Category: Column

Ruth Asawa’s “San Francisco Fountain” owes Apple big time. Before the tech behemoth announced its plans to plop a slick, glassy Apple Store where Levi’s and the fountain plaza reside, many locals were blithely unaware of the bronze landmark. Mayor Ed Lee apparently forgot about it when he cozied up to Apple execs announcing their […]

“We know the statistics,” said President Barack Obama, “that children who grow up without a father are five times more likely to live in poverty and commit crime; nine times more likely to drop out of schools and 20 times more likely to end up in prison. They are more likely to have behavioral problems, […]

Why does President Obama boast an average approval rating of 48 percent when he scores terribly on each issue he is now handling? Here’s the rundown in the latest Bloomberg News poll: Do you approve or disapprove of Obama’s handling of this: Economy: –approve: 42 percent disapprove: 53 percent Health Care: –approve: 40 percent disapprove: […]

For years I have been writing about the failures of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) as a warning for what the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) will do to health care here in the U.S. London’s Daily Mail has chronicled the growing problems with the NHS, which include declining quality of care and availability […]

Over the last seven decades, 115 veterans of World War II have served in the United States Senate. This week, the last of them, Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, died. Two World War II veterans still serve in the House — Ralph Hall of Texas, who was a Navy pilot, and John Dingell, who joined […]

In response to the acknowledged abuses of his own Justice Department, President Obama has urged Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to reintroduce legislation for a “journalist shield law.” And in typical Washington fashion, the proposed act would do nothing to prevent the abuses that supposedly make the law so necessary. We saw a similar response to […]

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has expressed opposition to President Barack Obama’s nomination of Samantha Power for the post of U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, a cabinet-rank position, in succession to Susan Rice. : Leaders of the ZOA include Sheldon Adelson, Dr. Irving Moskowitz and: Ronn Torossian.:  We understand that Samantha Power played an important […]

Sun, sun, sun, here it comes. Welcome to the Summer of Belated Epiphanies. Media lapdogs are finally, finally arriving at the conclusion that maybe this isn’t the most transparent administration in world history, after all. On Tuesday, the Associated Press reported on the Obama administration’s use of secret email accounts, stonewalling on Freedom of Information […]

Europe’s struggles prove that “austerity” fails! So say the Big Spenders. With a condescending sigh, they explain that Europe made deep cuts in government spending, and the result was today’s high unemployment. “With erstwhile middle-class workers reduced to picking through garbage in search of food, austerity has already gone too far,” writes Paul Krugman in […]

PARIS — To believe the media narrative, the “Arab Spring” has arrived in yet another Islamic nation — Turkey this time — snowballing at record speed from a single protest over the fate of trees under an urban-development plan. This simplistic explanation might have more merit if Turkey wasn’t the staging ground for Western interests […]

In order to understand the liberal and progressive agenda, one must know something about their world vision and values. Let’s examine some of the evidence. Why the 1970s struggle to ban DDT? Alexander King, founder of the Malthusian Club of Rome, wrote in a 1990 biographical essay: “My own doubts came when DDT was introduced […]

If there was a moment when the United States could have productively intervened in Syria, it looks like that moment has passed. Shiite militants, including Hezbollah — partly at the behest of their paymasters in Iran — are racing to the defense of Bashar Assad’s regime. According to a witness account in the New York […]

It must be nice to be a leftist. The solution to every problem is more of someone else’s money. That’s the favored solution over on the Democratic Party side of the aisle when it comes to the IRS’ targeting of conservative non-profits. In a House Appropriations Subcommittee hearing, Democratic Rep. Jose Serrano of New York […]

It is not really news that Victor Davis Hanson has written another outstanding and eye-opening book. He has done that before and repeatedly, on a variety of subjects. The subject of his latest book, “The Savior Generals” is given in the subtitle: “How Five Great Commanders Saved Wars That Were Lost– From Ancient Greece to […]

Round-up of some interesting stories from around the Internet over the past few weeks: If you missed it, there was a profile of Sheldon Adelson, the billionaire who does so many great things for America, Israel and many other vital causes.: Read the op-ed here about how a broken clock and The New York Times can […]

One of the many sad signs of our times is the way current immigration issues are discussed. A hundred years ago, the immigration controversies of that era were discussed in the context of innumerable facts about particular immigrant groups. Many of those facts were published in a huge, multi-volume 1911 study by a commission headed […]

On Memorial Day weekend, 2 million people marched in protests against seed giant Monsanto for the purpose of bringing awareness to hazards from genetically modified food, which it and other companies manufacture. Organizer Tami Canal said protests were held in 436 cities in 52 countries. Genetically modified plants are grown from genetically modified, or engineered, […]

Isn’t it rich that the White House is accusing Attorney General Eric Holder’s critics of being “partisans who seem more interested in launching political attacks than cooperating with him to protect the security and constitutional rights of the American people”? Partisan? Launching political attacks? Well, if the White House and Holder were not so partisan […]

Here is a contemporary political truth: Every time you think that the left and its political party have hit moral bottom, they will eventually prove you wrong. The most recent example occurred last week in Louisiana. The head of the Louisiana Democratic Party, State Senator Karen Carter Peterson, D-New Orleans, stood before her colleagues in […]

Did the IRS scandal begin when the Obama administration aggressively tried to deny tax-exempt status to pro-Israeli groups that funded settlements on the West Bank in defiance of its wishes? The IRS seems to have used tax audits to try to cripple these Jewish groups. When the Citizens United decision came down, did President Obama […]

The power to prosecute is an awesome power that confers the ability to ruin people’s lives, which is why an attorney general should use that power judiciously. There should be, to borrow from language in currency at the Obama Department of Justice these days, “balance.” When authorities uphold federal drug laws, they should target the […]

That’s all, folks. One look at the headlines will tell you the gold bull market is officially over: the stock market is booming, a modest recovery of the US economy is underway, and the dollar is dominating the forex. Time to sell your bullion and get back into US stocks! Does anyone really believe this […]

The annual ritual known as the Scripps National Spelling Bee came and went last week with kids spelling words that, I suspect, many with graduate degrees couldn’t spell. The winner was Arvind Mahankali, a 13-year-old eighth-grader from Bayside Hills, N.Y. Mahankali is the first boy to win the title since 2008. There is a lesson […]

The subject of Islam is a growing area of concern around the world, and one can also ask about “What is the threat of Islam to all other religions?”: : People can no longer pretend that Muslims live on the other side of the globe, or that what they believe doesn’t affect us.: Inspiration Ministries: is exploring these vital […]

Detroit, once one of the nation’s most vibrant cities, faces imminent bankruptcy. That’s the headline from the report last month of emergency fiscal manager Kevyn Orr, issued 45 days after he was appointed this spring by Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder to take over the city’s government. “The path Detroit has followed for more than 40 […]

In March, President Barack Obama signed the Sequester, a budget control act that dramatically affects our nation’s military. We are cutting our carrier force in the all-important Persian Gulf in half, and the Army is planning to cut tens of thousands of American soldiers. Yet on: March 4, Secretary of State John Kerry pledged $250 million […]