COMMENTARY AND OP-EDS
Ken Blackwell: The Left Goes to War Against Science, Surrenders on Terror
Two ongoing trends I chronicled during 2009 highlight an ironic situation: Leftists remain tough on their domestic political opponents, while lax when it comes to our real common enemies. As we recently saw with the Christmas airplane-bombing attempt, leftists seem bent on treating terrorists with kid gloves, insisting they receive rights normally reserved for U.S. citizens (even when this means failing to extract timely information that might save lives).
Ken Blackwell: President Obama: How About Bowing to Reality?
The editor of the New Yorker was once asked about the hip, cool, insider writing that graced his journal. Didn't its stylish prose go over people's heads? "We don't write it for the little old lady from Dubuque," he replied. Not pitching your case to the little old lady from Dubuque, Iowa, became a hallmark of modern sophisticated liberalism--a liberalism more characterized by point-of-view than by policy point papers. So when the New Yorker's Christmas week number hit newsstands, it was bound to attract attention.
Newt Gingrich and Peter Ferrara: A Vision for Prosperity
America is careening in overdrive in exactly the wrong direction, and the American people know it. All across this nation, people crave a new vision of leadership to restore traditional American prosperity and the American Dream, which they rightly see slipping away.
Peter Ferrara: Washington Knows Best
This column originally appeared on The American Spectator website on December 30, 2009.The health policy atrocity that Washington Democrats are now finalizing represents an ugly new turn in American politics. From almost the founding of the Republic, we have seen demagogues seek to sway public opinion in their favor with [...]
Orrin Hatch, Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski: Why the Health-Care Bills Are Unconstitutional
President Obama's health-care bill is now moving toward final passage. The policy issues may be coming to an end, but the legal issues are certain to continue because key provisions of this dangerous legislation are unconstitutional. Legally speaking, this legislation creates a target-rich environment. We will focus on three of its more glaring constitutional defects.
Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski: ObamaCare: Running for Rushmore?
"Ever since Teddy Roosevelt first called for reform in 1912, seven presidents -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- have taken up the cause of reform time and time again," President Obama said in a statement hailing the Christmas Eve Senate vote to take over 1/6 of the nation's economy. "Such efforts have been blocked by special-interests lobbyists who have perpetrated the status quo that works better for the insurance industry than it does for the American people."
Ken Blackwell: Senator J. Wellington Wimpy's Health Care Bill
Pollsters like to say their surveys are like a snapshot, limited to the time and the picture frame in which they are taken. What we are seeing in polling on the takeover of health care by the federal government is a consistent opposition by the American people. No major poll shows the people supporting the House or Senate bill.
Ken Blackwell: In the Long Run..
John Maynard Keynes is considered one of the leading lights of liberal economics. Challenged by a critic who said that in the long run, Keynesian economics would lead to national bankruptcy, Keynes memorably responded with a witticism: "In the long run, we're all dead."
Ken Klukowski: High Court Rejects Challenge to NRA's Signature Law
In 2005, the National Rifle Association of America enacted a law that probably saved the American gun-making industry from bankruptcy. And just this last week, the Supreme Court rejected a constitutional challenge to this landmark legislation, ensuring this law stays on the books to preserve America's culture of lawful firearm ownership.
Ken Blackwell: Power Player of the Week?
Markos Moulitsas Zuniga is the proprietor of the influential liberal blog Daily Kos. The blog is a must-visit site for those who are serious about the direction of the Democratic party. The blog was influential in the rise of Vermont's former Gov. Howard Dean in the run-up to the 2004 election.
Ken Blackwell and Ken Kluklowski: Court Strikes Down Law De-Funding ACORN
As Fiscal Year 2010 finally begins, a judge has struck down Congress' law ending federal funding of ACORN. It's ironic in that de-funding ACORN was the only example of fiscal restraint we've seen from Barack Obama, even more so since he's now stacking the courts with judges that will continue to issue such rulings. And perhaps that's what he's wanted all along.
Ken Klukowski: Health Insurance isn't Car Insurance, Mr. President
Asked about the constitutionality of his healthcare bill's key provision, President Obama said it's legal because people have to buy car insurance. That statement is so dead wrong as a matter of constitutional law that it makes anyone who practices constitutional law wonder how the Harvard Law School faculty would now grade their most famous graduate.
Ken Blackwell: Something's Still Rotten in Denmark
President Barack Obama has completed his months-long "deliberations" over his latest Afghanistan policy. He got more applause from Republicans than from Democrats after his long-running Hamlet act. The Prince of Denmark was famous for his indecision: "To be or not to be..."
Ken Klukowski: High Court Considers Whether Feds Can Make Everyone a Criminal
What if there was a federal law stating that anytime you owe anyone a duty to be honest and you violate that duty, you're committing a federal felony? Guess what--there already is. And now the Supreme Court is deciding whether to strike it down.
Ken Klukowski: Obama Seeks to Evade Accountability in Supreme Court
The Supreme Court heard arguments in a case over an executive-branch agency that is completely outside presidential control. Team Obama argued that the Court should keep it that way, leaving in place an agency that meddles in business affairs, but cannot be stopped by the public and for which Obama cannot be blamed.
Ken Klukowski: White House Hypocrisy on Executive Privilege
Congress wants the White House staff director involved in the now-infamous "gatecrasher" dinner to explain what happened. She won't, because President Obama is invoking executive privilege. While there's a decent claim for executive privilege here, Barack Obama's hypocrisy is nothing short of stunning.
McDonald v. City of Chicago
The case McDonald v. City of Chicago presents to the Supreme Court the issue of whether the Second Amendment right to bear arms is applicable to state and local governments, or instead is only a right that Americans have against the actions of the federal government. Specifically, the question is [...]
Ken Klukowski: Upcoming SCOTUS Case: Major Implications for Obama's Czars
The American people are fed up with an out-of-control government, largely run by unaccountable officials like President Obama's "czars." The Constitution strictly limits how officials can get their jobs and their power, and the Supreme Court is about to weigh in on one of those cases.
Ken Klukowski: Justices Debate Whether Courts Can Take Property
If government action takes your property, the Constitution says government must give you fair market value for it. But what if a court takes your property? That's what the Supreme Court is going to decide.
Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski: De-Fund Holder's Manhattan Transfer
Ex-White House counsel Greg Craig thought it was a good idea to transfer Eliàn Gonzalez from the arms of his loving family in Miami into the arms of Fidel Castro. Transfer Eliàn from Florida to Cuba. Bad idea. Attorney General Janet Reno thought she might have to prove her toughness by transferring dozens of women and children from a Waco cult headquarters to eternity. Really bad idea.