Those of us who are self-appointed advocates -- who expend our efforts trying to persuade a few more people to our political point of view -- must sit back in slack-jawed wonder when the great American public makes one of its great roars, as we all have been hearing in town hall meetings across the country.
Now we say good-bye to Robert Novak, who passed away early Tuesday morning at the age of 78. Yet another conservative icon has left us. He was a good friend, and an amazing reporter.
When Barack Obama was 11, his mother and grandmother took him and his half-sister Maya on the most American of family vacations -- a road trip that included Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon. Last week, Obama passed on that gift as he took his wife, daughters Malia and Sasha -- as well as Maya and her family -- on a four-day trip to two of America’s most breathtaking national parks.
"Death panels"? I'll tell you about death panels. My husband faced one some years ago, and it didn't involve any government bureaucrat. It was run by our private insurer, the sort of corporate entity that foes of health care reform say will give you anything you want.
Dear Young Obama Voter,
Congratulations. You have truly changed America.
The latest infamous incident of Major Airline Tarmac Dysfunction occurred in Minnesota last weekend when a severe storm curtailed Continental ExpressJet Flight 2816.
America has two problems to deal with in the health care debate, and only one of them relates to health care.
First a confession: I've never flown on a private jet. I've never flown on a Gulfstream. Never flown on a private 737 "office in the sky."
Craig Anthony Miller earned brief fame by screaming something about the Constitution in the face of Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter. A woman followed with the same scripted rant. The subject of the meeting in Lebanon, Pa., was to be health care, and the goal of the organized mobs was to disrupt it.
When Republican politicians and right-wing talking heads bemoan the fictitious "death panels" that they claim would arise from health-care reform, they are concealing a sinister reality from their followers. The ugly fact is that every year we fail to reform the existing system, that failure condemns tens of thousands of people to die -- either because they have no insurance or because their insurance companies deny coverage or benefits when they become ill.
There are more conservatives than Republicans and more Democrats than liberals. That's one of the asymmetries between the parties that helps to explain the particular political spot we're in. The numbers are fairly clear. In the 2008 exit poll, 34 percent of voters described themselves as conservatives and 32 percent as Republicans; 39 percent described themselves as Democrats but only 22 percent as liberals.
It’s hard to know why President Obama said what he said at Tuesday’s health-care town hall in New Hampshire. He actually stated, “If you think about it, UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.”
I have talked with soldiers from Afghanistan -- both American and British, both in the ranks and field-grade officers -- in an effort at making sense of what we are doing there. The White House and Pentagon publicly say they are reassessing policy in Afghanistan. It is well that they should. So far, both means and goals are confused.
She was the candidate's sister, the former president's sister, the wife of the former vice presidential candidate. Legend had it that she was smarter than any of them.
The most ominous signal yet for the Obama health care plan emerged in the poll by Scott Rasmussen released today. While public support for the plan fell to a new low (42% support, 53% oppose -- down five points in two weeks), the elderly emerged as the strongest opposition group.
The first thing you have to know when you read that California's 33 adult prisons -- like the state prison in Chino where riots erupted over the weekend -- are operating at 190 percent capacity is that 100 percent capacity means one inmate per cell, single bunks in dormitories and no beds in spaces not designed for housing. Put two inmates in a single cell and bunk beds in lieu of single beds and you get 200 percent capacity.
Let's talk about greedy geezers. The term displeases me because I find the vast majority of older people to be wonderfully generous and concerned for others.
One video is worth a thousand words (or, as in this column, about 730). The video in question, put together by a group called Verum Serum, shows public statements by three advocates of single-payer (government monopoly) health insurance explaining that a health care bill with a "government option" would move America toward a single-payer government health care system. You may not have heard of the first two, Rep. Jan Schakowsky and professor Jacob Hacker. But you have heard of the third, President Barack Obama.
Imagine it's four years ago and an aide to President Bush posted a blog on the Whitehouse.gov website that bemoaned Internet criticism of the Iraq war, then continued: "These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversations.
Last month, when reports surfaced that Los Angeles Police Chief Bill Bratton and his wife, Rikki Klieman, were putting their house on the market, people in L.A. started getting nervous. The chief is in the second year of his second five-year term. It is the first time in the 20-plus years I've lived here that no one was trying to show him the door.
