Category Archives: Media Criticism
Jennifer Granholm’s Perfect Bad Example
It’s easy to blame her for Michigan’s woes, but my home state has to own up to the fact that they voted for her:
With this kind of record, most politicos might take refuge in prudence. Not Ms. Granholm. Today she is running around the nation selling a book and a message. The book is called “A Governor’s Story: The Fight for Jobs and America’s Economic Future.” Her message—that Granholm’s Michigan shows the way forward—has been taken seriously in all the places you might expect: the New York Times and Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show.”
At the top of Ms. Granholm’s claims is that she knows that low taxes and lean government are no prescription for growth because she tried supply-side and found it wanting. To prove her point, her appendix lists 99 business and 17 individual “tax cuts” she approved. She notes likewise that both state spending and the number of state employees dropped during her time.
In fact, almost all Ms. Granholm’s “tax cuts” are tax credits or other forms of tax preferences. A less delicate way of saying this is that far from reducing rates for everyone, Ms. Granholm played favorites. That meant a more complicated tax code where trendy businesses (green jobs, anyone?) that would fail without subsidies are effectively underwritten by non-favored businesses and other taxpayers.
A good plan, as always. Not.
Why Do They Hate Us?
Or more precisely, why does the president hate us, and what can we do to placate Him?
The EU Monetary Union
Is it on the verge of collapse?
Something profound has changed. Germans have begun to sense that the preservation of their own democracy and rule of law is in conflict with demands from Europe. They must choose one or the other.
Yet Europe and the world are so used to German self-abnegation for the EU Project – so used to the teleological destiny of ever-closer Union – that they cannot seem to grasp the fact. It reminds me of 1989 and the establishment failure to understand the Soviet game was up.
Go long on the Deutschemark.
SCOTUS And ObamaCare
Does the White House actually think it would be good for it to be struck down? Or at least, would it be objectively good for the Democrats going into next November?
Mickey’s a smart guy, but he’s too clever by half here, I think. I agree with most of the commenters. It’s a torpedo below his water line that can’t be undone now, and if it’s demonstrated to be unconstitutional as well, it just makes it that much worse, politically.
The Legacy Of “Reset”
Is Russia reverting to the Soviet Union?
“Shame On Australia”
Thoughts on the Andrew Bolt conviction from fellow thought criminal Mark Steyn.
There is no right to not be offended that supercedes freedom of expression (contrary to what is taught on many campi here).
The Libyan Missiles
What, if anything is really missing? If we dodged a bullet here (so to speak) I hope that it raises awareness of this issue for the future.
The Scandal That Still Isn’t A Scandal
It’s really long past time for a special prosecutor:
So now the wheels have come off the official explanation for Fast and Furious. Of course, that explanation never made much sense in the first place.
For one thing, the ATF had no authority to track the guns once they were in Mexico; for another, nobody bothered to inform the Mexicans of this intrusion on their national sovereignty.
Further, we now know that a host of federal agencies (including the ATF, the FBI and IRS, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Drug Enforcement Administration and, very probably, top officials at the Department of Homeland Security) were all in the loop at various levels, as was the White House.
So calling “Fast and Furious” a cockamamie operation gone wrong just isn’t going to cut it anymore.
There are two possible explanations. The first is that the anti-gun Obama administration deliberately wanted American guns planted in Mexico in order to demonize American firearms dealers and gun owners. The operation was manufacturing “evidence” for the president’s false claim that we’re to blame for the appalling levels of Mexican drug-war violence.
If this is true, then Holder & Co. have got to go — and the trail needs to be followed no matter where it leads. For the federal government to seek to frame its own citizens is unconscionable.
A second notion is that the CIA was behind the whole thing, which accounts for all the desperate wagon-circling. Under this theory, the Agency feared the los Zetas drug cartel was becoming too powerful and might even mount a coup against the Mexican government. So some 2,000 weapons costing more than $1.25 million were deliberately channeled to the rival Sinaloa cartel, which operates along the American border, to keep the Zetas in check.
Of course, there’s a third explanation — that both scenarios are true, and that those in charge of Fast and Furious saw an opportunity to shoot two birds with one Romanian-made AK Draco pistol.
Any administration defenders have a better explanation?
MSM Sheep
…ignoring the scandal of the century:
The Gunwalker conspiracy is the kind of story that journalists dream of breaking their entire careers. It is now in the palms of their hands: a story in which they can make a difference, take down the evil and corrupt, and ensure justice is served.
Instead of reporting, however, they are complicit. They have chosen to acquiesce to a clear and obvious evil, an aberration of our most basic values. They are no longer watchdogs, but docile sheep.
When it’s a Republican scandal, they’re watch dogs. When it’s a Democrat scandal, they’re lap dogs.