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Republicans and Tax Realities

In the 1980s, a Republican House member, fed up with bipartisan efforts to reduce the budget deficit, denounced Republican Sen. Bob Dole as the "tax collector for the welfare state." Newt Gingrich, who later became Speaker, had captured something essential about the party's mood. It was not against the welfare state. It was just against paying for it. That remains the case today, as John ...

Lenore Skenazy

Elect-Me Elmo — and Other Potential Veeps

Our presidential candidates have been through a lot. At least mine sure has. So here is the ultimate gift: vice presidential short lists for each of them. No need to thank me, friends (unless you win). For John McCain: — Elmo: As red-state as McCain — or red, anyway — but younger, cuddlier. Lowers the ticket age by about 173 percent. Genial nature could well recaptu ...

Miguel Perez

In Puerto Rico, Rare Vote for 'Presidente'

They serve valiantly in our armed forces, yet they don't have the right to vote for the president, who is their commander in chief during war. They are American citizens, yet they don't have a single voting representative in Congress. They are our 4 million fellow Americans who live on the island of Puerto Rico — a people about to get a rare say on who gets to live in the White House. Althou ...

Thomas Sowell

Too "Complex"?: Part III

In one of those typical San Francisco decisions that makes San Francisco a poster child for the liberal left, the city's Board of Supervisors is moving to block a paint store from renting a vacant building once used by a video rental shop. That paint store is part of a chain, and chain stores are not liked by a vocal segment of the local population. Chain stores are already banned from some parts ...

Mona Charen

Did Israel Drive Out the Arabs 60 Years Ago?

Sixty is pretty old for a country. Consider that by the time the United States was 60 (counting from the conclusion of the War of Independence), the year was 1843. We'd already had 10 presidents, had nearly quadrupled the size of the nation, and were on our way to becoming a world power. As with the histories of all nations, our birth was not without sins and crimes. The Indians paid a dear price ...

Susan Estrich

Playing Nice

A few years ago, the National Abortion Rights Action League, as it was then called, or NARAL for short, changed its name to NARAL Pro-Choice America. The idea, as I understood it, was to put the emphasis on "choice" rather than "abortion." This week, the organization announced its own choice in the Democratic primary contest, and as best as I can tell, it had absolutely nothing ...

Debra Saunders

Gas-Tax Holiday a Loser

Four years ago in February, San Francisco City Hall was a chapel of love. Mayor Gavin Newsom had announced that — a 2000 voter-approved initiative that limited marriage to heterosexual couples notwithstanding — San Francisco would allow gay and lesbian couples to wed. More than 4,000 same-sex couples obtained licenses that would allow them to pronounce, "I do." First they had ...

R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr.

The Mayor of London Who Would Be President

WASHINGTON — Readers of this column will recall that from time to time in covering an election cycle, I have referred to a voting bloc that political analysts of more delicate sensibilities would rather not mention, to wit, the moron vote. It is a constituency composed of politically ignorant citizens who nonetheless feel very intensely about political issues once their respective demagogues ...

Tony Blankley

Personal and Economic Recovery

Race, the yet unclosed scab that has run deep through our history, is about to be discussed as it never has been in a presidential election. In fairness to the United States, racial attitudes (or man's view of the "other" man) is a universal phenomenon that in most countries either goes unspoken or results in straight-out ethnic cleansing and murder. Here in America, in our earnest striv ...

David Limbaugh

Is Barack a Team(ster) Player?

Let me get this straight. It's perfectly fair for Barack Obama and his cohorts to repeatedly disparage President Bush's foreign policy as "cowboy diplomacy" but unspeakably horrific for Bush to analogize the Democrats' approach to foreign policy to appeasing Hitler? When Obama compared Hillary Clinton's threats against Iran to President Bush's threatening "bluster" and "co ...