Year: 2013

On almost every left-right issue that divides Democrats and Republicans — as well as Republicans themselves — there is a neglected populist constituency. The result is that populist politics are largely caricatured as Tea Party extremism — and a voice for the middle class is largely absent. The problem with Obamacare is that its well-connected […]

The outrage industry was in high dudgeon just before Christmas over remarks “Duck Dynasty” family patriarch, Phil Robertson, made to GQ magazine about homosexuality. Outrage is the primary ingredient for political fundraising and political power. One must always have an enemy. Let’s go down the “I Take Offense” checklist and make sure all the boxes […]

Consider this: Taylor Swift wasn’t even born yet when the fight over the Mount Soledad cross began. How much longer will it drag on? Disgruntled atheists first filed suit over the memorial at a veterans park in San Diego in the summer of 1989. The fringe grievance-mongers have clung bitterly to their litigious activities for […]

If you saw a fat man in a sleigh distributing presents this week, he was in violation of several government regulations. The Federal Aviation Administration has complaints about his secret flight path. The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources might shoot his unauthorized reindeer the way they shot a baby deer named Giggles at an animal […]

Politicians can be progressives, liberals, conservatives, Democrats or Republicans, and right-wingers. They just can’t be dumb. The American people will never elect them to office. Let’s look at it. For years, I used to blame politicians for our economic and social mess. That changed during the 1980s as a result of several lunches with Sen. […]

A&E’s indefinite suspension of “Duck Dynasty” star Phil Robertson over his comments regarding homosexuality, and the subsequent backlash, is an important cultural moment in American life. For the first time in decades, traditionally religious Americans have come out of the closet en masse to speak out against anti-religious bigotry from proponents of gay rights. This, […]

Normally at this time of year, the culture-war fight is over a guy with a white beard. That’s true again this year. What’s different is that Phil Robertson has taken Santa’s place, and instead of a war on Christmas, we have a war on “Duck Dynasty.” The patriarch of the popular A&E reality show said […]

Ronald Hale went to the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Canada last month with a lung problem, but instead of being helped, he was killed by the superbug carbapenem-resistant enterobacteriaceae. The germ, which had been brought into the hospital by a female patient initially treated outside Canada, put him into septic shock and caused organ failure. […]