicare cuts. (2) The Mikulski amendment to mandate mammograms and other screenings without co-pays. (3) The Dorgan-Snowe amendment to allow drug…

You may remember a rash of media reports in August and September about a claim that assassination threats directed at President Obama are up 400 percent over previous presidents, stretching the Secret Service to its limits. The claim came from a book by NewsMax's Ronald Kessler, "In the President's…

The irony seems entirely lost on our British allies, but one can understand why not all of them are so amused by the prospect of being in a foxhole with a stoned out Afghan. Still, watching this I can't help thinking that some American soldier in the First World War must have been looking at his…

The sentiment should be, "Hey, what we may be asked to sacrifice to be in session on a Christmas Eve is nothing compared to what our men and women in uniform sacrifice every day of their comfort and safety in order to keep us safe from threats." Instead the sentiment is, "If that soldier can be on…

What would Palestine look like today if the Arabs hadn't rejected the 1947 partition plan that assigned to them most of the arable land and to the Jews most of the desert; hadn't continued to dream of being restored to the puppethood of a resurgent Third Reich; hadn't set upon the Jews with their…

As Obama convenes his jobs summit and his allies in the media hail a new CBO report that supposedly shows the stimulus spending "has saved or created more than 640,000 jobs, and possibly as many as 1.6 million," make sure to check out this post by the American Spectator's Joseph Lawler, who…

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs seems to have a real problem with Defense Secretary Robert Gates. Either that or Gibbs is so dim that he doesn't realize that when he misrepresents Afghanistan troop requests at the end of the Bush administration he's trashing Gates -- President Obama's top…

The number of Americans identifying as Democrats, though still hovering above Republican identification, fell two points in November alone: The number of Americans identifying themselves as Democrats fell by nearly two percentage points in November. Added to declines earlier in the year, the number…

You can't get much more Washington than this: Reports from stimulus recipients show that a sizable sum has gone to federal contractors in the Washington area who are helping implement the initiative -- in effect, they are being paid a hefty slice of the money to help spend the rest of it. The…

At an FTC workshop on the future of media entitled, "How will journalism survive the Internet age?" this week, the usual suspects were begging for a hand out, led by Rep. Henry Waxman. "Government's going to have to be involved, in one way or the other," to save journalism from an ongoing "market…

Der Spiegel jumps ship: "Never before has a speech by President Barack Obama felt as false...It was two speeches in one. That is why it felt so false. Both dreamers and realists were left feeling distraught. The American president doesn't need any opponents at the moment. He's already got himself."…

'Doh! Obama and Tiger Woods appear on Photoshopped cover of Golf Digest together this month. Clinton, Gates, McChrystal: July 2011 not "locked in," and president could change his mind based on conditions. Obama says July 2011 troop withdrawal "etched in stone," but an Obama stone usually operates…

President Obama convenes a "jobs summit" at the White House today, as our nation faces its worst employment crisis in the last 25 years. In preparation, he should carefully read an article in the October edition of Trends magazine titled, America's Future: California vs. Texas.

The New York Senate defeats gay marriage on a 38 to 24 vote. Jeff Sessions: KSM in NYC is bad for America. Obama says July 2011 is a hard target to begin withdrawing troops. The New Haven firefighters whom Sonia Sotomayor ruled against finally get their promotions after their victory at the Supreme…

President Obama last night: This vast and diverse citizenry will not always agree on every issue -- nor should we. But I also know that we, as a country, cannot sustain our leadership, nor navigate the momentous challenges of our time, if we allow ourselves to be split asunder by the same rancor…

Answer: Obama won't pose for a picture with either of them: When President Obama spoke to troops at Alaska's Elmendorf Air Force Base last month, the unit there parked a shiny new F-22 fighter plane in the hangar. But according to multiple sources, White House aides demanded the plane be changed to…

In Pakistan and Iraq and among groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah, women have proven capable of becoming equally or more radicalized than men. This is not the case in Afghanistan--and it is a shame that President Obama did not seize the promise and potential of Afghan women as part of his new…

You'd think that Eric Holder would check with the Secretary of Homeland Security before making a decision to send the man behind the 9/11 attacks back to the scene of the crime for an open trial in federal court. There are all kinds of national security implications that stem from Holder's…

Nobody drives the left nuts like Joe: Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), a member of the Armed Services Committee, praised President Obama today for disagreeing with Democrats over Afghanistan war strategy. "In making this decision, President Obama has respectfully disagreed with the majority of the…

His must-read post can be found here. From the conclusion: Perhaps this same deep American refusal to accept losing gracefully will also check the foreign policy establishment's rush to embrace American decline. The Obama administration's ranks are filled with people, fresh from the academy and the…

Senate Republicans highlight this line from Senator Max Baucus's (D-Mont.) floor remarks today: "Just for a second -- health care reform, whether you use a ten-year number or when you start in 2010 or start in 2014, wherever you start at, so it is still either $1 trillion or it's $2.5 trillion,…

Among the interesting moments during President Obama's speech on the Afghanistan surge last night, there was his rejection of the Vietnam analogy: First, there are those who suggest that Afghanistan is another Vietnam. They argue that it cannot be stabilized, and we're better off cutting our losses…

The statement from Rumsfeld: "In his speech to the nation last night, President Obama claimed that ‘Commanders in Afghanistan repeatedly asked for support to deal with the reemergence of the Taliban, but these reinforcements did not arrive.' Such a bald misstatement, at least as it pertains to…

The White House wanted health care reform on the president's desk by summer. It didn't happen. Nancy Pelosi got her bill through before Thanksgiving. Now Harry Reid's goal is to pass his version by Christmas. Pelosi says it would be a "Christmas present" to the "American people." (No return…

The Hill reports: A new measure on the public option will be unveiled next week, which Senate Democratic leaders hope will break the logjam on healthcare reform. Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), who has been tapped by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to come up with a Plan B approach to the public…

In his prepared remarks before the Senate Armed Services Committee today, Secretary Gates does a much better job of explaining the relationship between fighting the Taliban and defeating al Qaeda than the president did last night. As the president first stated in March, and re-emphasized last…

Andy McCarthy writes: Is there any way of getting Obama to reverse himself on KSM? If I've heard that question once, I've heard it a thousand times since Attorney General Eric Holder's announcement that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other 9/11 plotters will be transferred to New York City for a…

ClimateGate III: The Mysterious Missing Data Courting Sen. Collins. Teach them young: College Democrats implicated in Ohio election bribery scheme. The dreaded X on Afghanistan. Video: Howard Dean talks about the peaceful coexistence of socialism and capitalism in the U.S. The overwrought Time…

The Urban Institute, a prominent liberal think tank, has come out with a report that proposes that the best reason for a strong public option is that it will actually strengthen the power of private insurance companies to bargain with the local powerful medical groups and hospitals as the latter…

Palin posts a statement: At long last, President Obama decided to give his military commanders much of what they need to accomplish their mission in Afghanistan. In the end, he decided to endorse a "surge" for Afghanistan, applying the counterinsurgency principles of "clear, hold and build" that…

After his speech tonight, I seem to be more upbeat about the prospects for the war in Afghanistan under President Obama's leadership than some of my friends. Obviously, the July 2011 date for beginning a drawdown deserves criticism. On the other hand, the pace and character of the drawdown is to be…

President Obama's speech on Afghanistan was disappointing. Yes, the policy is right: more troops, a counter-insurgency strategy, a stronger alliance with Pakistan. But the personal commitment of the president to pursue the war against the Taliban and al Qaeda until they are defeated was not there.…

Almost all presidential speeches are too long, and President Obama could have shaved 60 percent from his address tonight, since he had approximately 15 minutes of content stretched over 35 minutes of talking. The excess came in platitudes about the economy, his own irenic intentions, and much else.…

Marc Ambinder: Obama's close buddy Durbin issues single sentence statement saying: Obama took months to make this policy, I'll wait to react to it. Contrast that with the statement from McCain.

Bill Kristol writes at the Washington Post: In his Monday open letter/cri de coeur to the man he supported for president, Michael Moore asked Barack Obama: Do you really want to be the new "war president"? If you go to West Point tomorrow night (Tuesday, 8pm) and announce that you are increasing,…

He appears to be referring to West Point cadets as Obama's "enemy camp," politically speaking, based on skeptical looks in the audience and the absence of lots of cheering. To be fair, the audience is quiet partly because it's a highly disciplined group of cadets accustomed to following strict…

President Obama's remarks as prepared for delivery after the jump:Remarks of President Barack Obama-As Prepared for Delivery The Way Forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan United States Military Academy at West Point December 1, 2009 Good evening. To the United States Corps of Cadets, to the men and…

President Barack Obama tonight: Our children's and grandchildren's "lives will be better if other peoples' children and grandchildren can live in freedom and access opportunity." President George W. Bush's second inaugural: "The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all…

ISAF posts the statement from General McChrystal: "The Afghanistan-Pakistan review led by the President has provided me with a clear military mission and the resources to accomplish our task. The clarity, commitment and resolve outlined in the President's address are critical steps toward bringing…

From the desk of Sen. John McCain: "The President has made the right decision to embrace a counterinsurgency strategy for Afghanistan and to resource it properly. I think the 30,000 additional U.S. troops that will deploy as part of this mission, plus greater allied commitments, will enable us to…

Chuck Todd of NBC was reporting that the relatively late release of excerpts was because Obama was still "tinkering" with the speech as of 6 p.m.: The 30,000 additional troops that I am announcing tonight will deploy in the first part of 2010 - the fastest pace possible - so that they can target…

Here's the full transcript of the Obama administration background briefing on the president's speech tonight. Ben Nelson says he'll introduce an anti-abortion funding amendment "as identical to Stupak as it can be." Richard Lindzen: The climate science isn't settled. Joe Carter: Huckabee and the…

The Obama administration conducted a 30 minute conference call this afternoon with journalists to preview President Obama's speech on Afghanistan tonight. The final question concerned Iran. The reporter who posed the question informed the senior administration officials briefing the media that Iran…

President Obama told congressional leaders this afternoon that a key message of his speech tonight is that the United States is "on the trajectory of a drawdown" in Afghanistan. Obama opened the meeting with a brief -- ten minute -- preview of his remarks. He then fielded questions, including some…

Aswat al-Iraq reports: An Iraqi journalist said on Tuesday that he threw his shoes at the famous Muntather al-Zaydi, a local TV reporter who threw a pair of shoes at former U.S. President George W. Bush at a press conference in Baghdad last year, during his visit to Paris. "I threw my pair of shoes…

Listening to the conference call just conducted by two senior administration officials, one is struck by the extent to which this administration has now appropriated the tactics, the language, and the logic of the 2007 surge in Iraq for their own 2010 surge into Afghanistan. This senior…

On a conference call this afternoon, a reporter asked for a senior Obama administration official's reaction to an Iranian spokesman's statement that "Iran regards the U.S. government's policy of surging forces as following Bush policy and that they see no change in U.S. policy…" The…

On a conference call with reporters, a senior Obama administration official said that during his speech on Afghanistan tonight, President Obama will reaffirm the "core goal of the United States in the region," which is to "disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al Qaeda and to prevent their…

Last week, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs hailed the fact that Russia and China supported an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) resolution criticizing Iran's continued noncompliance with multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions, saying in a statement that Friday's vote…

Here's the AP on the first day of the Senate's health care debate. The most interesting stuff comes toward the end of the story: Despite the public jousting, significant action was occurring behind the scenes Monday evening as Reid, D-Nev., and Baucus huddled to plot strategy with top White House…

If you spend as much time watching television--particularly children's programs -- as I do lately, you are probably wondering the same thing I am: Since when did the Sun-Maid Girl become hot? Apparently the computer-animated version of the Sun-Maid Girl has been out and about, gallivanting through…

The former veep gives an interview to not a real news organization Politico: In a 90-minute interview at his suburban Washington house, Cheney said the president's "agonizing" about Afghanistan strategy "has consequences for your forces in the field." "I begin to get nervous when I see the…

New poll numbers from Rasmussen show that 60 percent of respondents say health care reform will increase the deficit, and 75 percent say that it's likely middle-class taxes will increase in order to pay for the Democrats' new entitlement. No wonder close to 50 percent of Americans disapprove of the…

Superwonk James Capretta has a must-read post at NRO on CBO's recent analysis of health care reform's probable consequences for insurance premiums. Capretta makes two key points. First, even though the CBO report contains data helpful to Senate Democrats, it also undercuts a recent study by liberal…

Fred Barnes writes on the START follow-on treaty with the Russians: When the Nobel Committee announced [Obama's Peace Prize], it pointedly "attached special importance to Obama's vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons." But Obama may go to Oslo empty-handed--and a bit…

wood17.jpg You know, sometimes I give short shrift to meddlesome lawmakers and busy-body bureaucrats, merely harping on them for their unnecessary interventions instead of recognizing them for their creativity. Sometimes statists need love, too. For instance, the Virginia legislature should be…

Sheriff Joe Arpaio, the Arizona sheriff famous for his tough stance on illegal immigration, appeared at Arizona State University's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication's interview series for students and journalists Monday. He took questions for more than 40 minutes before…

"Today's" Matt Lauer lands the first, coveted interview with....the Salahis. Floodgates, open.

washington_Maurice-_652766a.jpg Clemmons, on the run since he killed four police officers in an execution-style ambush at a coffee house, has been shot by Seattle police. Several news sources are reporting him dead: Police radio traffic monitored over the internet suggested that the suspect,…

Ain't no party like a holiday Tea Party, 'cause a holiday Tea Party don't stop. Democracy Corps: "The survey found that voters now say, by a three-point margin (45% to 42%), that Republicans would do a better job on the economy than Democrats. That's a change from the 16-point lead Democrats had in…

One of the best kept secrets in Washington is the continuing valuable service provided by the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. The commission, established by Congress in late 2000, reports to Congress annually "on the national security implications of the bilateral trade and…