LFTC - Letter From The Capitol

Immigration: Obama's Hail Mary

President Obama's lawsuit against Arizona's law is a federal power grab....

ObamaLand: Change Cynics Can Believe In

Several recent government moves will give cynics much cheer....

ObamaCare's "Death Panel" Tsar

Obama's new Medicare/Medicaid chief wants Sarah Palin's "death panels"....

Arizona: The Justice Department Sues

The Justice Department filed a 25-page complaint aimed at Arizona's immigration law....

Kagan's True Conservative Touch

Lefty Elena Kagan may expand judicial conservatism, by pushing Justice Kennedy rightward....

NASA: Lost in (Multicultural) Space

NASA's new chief sees Muslim outreach as a prime goal.  NOT made up....

Kagan: Full-Disclosure Filibuster

One pundit proposes the GOP force a debate on Kagan before a final vote....

Kagan: Why Have Hearings?

Legal eagle Stuart Taylor asks why have Supreme nominee hearings at all?....

Kagan's Damascus Conversion

Elena Kagan's Damascus conversion testimony was predictable....

Tea Party Winners

Jeffrey Lord profiles for TAS several Tea Party primary election winners, with much of interest....

Kagan Hearings & Supreme Salvo

More questions on offer after Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan's first day....

Elena Kagan Nomination: "Let the Confirmation Games Begin!"

Elena Kagan, whose Supreme Court nomination hearings begin today, is even worse than I feared....

Obama: Manchurian Candidate?

A former college classmate of the President's argues that "O" is following a sinister agenda....

Hollywood Right: Constitution Central

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

Afghanistan: McChrystal Shatters Administration Glass

Had General Stanley McChrystal even HEARD of "Rolling Stone"?....

"The One": The Love Affair Wanes--Worldwide

When formerly entranced supporters head for the exits The One is in trouble indeed....

Congress: In Love With Their Own Voices, Yet Again

As President Obama's fortunes fade, Congress is in mid-season form disgracing itself....

Judge to Voters: Vote Early & Often!

Another judge, run amok, allows multiple votes by selected voters....

Gulf Oil Spill - Obama's "It's Another 9/11" Boomerang

Obama's "another 9/11" remark is wrong; were it true, it would be worse for him.  Here's why....

America's Doctor: Kathleen Sibelius

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, as Health Care Tsarina, is becoming America's Doctor....

Unions: Arkansas Armageddon

Michael Barone details why unions lost big when Democrat Blanche Lincoln won renomination for senator....

Education: Teachers' Unions v. Parents & Students

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

White House Primary Games: A Democrat Objects

Loyal, serious opposition voices are essential to our debate.  A Democrat dissents from Obama....

Supremo-To-Be Elena Kagan (Gasp!) is a Liberal!

Extra!  Extra! Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan is a (gasp!) liberal!!!...

Education: NY Public School Math for Future Pilots

NY public schools in grades 3 - 8 give partial credit for wrong math answers.  Here's where that idea leads....

Gulf Oil Spill: An Apollo Astronaut Takes Exception

Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt slams Team Obama for comparing its performance to NASA's....

Government: The Stupidity Factor

Will stupidity end the reign of unlimited public spending to support wasteful idiocies?...

Gulf Oil Spill: Governor Jindal Governs, President Obama Grandstands

"What I care about is stopping this oil off our coast."  Cheers to Bobby Jindal!....

Happy Memorial Day & Thanks to Our Heroes

Watch this video of America's most-decorated American air crew....

Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, 9/11, National Security, Foreign Policy

Financial Reform: Can Markets Survive the Chris & Barney Show?

Yesterday The Fenton Report posted my article on why the financial reform bill cannot be trusted.

Letter from the Capitol, LFTC, Economy, Conservative Politics

Immigration: A Congressman's Answer to President Calderon

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

Lena Horne, 1917 - 2010: Song & Sadness

Last week the great singer Lena Horne passed on at 92.  Her career traced race in America, as her art transcended it....

Kagan: Jumper Justice?

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

Kagan: Obama's Senate & Marshall's Miranda

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

Kagan Ka-Boom: Supreme Court Should Rule Based Upon Legislative Motives

The First Bombshell: Kagan argued that in First Amendment speech cases the Supreme Court should examine governmental motives in deciding them....

Kagan & the Court: Elitist Entitlement

Scholar James Piereson exposes the "diversity scam" re Elena Kagan's Supreme Court nomination....

NEWS REPORTS: Elena Kagan is Obama's Next Supremo

MSNBC reported first that Solicitor-General Elena Kagan will be nominated today to the Supreme Court.  What should the GOP do?....

REAL Immigration Refrom: Three Pillars

Immigration reform can only work given three pillars--NONE OF WHICH IS IN PLACE TODAY....

VAT: Making Big Government Permanent

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

Does ObamaCare Really Care?

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

Obama's Spaced-Out Space Policy

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

Justice Stevens: A Lesson from History

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

INCOME TAX DAY: VAT TRAP

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

First Lady Visits the Pentagon

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

Justice Stevens Delivers for His President

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

Justice Stevens Signals His President

"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

Team Obama: Hectoring His Subjects

Ever hear of the Census Bureau's American Community Survey?  Daniel Freedman has, and found himself bullied by intrusive bureaucrats.  He shows why you should hope ACS passes you by....

ObamaCare: Stalking Horse for VAT Taxation

Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels says we must live "like good Europeans" as ObamaCare stifles choice & raises costs.  Which may explain why Fidel Castro called ObamaCare "a true miracle" and compared it to Cuba's CastroCare....

Canaries in Financial Coal Mine

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

ObamaCare: Crazy Senate Amendments Democrats Had to Swallow!

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