In his first televised speech before Congress, President Obama asserted that prosperity will return once the government restores the flow of credit in the economy. It may come as a surprise to him, but an economy cannot run on consumer loans. Furthermore, credit stopped flowing in the U.S. for a very good reason: there was no more savings left to loan. … [Read More]

“Real men go to Tehran!” brayed the neoconservatives, after the success of their propaganda campaign to have America march on Baghdad and into an unnecessary war that has forfeited all the fruits of our Cold War victory. Now they are back, in pursuit of what has always been their great goal: an American war on Iran. It would be a mistake … [Read More]

Back in January I threatened to inflict on Takimag readers a series of articles on how to convince patriotic conservatives that it’s time for America to scale back significantly on the military spending that wastes so vast a portion of our national resources, inflates our deficit (and hence our currency), and gives irresponsible civilians “big ideas” that entail sending Americans to … [Read More]

Despite any minor conservative attributes, Bobby Jindal, Sarah Palin and Michael Steele don’t possess any extraordinary qualities or demonstrably different principles from countless other Republican governors, congressman and senators. In an era when Americans are screaming for change, Jindal, Palin and Steele don’t exactly represent a big departure from the Republicanism of the last eight years or even enough of a … [Read More]

Recently conducted polls among a number of unidentified historians concerning their views about our best and worst presidents reveal certain long-term trends. Not surprisingly Lincoln was at the top of the lists while our Lancaster County native son, James Buchanan, was at the very bottom. Only a few notches above the man nicknamed “Old Buck” was the clueless W, whom the … [Read More]

Before he was a world-rebuilding, race-transcending international statesman, our president had become well acquainted with the Chicago Way. And they tell me your are crooked and I answer: Yes, it is true that I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again. ~Carl Sandburg, “Chicago,” 1916 When Rudyard Kipling saw Chicago in 1891, he wrote, “I urgently desire … [Read More]

Geert Wilders is in the US at the moment and will be showing his film “Fitna” in Congress tomorrow, Thursday. US Republican Sen. Jon Kyl is hosting a film screening at the Capitol building on Thursday for Geert Wilders, a Dutch lawmaker whose film claims that Islam inspires terrorism. Kyl agreed to facilitate the event because “all too often, people who … [Read More]

Call me slow, but I think have finally understood one of the most puzzling claims of terror warriors, namely, that the crucial difference between them and their liberal opponents is that the latter believe that hunger and poverty cause terrorism. As Norman Podhoretz writes, “standard academic and intellectual discourse” holds that terrorism is “a product of economic factors,” namely, “hunger and … [Read More]

Lecturing a conscript conclave of Justice Department bureaucrats, Attorney General Eric Holder last week called America a “nation of cowards” for not spending more time talking about race. Reading his speech, however, one recalls the sage counsel of Pat Moynihan to President Nixon in 1970: This whole subject might benefit from a long period of “benign neglect.” One point Holder did … [Read More]

During a speech in honor of Black History Month, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said last week that America is a “nation of cowards” because we “simply do not talk enough with each other about race.” That Holder believes Americans don’t talk enough about race is absurd, as it often borders on being a national obsession. But Holder is right that … [Read More]