Glenn Beck’s people have it totally wrong
More than a century ago, William Jennings Bryan’s populists saw government as the protector of the little guy. Today, Glenn Beck and his followers see government as the peoples’ oppressor.
Bryan’s people got it right. Becks’ don’t.
GOVERNMENT PROTECTS THE LITTLE GUY
Tags: conservatives, Democrats, Glenn Beck, politics, populists, Republicans, Wall Street, Washington
Democrats pay price for health-care circus
Democrats would be so much better off today had they given up their fruitless quest for bipartisanship last year and nailed down the health-care reforms two months earlier.
DEMOCRATS MADE THEIR OWN LUMPY BED
Tags: Democrats, health care, politics, Republicans, Washington
John Kerry, his yacht, and his taxes
John Kerry’s example offers several lessons for makers of tax policy — though not the ones Republicans intended.
REPUBLICANS OVERBOARD ON YACHTSMAN KERRY
Tags: Democrats, Massachusetts, Republicans, Rhode Island
Why would ethics trials hurt Democrats?
I can’t see it. If Nancy Pelosi is backing the ethics investigations of two high- profile Democrats, shouldn’t that be a badge of honor for her party?
ETHICS TRIALS COULD HELP, NOT HURT, DEMOCRATS
Tags: California, Democrats, ethics, House, Nancy Pelosi, Republicans, Senate
Raise taxes to cut government?
So much for the starve-the-beast theory whereby cutting taxes leads to smaller government. Our two leading tax-cutting presidents, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, advocated that theory, then expanded government with borrowed money. Clever fellows.
Another theory based on the “fiscal illusion” effect holds that raising taxes is a more effective way to contain government than cutting them.
I discuss that thinking in my new column:
RAISE TAXES TO CUT GOVERNMENT?
Tags: Democrats, economics, Republicans, taxes
Jim Webb gets it right on race-based policies
Tough Liberals have long been frustrated by the Democratic leadership’s periodic ventures into racial preferences — even as they abhor Republicans’ not-so-subtle appeals to prejudices among white voters. I express such displeasure toward the end of a recent column.
Virginia Sen. Jim Webb hits the nail on the nuanced head, when he criticizes racial preferences as they’ve evolved since the Civil Rights era. A long-time defender of poor Southern whites, he makes his case against laws that, in effect, discriminate against them in today’s Wall Street Journal.
By the way, Webb’s book, “Born Fighting: How the Scots-Irish Shaped America” is both informative and a wonderful read.
Tags: culture, Democrats, Jim Webb, race, Republicans, Virginia, Washington
Thank you, Richard Reeves…
for generously praising my recent primal scream on what peoples’ answers to the pollsters’ questions really mean.
Hint: Being angry over ” the direction of the country” does not necessarily translate into support for the Republican Party. It may well mean the opposite.
Tags: Democrats, Obama, politics, polls, Republicans, Washington
Democratic rout no sure thing
Do we like the direction of the country? No. Are Republicans the answer? Hell no.
REPUBLICAN VOODOO PUT US ON THIS PATH
Tags: conservatives, Democrats, politics, polls, Republicans, Washington
Hear me in Jacksonville….
To my comrades in Florida and everyone else, hear me at 3:45 pm EST on the Brother Stan Labor Show. Subject: immigration reform.
“THE BROTHER STAN LABOR SHOW”Wednesdays, 3:00 PM – 5:00 PM EDSTLIVE — ON AIR AND ON THE WEB!FM 105.3 (WJSJ) in Jacksonville — Streaming Worldwide: www.radiofreejax.comAND ON REPLAY! /// THE SAME DAY!10:00 PM – 12:00 Midnight /// Same Station and Website!LISTEN IN! — CALL IN!Call-In Number = 854-8255 (854-TALK) — Area Code = 904
Tags: Arizona, Democrats, immigration, Republicans, Washington
To my friends in Louisiana…
I come in peace.
My plans were to spend this Saturday morning drinking coffee and staring at the birdbath. But my column, MAKE LOUISIANA A U.S. PROTECTORATE, has provoked some alligator reactions. Let me address the more relevant ones.
Several of my correspondents complain that I named only Republican politicians in my discussion of what’s wrong with Louisiana’s political class, whereas Democrats have been as bad, if not worse.
Point granted. It was not my intention to make this discussion partisan. It happened that the two examples are Republicans. I could have included Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu, who is also defends the timber industry’s cutting of trees that hold the wetlands in place. But unlike Republican Sen. David Vitter, she wasn’t in a position in 2005 to castrate the Army Corps of Engineers’s powers to regulate these activities.
What makes the Republicans less charming is their baloney spiel about cutting down the size of the federal government combined with their constant howling for more federal money. And, of course, they never want to pay for anything with taxes.
About me. I was born in and raised around New York City. (One thing New Yorkers and Cajuns can agree on is that Rapid Ron Guidry’s number should be retired.)
However, I have been a resident of Rhode Island for the last two decades. Rhode Island is also famously corrupt and for that has been called the Louisiana of the North. Our legislature is overwhelmingly Democratic and does appalling things on a weekly basis. One thing the politicians don’t do, however, is mess with the environment. The people would not stand for it.
As a sucker for the environment, I would be happy to see my tax dollars spent on fixing up the ravaged Gulf coast. But ,no, I don’t care to spend billions restoring the wetlands as the locals continue destroying them for a quick buck or, in the case of Jindal and his berms, to make a show of doing something.
That shouldn’t be a very controversial position.
Meanwhile, let me offer my sincere condolences to the people of the Gulf.
Tags: culture, Democrats, Gulf disaster, Louisiana, oil, politics, Republicans
