Free Republic

The big story last week was the incredible Congressional rush to pass a bill that was more than a thousand pages long in just two days-- after which it sat on the President's desk for three days while the Obamas were away on a holiday. There is the same complete inconsistency in the bill itself. Despite the urgency in President Obama's rhetoric, as well as in Congress' haste in passing a bill which few-- if any-- members had time to read, much less consider, most of the actual spending will take place next year, at the earliest. Not even the...

Everyone is talking about how much money the government is spending, but very little attention is being paid to where they are spending it or what they are buying with it. The government is putting money into banks, even when the banks don't want it, in hopes that the banks will put it into circulation. But the latest statistics shows that banks are lending even less money now than they were before the government dumped all that cash on them. Even if it had worked, putting cash into banks, in hopes that they would put it into circulation, seems a...

If making speeches is one of the tests of a President of the United States, then Barack Obama has passed his first test with flying colors. He has understood the varied constituencies, and the various hopes and fears he had to address. He said the kinds of things that all these constituencies wanted to hear. As a speech, it was the best inaugural address since Ronald Reagan. This is not to judge the substantive merits or demerits of what he said. Anyone who judges any political speech by its substance-- much less by what actions follow-- is likely to be...

Barack Obama says that we have to "jolt" the economy. That certainly makes sense, if you take the media's account of the economy seriously-- but should the media be taken seriously? Amid all the political and media hysteria, national output has declined by less than one-half of one percent. In fact, it may not have declined even that much-- or at all-- when the statistics are revised later, as they very often are. We are not talking about the Great Depression, when output dropped by one-third and unemployment soared to 25 percent. What we are talking about is a golden...

After the big gamble on subprime mortgages that led to the current financial crisis, is there going to be an even bigger gamble, by putting the fate of a nation in the hands of a man whose only qualifications are ego and mouth? Barack Obama has the kind of cocksure confidence that can only be achieved by not achieving anything else. Anyone who has actually had to take responsibility for consequences by running any kind of enterprise— whether economic or academic, or even just managing a sports team— is likely at some point to be chastened by either the setbacks...

Some elections are routine, some are important and some are historic. If Senator John McCain wins this election, it will probably go down in history as routine. But if Senator Barack Obama wins, it is more likely to be historic— and catastrophic. Once the election is over, the glittering generalities of rhetoric and style will mean nothing. Everything will depend on performance in facing huge challenges, domestic and foreign. Performance is where Barack Obama has nothing to show for his political career, either in Illinois or in Washington. Policies that he proposes under the banner of "change" are almost all...

Chief Justice John Marshall said it all in one sentence: "The power to tax is the power to destroy." It is not the money that is taxed away that is destroyed. What is destroyed is the wealth that does not get produced in the first place, because high taxes make its production not worthwhile. Those who are receptive to Senator Barack Obama's plan to increase taxes on "the rich" seem not to understand that the issue is the nation's loss of wealth. Today, wealth can leave the country when heavy taxes threaten it— instantly, in an age of electronic financial...

One of the biggest and most long-lasting "change" to expect if Barack Obama becomes President of the United States is in the kinds of federal judges he appoints. These include Supreme Court justices, as well as other federal justices all across the country, all of whom will have lifetime tenure. Senator Obama has stated very clearly what kinds of Supreme Court justices he wants— those with "the empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old." Like so many things that Obama says, it may sound nice if you don't stop and...

Although Senator Barack Obama has been allied with a succession of far left individuals over the years, that is only half the story. There are, after all, some honest and decent people on the left. But these have not been the ones that Obama has been allied with— allied, not merely "associated" with. ACORN is not just an organization on the left. In addition to the voter frauds that ACORN has been involved in over the years, it is an organization with a history of thuggery, including going to bankers' homes to harass them and their families, in order to...

It may seem hardly worthwhile going to the polls to vote this election year, since ACORN and the media have already decided that Barack Obama is to be the next President of the United States. Still, it may take more than voter fraud and media spin to put Senator Obama in the White House. Most public opinion polls show Obama ahead, but not usually by decisive margins, and sometimes by a difference within the margin of error. There has been a history of various polls over the years projecting bigger votes for the Democrats' presidential candidate in October than that...

Telling a friend that the love of his life is a phony and dangerous is not likely to get him to change his mind. But it may cost you a friend. It is much the same story with true believers in Barack Obama. They have made up their minds and not only don't want to be confused by the facts, they resent being told the facts. An e-mail from a reader mentioned trying to tell his sister why he was voting against Obama but, when he tried to argue some facts, she cut him short: "You don't like him and...

One of the oldest phenomena of American elections— criticism of one's opponent— has in recent times been stigmatized by much of the media as "negative advertising." Is this because the criticism has gotten more vicious or more personal? You might think so, if you were totally ignorant of history, as so many of the graduates of even our elite universities are. Although Grover Cleveland was elected President twice, he had to overcome a major scandal that he had fathered a child out of wedlock, which was considered more of a disgrace then than today. Even giants like Lincoln and Jefferson...

Barack Obama's supporters often try to sidestep questions about his character and judgment by saying that we should stick to what they arbitrarily define as "the real issues." But Senator Obama's record on specific issues is as bad as his record of repeatedly allying himself over the years with people who make no attempt to hide their hatred of America. Among the so-called "real issues" are earmarks for Senators' pet projects, like the "bridge to nowhere." These are among the most indefensible parts of the inbred Washington political culture, which Obama has so often claimed to be against, as part...

What about those "real issues" that Barack Obama's supporters in the media say we should get back to, whenever some new unsavory fact about his past comes out? Surely education is a real issue, with American school children consistently scoring below those in other countries, and children in minority communities faring worst of all. What about Senator Obama's position on this real issue? As with other issues, he has talked one way and acted the opposite way. The education situation in Obama's home base of Chicago is one of the worst in the nation for the children— and one of...

A recent Republican campaign ad sarcastically described as Barack Obama's "one accomplishment" his supporting a bill to promote sex education in kindergarten. During an interview of a Republican spokesman, Tom Brokaw of NBC News replayed that ad and asked if that was something serious to be discussed in a presidential election campaign. It was a variation on an old theme about getting back to "the real issues," just as Brokaw's question was a variation on an increasingly widespread tendency among journalists to become a squad of Obama avengers, instead of reporters. Does it matter if Barack Obama is for sex...

Critics of Senator Barack Obama make a strategic mistake when they talk about his "past associations." That just gives his many defenders in the media an opportunity to counter-attack against "guilt by association." We all have associations, whether at the office, in our neighborhood or in various recreational activities. Most of us neither know nor care what our associates believe or say about politics. Associations are very different from alliances. Allies are not just people who happen to be where you are or who happen to be doing the same things you do. You choose allies deliberately for a reason....

Abraham Lincoln said, "You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time." Unfortunately, the future of this country, as well as the fate of the Western world, depends on how many people can be fooled on election day, just a few weeks from now. Right now, the polls indicate that a whole lot of the people are being fooled a whole lot of the time. The current financial bailout crisis has propelled Barack Obama back into a substantial lead over John...

"A human group transforms itself into a crowd when it suddenly responds to a suggestion rather than to reasoning, to an image rather than to an idea, to an affirmation rather than to proof, to the repetition of a phrase rather than to arguments, to prestige rather than to competence." Jean-François Revel was not referring to the United States when he wrote those words, nor to his own France, but to human beings in general. He was certainly not referring to Barack Obama, whom he probably never heard of, since Revel died last year. To find anything comparable to crowds'...

One of the few political cliches that makes sense is that "In politics, overnight is a lifetime." Less than a year ago, the big question was whether Rudolph Giuliani could beat Hillary Clinton in this year's presidential election. Less than two months ago, Barack Obama had a huge lead over John McCain in the polls. Less than a week ago, the smart money was saying that Mitt Romney would be McCain's choice for vice president. We don't need Barack Obama to create "change." Things change in politics, in the economy, and elsewhere in American society, without waiting for a political...

We take it for granted that a vote means a secret ballot but it was not always that way. Moreover, it will not remain that way for workers who vote on whether or not they want a labor union, if legislation sponsored by Congressional Democrats and endorsed by Senator Barack Obama becomes law. Before there were secret ballots, voters dared not express their true preferences if those who watched them vote could retaliate— whether by firing them, beating them up or in other ways. Anyone who is serious about people being free to express themselves with their votes wants a...