Category: Column

Sometimes a trivial embarrassment can become a teachable moment. It was recently revealed that Harvard professor and U.S. Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren had self-identified as a Native American for nearly a decade — apparently to enhance her academic career by claiming minority status. Warren, a blond multimillionaire, could not substantiate her claim of 1/32 Cherokee […]

Walid bin Attash used to frequent online dating sites. “Loves to travel — sometimes at a moment’s notice,” bin Attash described himself before his 2003 capture. So writes former CIA veteran Jose Rodriguez in his new book, “Hard Measures: How Aggressive CIA Actions After 9/11 Saved American Lives.” On Saturday, bin Attash was one of […]

National Public Radio’s Kai Ryssdal recently talked about the weak economy. His guests, two reporters from The Washington Post and The New York Times, acknowledged the obvious — that the economy is underperforming. Yet, in the 20 minutes of my sitting and listening in the car in bad Los Angeles traffic, I heard no one […]

Former NPR and current Fox News political analyst Juan Williams made an excellent point Monday night on “The O’Reilly Factor.” Williams said the major reason President Obama had not endorsed same-sex marriage is because of the strong opposition to it in the black and Hispanic communities. Who could have doubted, though, that the president favors […]

If the election were held today, Mitt Romney would win by a landslide. The published polls reflect a close race for two reasons: 1. They poll only registered voters, not likely voters. Rasmussen is the only pollster who tests likely voters, and his latest tracking poll has Romney ahead by 48-43. 2. As discussed in […]

This week, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan essentially endorsed same-sex marriage. The Obama campaign, however, wary of minority and blue-collar voters, promptly announced that President Obama was against same-sex marriage — sort of — but that his position was “evolving.” Like a flower waiting to bloom, eventually Obama?s support for […]

Just as the political air is filled with talk of the inevitability of Barack Obama’s re-election — we are told that the kids at his Chicago headquarters are brimming with confidence — in come some poll numbers showing him behind. Not by anything statistically significant, mind you. But when you get the Gallup and Rasmussen […]

With six months until Election Day, conspiracy theories are percolating on the Internet like bubbling mud pots at Yellowstone: Left-wing billionaire George Soros is going to rig the election for Barack Obama. Foreigners will oversee the nation’s entire vote-counting system. The fix is in, and all is lost. Before conservatives go all Michael Moore-moonbatty, let’s […]

A child leaving home alone for the first time takes a risk. So does the entrepreneur who opens a new business. I no more want government to prevent us from doing these things than I want it to keep us in padded cells. Everyone has a different tolerance for risk. One person takes out a […]

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, in a recent debate with former Republican National Chairman Michael Steele, called the Republican Party the “grand wizard crowd.” Grand wizard is the title given to the leader of the Ku Klux Klan. It is truly misinformed to call Republicans the party of the Klan. Throughout our history, most Klansmen and most […]

At last, Obama’s economic strategy becomes clear: Encourage Americans to stop even looking for work! In April, the number of Americans seeking work dropped by 522,000, part of a long term decline of 22 million in the number of adults seeking work. When Obama took office, 135 million American adults had jobs. Now, 139 million […]

President Barack Obama has compiled a handy to-do list for Congress that, “if acted upon quickly, will create jobs and help restore middle class security,” according to the White House’s blog. And it’s about time. This is most certainly not, as cynics might suggest, another transparent political scheme. After all, these initiatives, the White House […]

The New York Times really loathes Rupert Murdoch. The Gray Lady almost achieved nirvana on the front page the other day when a group of laborites in the British Parliament asserted in a “damning report” that Murdoch was “not fit” for major media ownership. Bill Keller, recently the paper’s executive editor, devoted his latest column […]

Socialism is a rich man’s game. Oh, sure, random overheated: (sometimes: impoverished) Occupiers agitate for their version of economic equality, possibly gumming up the works at the Lincoln Tunnel, but the real financial justice action comes from the wealthy — or so it would seem. And I’m not just talking about Hollywood, where George Clooney is full […]

Trayvon Martin became a household name for all the wrong reasons. Martin’s death created an international firestorm because George Zimmerman, the person at fault, was not immediately taken into custody by Sanford, Florida authorities. What made things worse is that Martin is black, Zimmerman is part-Hispanic/part-white and the Sanford police chief is white. It is […]

“If Mitt Romney can be pushed around, intimidated, coerced, co-opted by a conservative radio talk show host in Middle America, then how is he going to stand up to the Chinese? How is he going to stand up to Putin?” So asked Bryan Fischer, a radio host with the American Family Association, after claiming credit […]

When I married five years ago, I was on the fence about having kids. I thought some parental gene might kick in, but it never did. Now, at 40, I’ve accepted that a childless marriage is best for us, given my wife’s fertility issues and my ambivalence about parenthood. My wife, however, sees no purpose […]

France has elected only the second Socialist president in its history — the first being Francois Mitterrand, who spent 14 years in the driver’s seat back when French presidential terms lasted seven years rather than five, and who made a hard-right turn away from economic socialism and toward spending cuts after his first two years […]

A moment’s reflection will remind us that virtually none of us get overly excited when confronted with a “problem.” That’s human nature. However, those who solve problems are the ones who survive and thrive. Think about it. The primary role of the physician is to help people solve their health problems. Attorneys solve people’s problems, […]

At my daughters’ school last week,: The Israel Defense Forces musical ensemble came to share the spirit of the youth of: Israel: with the popular and traditional songs that they perform at army bases in: Israel.:  Naturally, following school there was a discussion at home about: Israel’s need for an army, and my daughter asking normal kid questions about good […]

In addition to labeling conservatives and Republicans “anti-woman” (for opposing government-mandated free contraception), “anti-black” and “anti-Hispanic” (for advocating photo identification for voting), and “anti-science” (for skepticism regarding the belief that man-made carbon emissions will destroy much of the planet), Democrats now regularly label Republicans “anti-gay” (for opposing same-sex marriage). All these charges are demagogic. But […]

The “Occupy” movement, which the Obama administration and much of the media have embraced, has implications that reach far beyond the passing sensation it has created. The unwillingness of authorities to put a stop to their organized disruptions of other people’s lives, their trespassing, vandalism and violence is a de facto suspension, if not repeal, […]

Last week, I showed how the Republican Party likely would lose the presidential election in November if it were to use conventional campaign tactics. However, I also explained an unconventional strategy that could usher in victory for the GOP and our republic — a tactic used by President Abraham Lincoln. This week, I want to […]

President Obama formally kicked off his re-election campaign in Richmond, Va., and Columbus, Ohio, Saturday, and his theme was certainly not, shall we say, “it’s morning again in America” — President Ronald Reagan’s optimistic re-election slogan in 1984. Obama’s central message was more like: “Hey, I realize things look bad, and I’m not going to […]

“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country,” President John F. Kennedy famously said in his inaugural address. In his bid for re-election, the hope-and-change president, Barack Obama, clearly has decided to ditch JFK’s country-first approach. The Obama-Biden campaign is all about what this country can […]

“Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr.” is another of the Harvard professor’s wonderful television series for PBS. This is “must-see TV” and a more than worthy sequel to three previous projects Gates has hosted about how some of us came to be what and who we are. In this latest 10-part series, Gates […]

In an April speech in Berlin, Dr. Andreas Dombret, a member of the Executive Board of the Deutsche Bundesbank (the German central bank), offered a startlingly frank assessment of the current problems in Europe.:  Although his comments were meant to apply to the tensions and imbalances that exist between the northern and southern tier of […]