Calling for the protection of the Constitution and the vision that guided the Founding Fathers is a common theme in speeches in this year’s presidential campaign. In practice, however, these campaigns have little resemblance to that original vision. The Framers sought to fashion a presidential selection process above politics in which the office would seek … Read more
Valentine’s Day is probably not the day most people would pick to remember the marriage of John and Jacqueline Kennedy. But on Feb. 14, CBS spent more than eight minutes recalling how it was the 50th anniversary of CBS’s “historic” TV tour of the White House with Jackie. They brought on liberal historian Doug Brinkley … Read more
On April 1, 2001, a U.S. spy plane and a Chinese fighter collided over the South China Sea, forcing the Americans to make an emergency landing on Chinese soil. But the Chinese government said it would not release the crew until it got an apology. The Bush administration tried to find other ways to satisfy … Read more
The Republican primary contest has come down to a choice between Mitt Romney and the anti-Romney. It is another in a series of battles between the non-conservative and conservative wings of the GOP. Arguably, the political seeds of today’s Republican schism were planted in 1966 when Ronald Reagan became governor of California and George Herbert … Read more
At the end of Sunday mass at the church this writer attends in Washington, D.C., the pastor asked the congregation to remain for a few minutes. Then, on the instructions of Cardinal Archbishop Donald Wuerl, the pastor proceeded to read a letter. In the letter, the Church denounced the Obama administration for ordering all … Read more
Our many fellow Catholics now enchained for the Faith of our Fathers in such places as China, Syria, and Egypt are, as Father Faber’s hymn says, “in heart and conscience free.” But what happens when a government tries to chain the conscience itself? A few weeks ago, in a remarkably unanimous decision, the U.S. Supreme Court … Read more
We got mixed signals from a turbulent political week. Barack Obama seems to be enjoying an uptick in polls up toward, but not quite at, 50 percent approval. It’s a reminder that he can expect to benefit from Americans’ desire to think well of their presidents and from the reluctance of many voters to … Read more
On Tuesday evening, I had the honor of attending the State of the Union address as the guest of Congressman Mike Kelly (PA-03). Here are my impressions in abbreviated form. The address seemed more like a rewrite of previous speeches than an original work. Sure, there were new anecdotes and fresh twists on old policy … Read more
Did President Barack Obama’s appointment of Richard Cordray to be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau without a Senate confirmation vote violate the Constitution? The answer is plainly yes. Article 2, Section 2 of the Constitution says the president “shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall … Read more
You know politicians are serious when they move from campaigning to governing. Something like that may be happening on the Republican campaign trail — but, unfortunately, not at the Obama White House. Campaigning clearly carried the day for Newt Gingrich in South Carolina, where he beat Mitt Romney by a 40 percent to 28 … Read more
Of course President Obama is not concentrating on campaigning, White House press spokesmen assured us — as the president headed off to Chicago for three fundraisers and a drop-in at his campaign headquarters, two days after a high-roller fundraising choked off traffic five blocks from the White House, with the assistance of a score … Read more
2011 was a low year for personal attacks in American politics, but the early days of 2012 are demonstrating that it can get even worse. The latest insurgent Republican front-runner in the Iowa caucuses, former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, is being smeared for a deeply personal event in his life. His offense? Being a good … Read more
For many months, the liberal media elite has made no secret that in its mind the field of Republican presidential candidates includes Mitt Romney and a collection of clowns. Clearly, Romney is the opponent that Barack Obama and the liberal establishment want nominated. Journalists have mercilessly savaged every single conservative alternative to Romney who’s … Read more
Since Barack Obama became president on Jan. 20, 2009, the federal government has not had a budget. It did not have one for the first two years of his presidency, when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, and it did not have one for 2011, when the Democrats controlled the Senate and the Republicans … Read more
Back in 2007, when Barack Obama was running for president, a mildly surprising bit of news emerged: He and Dick Cheney were eighth cousins. Today, though, it appears that report was wrong. Judging from Obama’s record in office, the two are practically brothers. As a candidate, Obama criticized the last administration for holding Americans … Read more
Even though he is a columnist for The Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer often makes shrewd observations about American politics. On Fox News the night before the Iowa caucuses, however, Krauthammer indulged in a false appeal to common knowledge — before casually dismissing Rick Santorum as a nonviable presidential candidate Bill O’Reilly asked: Who is … Read more
The world usually turns out to work differently from what American presidents expected when they were campaigning. Franklin Roosevelt campaigned on domestic issues in 1932 and ran a more isolationist foreign policy for his first years in office than any of the Republican presidents elected in the 1920s. But he became aware of the … Read more
Can Congress make legal something that is inherently wrong, and can Congress take a freedom that is a part of our humanity and make its exercise criminal? If there were no First Amendment, would we still have the freedom of speech? The answer, like many in the law, depends on what values underlie the legal … Read more
Moscow is not a city of ghosts, but on Saturday, tens of thousands of figures were seen marching in the Russian capital chanting, “We exist! We exist!” That might seem like an exercise in the obvious. But the crowd thought a reminder was in order for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who has generally regarded … Read more
The most prevalent theme in President Barack Obama’s Dec. 6 Osawatomie, Kan., speech was the need for greater “fairness.” In fact, though the president never defined the term fair(ness), he used it 15 times. Explaining his new hero, Teddy Roosevelt, Obama said: “But Roosevelt also knew that the free market has never been a … Read more