July 19, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "ObamaLand: Change Cynics Can Believe In" »
July 12, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Obama's new Medicare/Medicaid chief wants Sarah Palin's "death panels"....
July 08, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
July 07, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
July 07, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
July 07, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
July 06, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
July 01, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 30, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 30, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 29, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Elena Kagan Nomination: "Let the Confirmation Games Begin!"" »
June 28, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 25, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Actress Janine Turner co-founded Constituting America, an educational website all should visit.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, 9/11, National Security, Terrorism, Homeland Security, Foreign Policy, UN, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
June 24, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Afghanistan: McChrystal Shatters Administration Glass" »
June 23, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading ""The One": The Love Affair Wanes--Worldwide" »
June 21, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
As President Obama's fortunes fade, Congress is in mid-season form disgracing itself....
Continue reading "Congress: In Love With Their Own Voices, Yet Again" »
June 21, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 18, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Gulf Oil Spill - Obama's "It's Another 9/11" Boomerang" »
June 17, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, as Health Care Tsarina, is becoming America's Doctor....
June 17, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 16, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Read this WSJ education article about a new film and weep for the ghetto kids trapped in teachers' union hell.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Conservative Politics
June 11, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "White House Primary Games: A Democrat Objects" »
June 11, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Supremo-To-Be Elena Kagan (Gasp!) is a Liberal!" »
June 10, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Education: NY Public School Math for Future Pilots" »
June 09, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "Gulf Oil Spill: An Apollo Astronaut Takes Exception" »
June 08, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
June 02, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
"What I care about is stopping this oil off our coast." Cheers to Bobby Jindal!....
Continue reading "Gulf Oil Spill: Governor Jindal Governs, President Obama Grandstands" »
June 01, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Watch this video of America's most-decorated American air crew....
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, 9/11, National Security, Foreign Policy
May 28, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Yesterday The Fenton Report posted my article on why the financial reform bill cannot be trusted.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy, Conservative Politics
May 25, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
This video clip (5:08) of Tom McClintock (R-CA) aptly answers the Mexican President's appalling address to Congress.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, 9/11, National Security, Terrorism, Homeland Security, Foreign Policy, Conservative Politics
May 24, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Last week the great singer Lena Horne passed on at 92. Her career traced race in America, as her art transcended it....
Continue reading "Lena Horne, 1917 - 2010: Song & Sadness" »
May 21, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Enjoy this remembrance of Elena Kagan's Supreme Court clerkship days from two fellow clerks. Then share Terry Eastland's concern about Kagan's belief that some books should be banned via campaign laws.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
May 19, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
This Sen. Obama on Harriet Miers clip (0;40) applies to Elena Kagan, who equally lacks judicial experience. A WSJ op-ed asks if Kagan shares her mentor Justice Thurgood Marshall's absolutist view of the Miranda rule, rejecting the public safety exception used by those interrogating the Times Square bomber and supported by A-G Eric Holder.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
May 14, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
The First Bombshell: Kagan argued that in First Amendment speech cases the Supreme Court should examine governmental motives in deciding them....
Continue reading "Kagan Ka-Boom: Supreme Court Should Rule Based Upon Legislative Motives" »
May 13, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
May 12, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "NEWS REPORTS: Elena Kagan is Obama's Next Supremo" »
May 10, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Immigration reform can only work given three pillars--NONE OF WHICH IS IN PLACE TODAY....
May 03, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
George Will shreds arguments for adding a Value-Added Tax (VAT) onto today's income taxes, showing it would forever entomb the Founders' vision of limited government. GW's answer: repeal the 16th Amendment. No income tax, plus a VAT whose taxes are fully transparent to taxpayers, might work. Liberals want to entomb limited government, and will not accede to this bargain. The Senate voted 85-13 last week to reject a VAT. Nonetheless, President Obama sees VAT as an option.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy, Conservative Politics
April 23, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Check this astonishing video clip (1:47) of President Obama's detached-cool exchange at a White House health care event, with one Jane Sturm:
Sturm in German translate as "storm." Policy ace Peter Ferrara sees a political storm coming from this clip come November.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy,Conservative Politics
April 22, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
President Obama's 21st century space policy remarks at NASA last Thursday simply astonish. Moonman #2 Buzz Aldrin may believe Obama actually intends, having scrapped the Moon mission, to go to the asteroids and Mars, as the US faces trillions in new red ink. But Moonman # 1 Neil Armstrong & other Moonwalkers see us giving up leadership in space. The sole bright spot I can see in the new policy as R&D on new forms of propulsion; chemical rockets are little more than fuel-guzzling Roman candles. Until newer, more powerful & efficient propulsion systems are deployed, deep space travel will remain the province of Trekkies.
While we play pretend, China aims to surpass America's space capability by 2016. And they began from scratch only 20 years ago!
Bottom Line. We cannot put a man (or woman) on the Moon today, as we did in 1969. We cannot build an atom bomb today, as we did in 1945. We do not even, anymore, have America's most famous Moonwalker of all (sorry Neil & Buzz), Michael Jackson. What we have a memories of "Ol' Blue Eyes" & "Der Bingle" colliding with Mars one July, and of "The Chairman of the Board" asking to see what life is like on Jupiter & Mars (before the collision). How does one say "Moon mission" in Mandarin Chinese?
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, National Security, Foreign Policy, Economy, Conservative Politics
April 19, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Leave it to Jeffrey Lord to offer another engrossing history lesson: how filibustering a Supreme Court nomination at the end of LBJ's Presidency allowed Richard Nixon to name Warren Burger Chief Justice in 1969. The parallel is not exact to the Stevens case, but is well worth reading. George Will warns conservatives that deference to legislative prerogative, a traditional measure of ranking judges, ignores depredations of popular sovereignty, such as abuse of eminent domain & curbing political speech.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
April 15, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
A WSJ editorial explains how a Value-Added Tax (VAT) on sales almost inevitably grows, without lowering income taxes. Europe tells the true tale. And the New York Times has discovered (who knew?) that Tea Party voters come from the demographic that, already heavily taxed, will pay a disproportionate share of new taxes.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy, Conservative Politics
April 15, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
First Lady Michelle Obama paid warm tribute to soldiers and their families in a visit last week to the Pentagon. Count this as the First Lady's finest achievement in office, supporting families of America's finest.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, National Security, Foreign Policy, Conservative Politics
April 13, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Friday's announcement by Justice John Paul Stevens, senior in service on the Supreme Court (34 years), gives President Obama a chance to lock in a second seat in the liberal bloc for decades. Stevens began as a moderate conservative, highly-regarded as a jurist. He swung well left during his tenure, a turn common to GOP nominees. What might President Obama, and Senate Republicans do?....
The Senate has until January 3, 2011 (when the 112th Congress is seated) 57 Democratic and 2 Independent votes presumptively solid for any non-radical Democratic nominee. Constitutional scholar Jeffrey Rosen said on Fox News that the President can go to his left, right or center, within the range of possible short-list nominees. Rosen suggested federal appeals judge Diane Wood as the lefty, federal appeals judge Merrick Garland as the righty & Solicitor-General Elena Kagan as the middle. Another option would be helping a political pal in trouble, like Obama doppelganger Deval Patrick, the embattled Massachusetts governor who is a lefty in the Obama mold.
Charles Krauthammer suggested that moderate Democratic senators facing tough re-election battles, like Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, would prefer not to have to defend a radical pick. While President Obama could throw them under the bus, the result could be more GOP pickups this fall. Changes in the new Senate could make a radical appointee no longer confirmable.
A crisp 4/10 WSJ editorial discusses Stevens, the three above-noted possible nominees and Krauthammer's point re moderates. Here are the President's April 9 Rose Garden remarks, which suggest he his leaving his options wide open, as well he should. Retired Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wants more "diversity" on the Court; she means more women & fewer judges. (O'Connor was a state legislator with no judicial experience; she felt, with some reason, that her legislative turn aided her in interpreting statutes.)
Hearings will be held no later than August, and more likely in July, to ensure that the new Justice is confirmed and has time to settle in at his new address, meet new colleagues, get his clerks into the routine, etc.
George Will said yesterday on ABC News Sunday "This Week" that the Judge Robert Bork nomination changed Supreme Court history. Noted GW: In 1939, FDR nominee Felix Frankfurter was confirmed in 12 days; in 1940 Justice William O. Douglas was confirmed in 15 days; in 1976 Justice Stevens was confirmed in 3 weeks, was not asked one question on abortion, and the Senate vote was 98-0 after 5 minutes of floor debate; in 1986 Antonin Scalia was confirmed 98-0.
What Democrats Hath Wrought. Judge Bork was defeated 58-52 in 1987, after months of savaging via grotesque caricature. While Anthony Kennedy (1988) & David Souter (1990) escaped a fusillade, Clarence Thomas (1991) was subjected to what the nominee himself termed "a high-tech lynching." The GOP tried to return nominations to traditional standards, with Clinton appointees Ruth Bader Ginsburg (q1993) & Stephen Breyer (1994) confirmed within about 10 weeks, with hearings notably free of aggressive questioning,, and GOP senators stressing that qualification & not judicial philosophy was their touchstone. While Breyer was a moderate liberal who had promoted economic deregulation while serving under Ted Kennedy in the Senate, Ginsburg had a long record of ardent liberal activism, in the forefront of many battles during the 1970s & 1980s.
Came then the hearings for Chief Justice nominee John Roberts (2005) & Associate Justice nominee Samuel Alito (2006). Both possessed sterling qualifications for the Court, and were entitled to the deference given Justices Ginsburg & Breyer during their nomination hearings. Their judicial philosophies were plumbed aggressively by Democrats. In Alito's case, harsh questioning became so intense that the nominee's wife burst into tears & had to leave the chamber.
Thus, after the GOP had tried to return judicial confirmation hearings to traditional rules--with qualification paramount & deference to Presidential preference as to judicial philosophy --Democrats resurrected their New Nomination Rules: viewpoint trumps qualifications, and GOP nominees are thus fair targets on any & all counts.
AMONG THE VOTES CAST AGAINST BOTH ROBERTS & ALITO WERE THOSE CAST BY THEN-SENATORS BARACK OBAMA & JOE BIDEN.
Bottom Line. THE GOP SHOULD FOLLOW DEMOCRATIC NEW RULES, SAVE BE COURTEOUS AT ALL TIMES. THEY ARE ENTITLED TO VOTE FOR THE RECORD EVEN AGAINST A FULLY-QUALIFIED NOMINEE, THAT THEIR VIEWS ON JUDGING REMAIN AN ELECTION ISSUE.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
April 12, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
"I will surely do it while Obama is still President." Liberal Justice John Paul Stevens openly acknowledges that he will retire in 2010 or 2011 to ensure that Barack Obama picks his successor. Brings to mind satirist Finley Peter Dunne's Mr. Dooley: "The Supreme Court follows th' 'iliction returns." Also brings to mind Gerald Ford's mistake in nominating Stevens.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Supreme Court, Conservative Politics
April 07, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
April 07, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
Continue reading "ObamaCare: Stalking Horse for VAT Taxation" »
March 31, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
One wonders if the news that the Social Security payout this year will for the first time exceed revenues, five years earlier than previously announced, was kept under wraps until after the health care vote. Michael Barone notes that for the first time US Treasury bonds are selling at lower prices than other high-grade bonds, reflecting lack of faith in the federal credit outlook.
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy, Conservative Politics
March 26, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)
WSJ pundit Kimberly Strassel explains the crazy amendments--e.g., a ban on providing erectile dysfunction drugs for convicted sex offenders!--Democrats voted down in order to prevent violations of reconciliation rules, which would send the bill to the House. Worse for Ds, the bill got sent to the House anyway, after two adverse parliamentary rulings. Savor Strassels' clunker list!!!!
Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Conservative Politics
March 26, 2010 in The Home Front | Permalink | Comments (0)

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