Like me, you may be wondering why 96,000 California state workers were given cell phones courtesy of the taxpayers. For, like me, you probably use a cell phone in the course of your work. And we know that if we asked our employers to pay for it, the answer would be N-O.
All the public opinion polls now confirm that President Obama has moved up sharply and significantly in popularity and job approval since he began to tack toward the center after the November election. Rasmussen and Zogby both have him over 50% job approval for the first time in almost a year. The key event was his high-minded speech in the aftermath of the Tucson shootings and his clear separation from the blame-oriented liberal commentators who tried to pin the killings on the Tea Party and Sarah Palin.
Last Thursday was the 50th anniversary of John F. Kennedy's inaugural speech, and while the anniversary did not go unmentioned, it got less attention than I expected. I suspect that those of us who can remember that snowy day -- why do we schedule our great national outdoor ceremony for a day that is as likely as any to be the coldest of the year? -- are inclined to overestimate the hold that Kennedy has on Americans five decades after he took the oath of office.
GOP Assemblyman Chris Norby is a former Orange County supervisor with a longtime and deep aversion to California's 425 redevelopment agencies. Some redevelopment zones may eliminate blight and provide low-income housing as originally intended, he concedes, but redevelopment also allows billions of tax dollars to bankroll the building of a lot of half-empty shopping malls, as well as sweetheart deals that pad the pockets of well-connected developers.
Can GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt talk President Obama into a major corporate tax cut? Immelt has been appointed to the new Council on Jobs and
Competitiveness, which replaces the disbanded Paul Volcker Economic Recovery Advisory Board. Immelt was a member of that original board. Now he has a more elevated position in the Obama 2.0, allegedly pro-business move-to-the-center Clintonesque White House.
One of the most widely circulated articles in The New York Times of late asks: "Is Law School a Losing Game?" For days, it was the most e-mailed story in the paper, and it is still among the Top 10.
My eyes are dry as I ponder Joe Lieberman's decision to not seek re-election. Voices on the right regard Connecticut's independent senator as a victim of left-wing intolerance. I see him as a sanctimonious hypocrite, political opportunist and double-crosser. Guess I don't like him.
In a January 2008 Democratic presidential debate, then-Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama both promised to deliver universal health care plans. But Obama hit Clinton for supporting a requirement that individuals buy their own health care.
Paced by California and Illinois, state governments across the country continue to mimic the unsustainable fiscal excesses of the federal government – creating crushing deficits and soaring unfunded liabilities. Moreover, any state attempting to plug these holes with tax hikes or other revenue enhancements could create an exodus of businesses and taxpayers – meaning fewer jobs, lost revenue streams and diminished political clout.
Where can the new Congress start cutting spending? Here's one obvious answer: high-speed rail. The Obama administration is sending billions of stimulus dollars around the country for rail projects that make no sense and that, if they are ever built, will be a drag on taxpayers indefinitely.
Facts always matter, but never more so than when politicians deal with issues of real consequence, like health care and budget deficits.
Precisely two years from today, America will be inaugurating a president. But much sooner, the full-blown contest for the White House will begin.
I got my first threat when I was a young law professor. The campus newspaper reported that in teaching criminal law to first-year students, I was not only including rape in the curriculum (unheard of at the time), but was actually telling students of my own experience in the criminal justice system as a rape victim and how it shaped my views on the law. I thought it was a nice piece. My mother thought I was out of my mind. Both appear to be true.
Is there a new Cold War developing between China and the United States? That’s a question hovering over President Hu Jintao and his entourage as they come to Washington to discuss military, trade, and financial flash points with the Obama administration.
What should the congressional GOP's policy objectives be for the next two years regarding federal deficits and prosperity?
U.S. economic recovery continues to look better, according to the stock market and a boatload of economic stats last week. Stocks jumped 133 points on the Dow, which hit a 30-month high following its seventh straight weekly rise. Early fourth-quarter profit reports from Alcoa, Intel, and JPMorgan all beat expectations. Share prices are back to June 2008 levels, before the financial meltdown.
For the past three years, the left and Obama have been indistinguishable, joined at the hip in a marriage of ideology and, where that failed, of convenience. Now the marriage is on the rocks and some see a divorce in the offing.
In his superb speech in Tucson, Ariz., Wednesday evening, Barack Obama did great service to the nation. He put to rest the libel that political incivility is responsible for the Tucson shootings. He did so with three words that he added to the written text: "It did not."
Can Jerry Brown do it?
In the typical economic downturn, Americans thrown out of work make a deal with Euthenia, the Greek goddess of prosperity. They say (in their heads): We will get through this. We'll move in with family, find any part-time job. All we want is an assurance that good times will eventually return for hardworking people like us.
