Author: Debra Saunders

“Barack Obama of 2007 would be right down here with me arguing against this drone strike program if he were in the Senate,” Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., declared in the course of his 13-hour Senate “talking filibuster,” which delayed a confirmation vote for now-CIA chief John Brennan. That’s the thing; the Obama of 2007 no […]

As a conservative with gay friends, nothing would make me happier than to watch Californians pass an initiative to legalize same-sex marriage — preferably with protections for religious objectors. Polls suggest it would pass today. Then the issue would be settled, and Californians — not a court in Washington — would have determined their own […]

“President Obama has been among the most merciless presidents in the history of the United States,” political science professor P.S. Ruckman wrote on his blog, “Pardon Power,” over the weekend. The president had just issued 17 pardons — the first pardons of his second term. That’s merciful, right? Except that though Obama rightly used his […]

There is a rule in Politics 2013 that’s evident in the flap about a White House aide’s maybe threatening or not threatening Washington Post veteran reporter Bob Woodward. The rule: The more superficial the brouhaha the bigger its impact. What public figures say is more important than what they do, because cable TV and political […]

When Rep. Jackie Speier, D-Calif., met with the San Francisco Chronicle’s editorial board last week, she said reasonable people could pass a bill to apply $85 billion in sequester cuts more surgically. Too bad she’s a member of Congress. When Editorial Page Editor John Diaz asked whether she considers the scale of the cuts to […]

You’ve got to admit that it’s awfully precious that there was a huge controversy about “Zero Dark Thirty” because Kathryn Bigelow’s film suggested that enhanced interrogation techniques helped intelligence officials find Osama bin Laden but no controversy about the final mission in the movie — to kill, but not capture, the al-Qaida leader. Some of […]

In its wisdom — and yes, I am being ironic — the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco issued a ruling Tuesday that revives a California inmate lawsuit to force the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to hire a paid, full-time Wiccan chaplain. Oddly, the three-judge panel found that the complaint […]

If President Barack Obama, the Republican House and the Democratic Senate cannot cut $85 billion from this year’s $3.8 trillion budget without laying off first responders, tying up airport security lines and furloughing food safety inspectors, what good are they? The answer is: Not much. It turns out we elect lawmakers so they can hold […]

Sen. Dianne Feinstein began her war on allergy and cold sufferers in 2005. In an effort to prevent small-time dealers from buying allergy and cold drugs and cooking them into methamphetamine, she pushed through legislation requiring consumers to show identification before purchasing products with pseudoephedrine — otherwise known as the good allergy drugs, known only […]

In 2010, Kimberly Munley sat next to Michelle Obama as President Barack Obama delivered his State of the Union address. Munley was invited as a hero of the 2009 Fort Hood shootings. As a civilian police officer, Munley fired back after Maj. Nidal Hasan allegedly opened fire in an attack that killed 13 adults and […]

In his column Sunday, former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown wrote that on Labor Day weekend, he’ll be preening at the Bay Bridge opening ceremony, taking credit for obstructing plans to rebuild the Bay Bridge so that it could be the “the world-class wonder” he knows it will be. “What gall,” quoth Judge Quentin Kopp, […]

San Francisco passed America’s first ban on plastic bags in chain groceries and drugstores in 2007. In a research paper for the Institute for Law and Economics, law professors Jonathan Klick and Joshua Wright crunched state and federal data on emergency room admissions and food-borne illness deaths and figured that the San Francisco ban “led […]

On Tuesday, NBC released a confidential Department of Justice paper concluding that our government can authorize the use of drones to kill targeted terrorist leaders, including U.S. citizens abroad. This story bares the dividing line between honest liberals — such as Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., the American Civil Liberties Union and the San Francisco Chronicle’s […]

President Barack Obama is not committed to fixing Washington’s chronic budget woes or jump-starting an ailing an economy, but that doesn’t mean this administration lacks focus. If there is one area in which this administration delivers, it is taunting Republicans. Think Lucy teasing Charlie Brown with the football — except in this case, Lucy is […]

“Why this fat cat likes Obama’s tax plan” was the headline of a full-page ad La Jolla, Calif., investor Norman Lizt took out in The New York Times in August. No, it wasn’t really an endorsement. Lizt wrote that he has been a successful investor over the years, but if Americans re-elected President Barack Obama […]

If you thought Republican presidential hopefuls were insane to refuse to raise their hands during a 2011 primary debate when asked whether they’d support a deficit reduction deal with $10 in spending cuts to $1 in tax increases, look at Washington today. In August 2011, President Barack Obama signed a debt ceiling deal that promised […]

California state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson has introduced a bill to allow 15-year-olds to preregister to vote. “I would like to engage young people in the political process at the earliest point in time. If young people get invested in the process earlier, they’ll be likelier to vote,” Jackson said Monday. To my mind, the reason […]

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Gov. Jerry Brown gives great speeches with unusual quotes that never let the listener forget he is a former seminarian. In that spirit during his State of the State address Thursday, Brown quoted jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes, told a story from Genesis and marveled at the “mysterious cycle in human events” observed […]

“With all due respect, the fact is we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest, or was it because of guys out for a walk one night who decided they’d they go kill some Americans? What difference, at this point, does it make?” Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asked the Senate Foreign […]

As President Barack Obama’s second term commences, I thought I’d write about the things I liked in his first term. Here are five: 1) Obama is a great role model — and not simply as a black American who broke racial barriers. Obama is a strong role model for the adult male — a husband […]

Like a lot of Californians, Stockton businessman Matt Davies, 34, expected that when Barack Obama was elected in 2008, the new administration would not prosecute medical marijuana dispensaries operating under a law passed by California voters in 1996. After all, as a candidate, Obama contended that he saw federal enforcement against medical marijuana as a […]

If I were president, what would I do in the wake of the Dec. 14 Sandy Hook School shooting, which left 20 first-graders and six adults dead, if I wanted not only to advance an ambitious initiative to reduce gun violence but also to sign a law that actually worked? To punctuate what is at […]

You know that old saying that there are no dumb questions? It’s not true. I know. As a journalist, I’ve asked my share of stupid questions. Yet even in the context of my own shortcomings, I do not understand what the White House press corps is thinking during what passes for a news conference in […]

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials detained Roberto Galo on Wednesday morning. Galo is a legal immigrant but an unlicensed driver who, on Nov. 16, 2010, took a left turn at Harrison and 16th streets in San Francisco. His car struck law student Drew Rosenberg. Witnesses later testified that Galo then backed over Rosenberg, who […]

“It is now time to return the control of our prison system to California,” Gov. Jerry Brown declared at a news conference Tuesday morning. Amen to that. Federal lawsuits and federal judges have taken over the state’s prison system. Unelected judges don’t have to worry about paying for what they command. Nor need they worry […]

“Never make an enemy by accident,” housemaid Anna Bates warned her husband in the third season premiere of “Downton Abbey” Sunday night. That’s what the housemaid’s mother always told her. If his mother ever gave him the same advice, former GOP Sen. Chuck Hagel — now President Barack Obama’s pick to serve as secretary of […]

During George W. Bush’s presidency, it was a matter of liberal faith that the use of enhanced interrogation techniques on al-Qaida members “undermine our moral authority and do not make us safer,” as Barack Obama once put it. According to Obama, “enhanced interrogation techniques” are wrong, and — no matter what common sense tells you […]

It tells you something about the news media that before the House vote Tuesday, talking heads were warning Americans that unless the GOP House voted for a bill to stall our going over the fiscal cliff, taxes would go up on 98 percent of Americans. President Barack Obama’s big talking point matched the cable news […]

Unlicensed drivers are nearly three times likelier than licensed drivers to cause a fatal crash in California. Indeed, unlicensed drivers are likelier to cause fatal crashes than drivers who have had their licenses suspended or revoked. So found a new study released by the California Department of Motor Vehicles. The study recommended “the use of […]

With humble apologies to Ernest Lawrence Thayer, who wrote “Casey at the Bat,” which was published in The San Francisco Examiner in 1888. The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the GOP this year: The economy had tanked; hope and change had morphed to fear. The strong and swift refused to join the presidential race. So the […]