Here comes Climate Rationing, or something like that.

Thomas Sowell on our Rookie President.

We've been reading Sowell's book, "The Vision of the Annointed."

Good, strong stuff. And with Obama as president it's about 80-20.

The subtitle of the book is "Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy." Economic policy too.

In New York a big pay day for Big Labor.

Chester Democrats are calling for "change" in next November's election.

Money Q from candidate Portia West.

“People are looking at the change that happened last year, when we voted in our first African-American president, and they are looking for more change on a county and city level.”

But Chester has had African-American mayors, Democrat and Republican, for years. And what would the Dems do that's so different than Republicans.

Maybe they would try to take over Harrah's, ala Obama's takeover of GM.

We suggest they start smaller. Something on the order of a AM-PM Mini-Mart and see how successful they are at running that.

Auto unionists are angry with Obama.

Money Q:

"It's the age-old Wall Street vs. Main Street smackdown again," said Brian Fredline, president of UAW Local 602 at a plant near Lansing. "You have all kinds of funding available to banks that are apparently too big to fail, but they're also too big to be responsible.

And how responsible were GM's unions? Obama fired GM CEO Rick Waggoner. He didn't fire UAW boss Ron Gettelfinger. A failed GM got billions for failing and only because organized labor demanded it.

UPDATE: Now others are questioning why Obama spared Gettelfinger.

It's Obama's economy now.

“He’s realizing, ‘Hey, the economy’s mine now, and I better do it my way,’” said the official. “So the administration is collaring people and letting them know who’s in charge. The days of saying, ‘It’s not our economy’ have come to an end.” 


Does disagreeing with Obama's agenda make you a racist? Angie Harmon claims no.

Mark Steyn on Obama's No Choice False Choice

Money Q:

Ahead of this week’s G20 summit in London, Timothy Geithner, America’s beloved Toxic Asset, called for “global regulation.” “Our hope,” said Toxic Tim, “is that we can work with Europe on a global framework, a global infrastructure which has appropriate global oversight . . . ”

“Global oversight:” Hmm. There’s a phrase to savor.

“We can’t,” he continued, “allow institutions to cherry pick among competing regulators and ship risk to where it faces the lowest standards and weakest constraints . . . ”

Just as a matter of interest, why not? If you don’t want to be subject to the punitive “oversight” of economically illiterate, demagogic legislators-for-life like Barney Frank, why shouldn’t you be “allowed” to move your business to some jurisdiction with a lighter regulatory touch?

The Economist joins the chorus of pre-election Obama supporters who are now questioning his competence, so reports Mark Steyn at NRO.

Arlen Specter does the right thing and tells big labor to shove it on check card. Did he do it because he's worried about being challenged from the right in his upcoming Republican primary?

Probably.

But the right thing is the right thing. Right?

Gay congressman Barney Frank accuses Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia of being homophobic and letting it interfere with his constitutional judgment.

Law Prof Ann Althouse disagrees.

Althouse and Scalia are right. Frank is wrong and just being himself.

It is he who is being anti-democratic here. He wants his cultural attitudes and values to be imposed on others from the altitude of the Supreme Court.

We guess that when you're partly responsible for a world-wide financial crisis by being in the protection racket of a corrupt quasi-government lending institution, it's better to change the subject.

George Will is scathing in his assessment of the direction America is heading under Democratic leadership.

With the braying of 328 yahoos — members of the House of Representatives who voted for retroactive and punitive use of the tax code to confiscate the legal earnings of a small, unpopular group — still reverberating, the Obama administration yesterday invited private-sector investors to become business partners with the capricious and increasingly anti-constitutional government. This latest plan to unfreeze the financial system came almost half a year after Congress shoveled $700 billion into the Troubled Assets Relief Program, $325 billion of which has been spent without purchasing any toxic assets.

He doesn't get any more optimistic

Democratic Party's bear-baiting of big business.

Money Q:

The current version of the party has largely broken free of any understanding whatsoever of the private sector -- how it works or what it needs to function.

True socialists at least think about markets so they can criticize them. The Democratic Party's leadership doesn't stir to even that level of engagement. In the House, Senate and some corners of the Obama White House, the party is acting as if the marketplace was the world of an alien tribe, which it has to control through intimidation or demands for protective tribute (read: campaign contributions).

The Obama Administration has behaved worse than AIG when it comes to these so-called outrageous bonuses.

Holman Jenkins explains.

AIG employee Jake DeSantis resigns, very publicly.

It's a letter that every congressman and administration official should read. Every voter too.

Where is America's Daniel Hannan?

I'm outta' town but here's my print column on Radnor's Colgan Leaming and what she learned doing volunteer work in India.

Ralph Nader would HATE this car. But 100 million Indians can't be wrong.

On second thought, Larry Tribe is now suggesting, at least according to this guy the house bill to target AIG bonuses is probably unconstitutional.

Just got this e-mail from William Penn school board member Charlotte Hummel.

TONIGHT - Monday - March 23rd - 7:30 at the High School Auditorium - the William Penn School Board will recognize and celebrate the achievement of the Penn Wood Boys Basketball Patriots on their State Championship win this past Saturday.

The entire community - all six boroughs! - are invited. Since parking is always at a premium, please walk if you can, or car pool or park behind the administration building. PLEASE do not part in front of neighbors driveway or in NO parking areas.

Please come! It will be a wonderful celebration!

Charlotte

Can't make it. Got a game myself. But congrats on a great season. What a team!

Market soars. Yea, Geithner.

As noted below Krugman hates the Geithner plan. Who ya gonna' trust? Krugman or investors?

Vanity Fair's Michael Wolff on Obama's presidency to date:

You can see the fundamental mistake he’s making. Having been so successfully elected, he’s acting like people actually want to hear what he thinks. He’s the great earnest bore at the dinner party. Instead of singing for his supper, he’s just talking—and going on at length. The real job of making people part of the story you’re telling, of having them hang on your every word, of getting the tone and detail right, the hard job of holding a conversation, he ain’t doing.

He’s cold; he’s prickly; he’s uncomfortable; he’s not funny; and he’s getting awfully tedious.

He thinks it’s all about him. That we want him for himself—that he doesn’t have to seduce, charm, surprise, show some skin.

And to think this guy, no doubt, voted for Obama.

NEWSFLASH: Washington politicians are hypocrites.

Film at 11.

Global warming is all the rage. But why aren't we making plans based on this scientific scenario. Shouldn't we be relocating millions of Americans away from this potential disaster?

Obama supporter Paul Krugman calls the Geithner plan a "mess."

My print column folo on the 13-year-old who Mike Chitwood accused of planning a Columbine-style take over of St. Andrew school is up.

UPDATE: Many interesting comments both pro and con.

The Inky's Melissa Dribben makes a fascinating comparison between the "Catholic Church" and the "Islamic hierarchy" and their penchants for "cruel crackdowns."

The cruelty of Islamic fundamentalism, she avers, is shown by an incident involving a 75-year-old woman in Saudi Arabia who was sentenced to 40 lashes, four months in jail and deportation for allowing two young men, who are not relatives, to visit her home.

"Lest you give in to the tempation to judge Islam harshly," Dribben writes (and gee whiz we wouldn't want to do that) "let me direct your attention to the outskirts of the city of Recife in northeast Brazil."

There, the cruelty of Catholicism is shown by a regional archbishop who ex-communicated the mother of a pregnant 9-year-old girl for allowing doctors to perform an abortion on her.

But let's compare the cruelty in Dribben's examples:

Excommunication (you are no longer a member of our
religious club) vs. 40 lashes, months of imprisonment and being kicked out of the country.

Which religious authority would you rather live under? Is it being too "harsh" to judge one religion more civilized than the other?

As for the "cruel crackdowns" of secular governments, like the ones that existed in the Soviet Union, Cambodia and still exist in North Korea and China where millions have been persecuted, imprisoned and killed for their religious beliefs well, never mind. They're beside Dribben's point, whatever it was.

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford explains why he is saying "No Thanks" to some of the so-called stimulus cash from Washington.

Money Q:

If we're going to spend money we don't have at the federal level, it becomes all the more important that our state balance sheet is in good order -- particularly if this is a protracted downturn. But many people do not realize that the stimulus money runs out in 24 months -- at which point South Carolina will be forced to find a new source of funding to sustain the new level of spending, or to make sharp cuts. Sure, I could kick the can down the road; in two years, I'll be safely out of office. But it would be irresponsible.

David Warren explains Obama's trouble with governing.

All his life, from childhood through university through "community organizing" and Chicago wardheel politics, through Sunday mornings listening to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, to the left side of Democrat caucuses in Springfield and Washington, he has been surrounded almost exclusively by extremely liberal people, and moreover, by people who are quick and clever but intellectually narrow.

That explains it.

In today's WSJ:

The worst-kept secret on Capitol Hill is that Democrats have always planned to tax health benefits to pay for their "universal" health-care plans. Now White House aides are whispering that they're also open to the idea. Maybe they will all now apologize to John McCain for trashing his proposal to do the same thing in the Presidential campaign.

They've got to be kidding. Being a Democrat in Washington means never having to say you're sorry.

Rep. Joe Sestak was one of the 328 members of Congress who voted to impose a 90 percent retroactive tax on AIG executives who were paid according to their existing contracts.

Having voted for the mamouth spending bill that permitted such bonuses, it's safe to say the Joe Sestak was "for the bonuses before he was against them."

“These bonuses are an outrage and an insult to the American taxpayer," Sestak thundered in a press release, "and that’s why I voted today for this measure to recoup the American people’s money.”

Great. So why did he vote for the bill that contained the bonuses in the first place? It's safe to say that - like every other member of Congress - he didn't read it.

Isn't that an outage? Congressmen voting for bills they haven't even read?

How about a resolution that says "Our leadership in Washington is so pathetic that congressional salaries are now going to be taxed at a rate of 90 percent"?

How much support do you think that proposal would glean with the American people? With Congress' approval rating hovering at about 28 percent, we're guessing quite a bit.

Sestak claimed that "normally" he wouldn't for such a punative bill (one, that is patently unconstitutional and has no chance of withstanding judicial scrutiny) "but these are not normal circumstances."

Right. The rule of law no longer applies when an issue like this can be demagogued by populist nincompoops.

As for the AIG bonuses themselves, well, as much as they stink, there is an argument for them.

The best way to understand this is to think about post WWII Germany. When Patton marched in, he decided to leave the people who were running the railroads, phone systems, and other bureaucracies in place, even if they were members of the Nazi party. He did this to keep the country functioning and orderly. It cost Patton his command, but it worked.

Contrast that with the Bush Administration's decision to boot all the Baathists out of government when we took over Iraq. Seemed like a good idea at the time but it made getting the country back on its feet tougher, fed the insurgency and almost led to civil war.

These AIG guys aren't Nazis or Baathist thugs, but they did help create the mess we're in. Most of them have taken their lumps for it, financial and otherwise, and are looking for work. The ones who are left are in the best position to know what to do now within the company as it pays out billions to other financial institutions, winds down and restructures.

Joe Sestak hasn't been a congressman in Washington long enough to be blamed for any part of this financial crisis. But the leaders of his party have. And they have contributed mightily to creation of the housing bubble that trigged this house of cards to implode.

Sestak CAN be blamed for this particular bit of shamelessness. He could've been one of the grown-ups in Washington and pointed out that abrogating legal contracts is unlawful and un-American. Instead, he's chosen to be just another Democrat, following a party leadership that doesn't know the meaning of "responsibility."

Rep. Barney Frank now wants the bonuses to Fannie Mae execs halted. Any chance he'll decline his own pay raise?

The very best.

So the Democrats are encouraging Americans to man the barricades in outrage at protest at bonuses to AIG executives, while the White House frantically rearranges the deckchairs, hanging Chris Dodd and increasingly Tim Geithner out as bait to a public that is staring in disbelief as an administration they elected on the basis of its supposed intellectual and ethical firepower has done more to wreck the economy in eight weeks than the Bush administration did in eight years.

Maria Shriver doesn't like Obama's self-deprecating Special Olympics quip.

"Often times we don’t realize that when we laugh at comments like this it hurts millions of people throughout the world,” added Shriver.

Baloney. No it doesn't. Any more than the AIG bonuses hurt the economy.

UPDATE: Besides, many Special Olympian bowlers bowl better than Obama. One has bowled five perfect games.

He now stands accused of bilking more than 100 investors of $75 million, up from the $50 million he told authorities about months ago. That's 50 percent more theivery than he originally admitted.

The big question: Where did it all go? And did any of it make it oversees in a difficult to trace bank account.

Chucky the K explains the buffoonery of Congressional Democrats on the AIG bonus-gate debacle. What a bunch of stumblebums!

What they are attempting is hypocritical, stupid, trivial and illegal. Besides that, no problem.

And get this...

Free trade is the one area where the world indisputably turns to Washington for leadership. What does it see? Grandstanding, parochialism, petty payoffs to truckers and a rush to mindless populism. Over what? Over 97 Mexican trucks -- and bonus money that comes to what the Yankees are paying for CC Sabathia's left arm.

UPDATE: And Mike Gerson's analysis is just as good.

My column on the closing of the Wallingford WAWA is up.

At Patterico, Barney Frank's lame attempt to excuse himself from any responsibility for the Fannie Mae meltdown is REJECTED.

Vedder and Denhart explain how universities exploit top athletes to line their own pockets. When it comes to getting their market value, big-time college athletes don't.

So what else is new?

Vedder and Denhard have a point.

Still, these athletes get a great stage on which to perform. They are worshipped. And they get the sheer unadulterated fun of playing in front of millions. Some things are more important than money.

The Democrats blow it and look like arrogant imbeciles in the process.

Dear Gil,

I just wanted to take a moment in thanking you for reaching out and caring
about our school, Saint Andrews. We the parents have had a rough week or two, reading your column put us at ease, also the children.

The only thing my boys were upset about was the how the media blew it up to be so bad.

I just read to them what you wrote and it brought smiles back to their faces. I just reassured them that the media is good from some things and not so good for others.

Next week we will be in the chess tournament. We were in first place so if we when this year hopefuly we will be noticed. You have gained more readings to your column. Keep it up.

Thanks again,

Jennie Tague a parent @ Saint Andrews

Go Nova!!!

We heard about this - maybe the greatest prank ever - by reading Michael Smerconish's column.

Smerconish wrties that he heard about Upper Darby's Matt Steven by reading ESPN's Rick Reilly, who, in turn, heard about Matt from somebody who, apparently, reads the Daily Times.

Armed citizen saves boy attacked by pitbulls in Upper Darby.

A bystander with a North Carolina concealed weapon permit fired several shots into the ground and shot the dog in the leg, police said. The dog was later euthanized. The youth, of the 7100 block of Locust Street, was able to get away.

The Glendale Road resident, 25, who scared off the dogs, was not charged.

Not charged? He should be given a medal. Just another example of what a gun in the right hands can do.

NASA Climate Changer James Hansen announces the democratic process is not working when it comes to doing what he thinks should be done to combat global warming.

Other things the democratic process is not working to correct:

1. Social Security
2 Medicare
3. Health Care reform
4. The education performance gap
5. Genocide in Africa
6. Break-down of the American family
7. America's drug incarceration rates
8. Nuclear proliferation in the Middle East
9. The closing of the Wallingford Wawa
10. Terrell Owens

Time to try something else. How about a single world government run by rocket scientists and Al Gore?

Rep. Jack "Abscam Earmark" Murtha (D-Pa.) defends his appropriating hundreds of millions for defense contractors and large campaign donors in his district by waving a little copy of the U.S. Constitution at an annoying reporter.

“What it says is the Congress of the United States appropriates the money. Got that?”

Absolutely.

Let's see, a little more than a year and half until the next election. His donors are under federal investigation for making illegal contributions to him. The jig about up.

Got that, Porkoronomus!

Obama Administration in full panic mode.

*the first person who comes up with the name of the movie from which the above headline was gleaned wins a stale Montecristo robusto.

Tucker Carlson unbraids Jon Stewart and the Stewart-loving media.

Jim Cramer never had a chance on the Daily Show, rigged as it is. At least, he's still rich.

Maybe the courtier Stewart can convince his hero in the Oval Office to bring "criminal" charges against Cramer and his fellow CNBC financial advisors.

Have you read about the millions in bonuses that went to AIG executives? Are you outraged? So is the President Obama, his administration, congressional Democrats and some Republicans. And yet, when the Obama administration had a chance to prevent the bonuses from being paid a couple of weeks ago, it didn't.

Why not. Was it stupidity? Incompetence? AIG donations? Whatever.

After expressing their outrage The White House and Democrats are backpedaling furiously.

In the meantime, Obama and his fellow Dems have been curiously silent about about all the bonuses that have been paid to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac execs.

And why aren't all those outraged pols hurrying to return all that disgusting AIG money donated to their political campaigns?

What a display of hypocrisy, incompetence, and arrogance.

My print column on a teenager who was booted out of school for residency reasons is up.

Man wearing "I ♥ My Marriage" t-shirt busted for domestic battery.

Makes perfect sense, it was his wife he couldn't stand.

Defending Jim Cramer, who is under rhetorical and comedic assault for questioning the destructive power of the Obama budget, over at Reason. With an assist from the Atlantic's Megan McArdle.

It's called Reason for a reason.

And check out the first comment from Morgan. It's dead on.

A Prop-8 supporter and artist is targeted by the Gay left for retribution.

Money Q:

Eat s--- and die, c--.
Eat c-- and die, bitch.
You right-wing, heterosupremacist t--.
You are the moral equivalent of a Jewish Nazi. Roast in hell, you filthy c--.

And that's what one of the nicer e-mails she received.

Characteristically brilliant, libertarian Charles Murray urges America's elites to eschew "European syndrome" and to once again fall in love with American exceptionalism.

He is optimistic that this will happen thanks to advancements in scientific understanding of what makes human beings tick and watching what happens to Europe (disintegrating communities, hedonism, low birth rates, unsustainable welfare benefits, etc.) in the coming decades.

Money Q:

Drive through rural Sweden, as I did a few years ago. In every town was a beautiful Lutheran church, freshly painted, on meticulously tended grounds, all subsidized by the Swedish government. And the churches are empty. Including on Sundays. Scandinavia and Western Europe pride themselves on their “child-friendly” policies, providing generous child allowances, free day-care centers, and long maternity leaves. Those same countries have fertility rates far below replacement and plunging marriage rates. Those same countries are ones in which jobs are most carefully protected by government regulation and mandated benefits are most lavish. And they, with only a few exceptions, are countries where work is most often seen as a necessary evil, least often seen as a vocation, and where the proportions of people who say they love their jobs are the lowest.

Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: I just discovered that Opinionjournal.com printed the same quote I chose from Murray's lecture in it's Notable & Quotable. A rather startling coincidence given the length of the lecture and all the good stuff in it to highlight. Nevertheless it is coincidence. Or an example of great minds thinking alike? OK, a coincidence.

Vince Fumo is found guilty and my first thought is... will he be sent somewhere that allows conjugal visits? And are girlfriends allowed.

Is Arlen Specter a Rino? He sure looks like one.

Heh. Listen to the whole thing. Pretty funny.

Headline: UW-Milwaukee Study Could Realign Climate Change Theory -
Scientists Claim Earth Is Undergoing Natural Climate Shift

How dare these "scientists" come up with an alternative theory on climate change. Don't they know the debate is over? Don't they listen to Al Gore and Barack Obama?

These quacks need to be silenced, like all those other scientists were during the Bush/Cheney/Hitler years.

Congressman Joe Sestak is holding a "business procurement summit" at Springfield Country Club later this month and he is asking participants, which includes companies like Boeing, Lockheed Martin, etc. and non-profits like SEPTA, plus individuals to help defray the costs of the affair.

The odd thing is he is asking participants to make checks - from $40 for individuals to $300 for businesses - out to "Congressman Joe Sestak."

That seems a bit strange.

A reader pointed this out to me and I told him I'd check it out. I just called Sestak's office. Now, someone there is checking it out and is supposed to call me back with an explanation.

We'll let you know what it is when he does.

UPDATE: This just in...

Gil, in response to your question:

In accordance with the House of Representatives Committee on Standards
of Official Conduct, and consistent with House Rule 24, a Congressional
Office can charge a registration fee to attendees at an event it is
sponsoring. The registration fee must be calculated to cover approved
costs and the member should establish a temporary, non-interest bearing
account to hold the fees collected until the bill is paid. The rules
prohibit checks being made out to third parties, and all checks are, by
the rules, to be made out to the Congress Member hosting the event, per
standard, required practice. Our procedures are conducted in strict
compliance with the House Ethics Manual.

In addition, Congressman Sestak's office reviewed all the procedures for
this event with the Committee and received their approval for the
process and procedures that were to be followed.

Hope this helps. Please contact me if you have any questions.

Yours,

Joe Langdon

Eric Holder likes to talk about "cowards." He believes he lives in a nation of them when it comes to talking about race.

Meanwhile, down in a little county in Mississippi, political officials and operatives have been found to be involved in numerous race-based voting rights violations thanks to the courageous efforts of some career lawyers in the Justice Department's Office of Civil Rights.

Why isn't Eric Holder talking about it? Find out by clicking here.

John Kass has a thoughtful piece on the use of embryonic stem cells for research.

In it, he quotes President Obama:

It's a difficult and delicate balance," said Obama. "And many thoughtful and decent people are conflicted about or strongly oppose this research. And I understand their concerns and I believe that we must respect their point of view. But after much discussion, debate and reflection, the proper course has become clear. ..."

It's good that he said that.

But what is "clear" is that this was not a "difficult and delicate" decision for Team Obama or Mr. Obama himself. It was a foregone conclusion. No "difficult and delicate" balance was struck, as it was during the Bush years. The act of dissecting human embryos for their stem cells will now be fully federally funded if Barack Obama has anything to say about it.

Obama's position is full speed ahead toward a Brave New World.

At one, the conferees want to stoke fear and alarm. At the other; scientific inquiry and skepticism.

George Will on racial gerrymandering and the Voting Rights Act.

Money Q:

The VRA was written to protect each individual's right to vote. Having been twisted to serve group rights -- certain groups' entitlements to win quotas of offices -- the VRA has become emblematic of both the noble flourishing and the ignoble decline of the civil rights movement.

Read the whole thing.

Gene Weingarten has a terrific piece in The Washington Post on parents who accidentally kill their children by forgetfully leaving them in cars.

It happened locally last year to a grandfather, Ed Kanterman. He pleaded no contest to involuntary manslaughter and was given three-years probation.

Read Weingarten's long piece. It comes with a wonderfully human payoff at end.

My print column on an 8-grader's alleged "plot" to take over St. Andrew school in Drexel Hill is up. There are holes in the case. Big ones.

So Joe Biden was right.

My column on a Springton Lake bullying is up.

In response, I received this e-mail:

Hello,

I am 26 years old and a former student through the Rose Tree Media School District. Currently I am in law enforcement and am highly respected by my peers. However, in High School I was threatened and made fun of almost every day. I was humiliated daily at lunch. It was so bad that I broke down crying in the principals office when I went to complain about it. Nothing was done. None of the kids were removed from the lunch. No action was taken against them. To be honest my self esteem is still screwed up because of it. I constantly worry about what people think about me behind my back and I have almost no confidence in myself. In almost any situation I am in I am seen as a leader and have people look up to me but I still can't stop second guessing myself or beating myself up if I make a mistake. Bullying is a serious issue and I thank you for covering it.


Powerful stuff

Thoughtful edit in today's WSJ on Madoff's crookery, prosecutorial ambition, and political blame-shifting.

Read it here.

If wheel-chair bound Charles Krauthammer had accepted the White House invitation to attend the signing ceremony at which President Obama removed restrictions on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, he says, he would have "walked out."

Such is the curative effect of presidential arrogance and hypocrisy.

Read the whole thing. My thoughts (nice to see them shared by C.K.) can be found here.

Rick Reilly at ESPN rewrites my column on Matt Steven, the CYO foul-shooting, game-winning blind kid, and does a very nice job.

George Will on our magnificiently-intentioned president

Money Q:

One afternoon last week, cable news viewers saw, at the top of their screens, the president launching yet another magnificent intention -- the disassembly and rearrangement of the 17 percent of the economy that is health care. The bottom of their screens showed the Dow plunging 281 points. Surely the top of the screen partially explained the bottom.

We especially like the idea of covering the moon with yogurt to save $5 trillion.

Read the whole thing.

Honeymoon over, the marriage begins, for better and for worse...

"We have nothing to fear but fear itself," said FDR, but that was before Climate Change, which will KILL US ALL, if we don't do something about it very soon, says John "Turkey Lurkey " Kerry.

Meanwhile, the number of Americans who believe the threat of global warming is exaggerated is at an all time high.

Good police work, nipping a 13-year's plan to take over his school in the bud. But the fact that he was going to use pellet guns to do it, take a little heat out of the story. Don't ya think?

The good news for the kid and his family, the bb guns will save him years behind bars.

My column on a bit of custodial buffoonery, and administrative ass-covering in Penn Delco is up.

At least new Superintendent George Steinhoff SAID the right things.

Especially disappointing was the reaction of schools maintenance director Tom Calvecchio, who refused to admit his employees had done anything wrong.

There may be more to this story. We'll see.

I hope as many people are as outraged by this as were outraged by Michael Vick's dog-fighting business.

Long prison sentences please.

Some lawyer with a funny name explains Obama's latest vetting disaster Charles Freeman as his top intelligence advisor.

Gone! Poof! (Freeman blames the Jews. Nice. Artful.)

This administration's poor judgement and stumble-bum quality is now an open secret.

Our own Camille Paglia, that libertarian lesbian Democrat, skewers Obama's political team of flacks, fixers and goons and not only defends Rush Limbaugh and his right to spout off, she admires him for his principles and grit.

Money Q:

And I'm sick of people impugning Rush's wealth and lifestyle, which is no different from that of another virtuoso broadcaster who hit it big -- Oprah Winfrey. Rush Limbaugh is an embodiment of the American dream: He slowly rose from obscurity to fame on the basis of his own talent and grit. Every penny Rush has earned was the result of his rapport with a vast audience who felt shut out and silenced by the liberal monopoly of major media.

Can't wait to hear what she thinks of Jerry Springer.

She also has a few harsh words for feebleness of the current crop of Republican leaders, all well-earned and deserved.

Good stuff.

The Swedish government is raising fuel taxes to battle global warming.

Good for them. Let's see how it works out.

Doubts about Obama's judgement are starting infect the "establishment" class.

Reminds me of what Mort Zuckerman said on one of the Sunday shows. Obama's still popular, but his credibility is sinking fast. And we're just six week in.

William Voegeli explains the roots the liberal condescension.

Money Q:

The late Susan Sontag was forbiddingly erudite—an essayist, novelist, playwright and critic. There's not a community college dropout in America, however, gullible enough to have traveled to Hanoi and reported back, as she did in 1968, "The North Vietnamese genuinely care about the welfare of the hundreds of captured American pilots and give them bigger rations than the Vietnamese population gets, 'because they're bigger than we are,' as a Vietnamese army officer told me, 'and they're used to more meat than we are.' "

This is long and none of you liberal losers will read it. But I did.

Why won't Al Gore debate his critics on global warming? John Fund thinks he knows.

Now playing in Washington, D.C.

Heh!

The Democrats are (SURPRISE!) fighting among themselves. Good! There are grown-up Democrats but too few in the White House and Congress.

Warren Buffett, yeah the billionaire Democrat, disagrees with our Commander-in-Chief and how he is trying to ram stuff down the country's throat.

Money Q:

BUFFETT: Now, just rephrase that and since it's, in my view, it's an economic war, and--I don't think anybody on December 7th would have said a `war is a terrible thing to waste, and therefore we're going to try and ram through a whole bunch of things and--but we expect to--expect the other party to unite behind us on the--on the big problem.' It's just a mistake, I think, when you've got one overriding objective, to try and muddle it up with a bunch of other things.

UPDATE: Jonah Goldberg strongly agrees.

WASHINGTON (AP) - From tiny embryonic cells to the large-scale physics of global warming, President Barack Obama urged researchers on Monday to follow science and not ideology as he abolished contentious Bush-era restraints on stem-cell research. "Our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values," Obama declared as he signed documents changing U.S. science policy and removing what some researchers have said were shackles on their work.

"It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda - and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology," Obama said.

Think what you will be the effectiveness and importance of embryonic stem cell research, this is not only pure nonsense it is pure arrogance on the part of a six-week-old president.

Apparently, some in the "scientific community" felt slighted by the Bush Administration when the former president failed to federally fund certain kinds of research because of his belief that human life begins at conception and deserves moral consideration at that moment. This, according to our new president, is a "false choice." What is false about it?

It is a choice that newly pregnant women across this country make every day. They chose between giving life and terminating it. For many it is a very hard choice, either way. But there is nothing false about it. It is as real as love itself.

When given the opportunity by Pastor Rick Warren, during the campaign, to tell voters at what point a baby "should get human rights," Barack Obama humbly said the answer to that question was "above my pay grade."

That was a lie.

The man was running for president of the United States and a president gets to decide - has to decide - many life and death issues.

Once inaugurated as president Barack Obama was not so humble anymore. He swiftly lifted the ban on federal funding of foreign abortion clinics. Before the election, Obama wanted to sound moderate and didn't want to offend pro-life voters by clearly stating his own views on abortion. His actions and previous votes, however, suggest he is one of the most pro-abortion politicians in America.

The scientific question of when human life begins is hardly a serious question anymore, among scientists, anyway. It begins at conception. A new living being, human - not in potential but in genetic reality - has been created.

The moral and political question is when to assign this being the full complement of rights and political protections we give other human beings.

That is a choice. It is both a personal choice and a societal choice.

Barack Obama has made a choice. He has chosen to give fewer protections to nascent human life in the hope of future scientific breakthroughs to help the sick and infirm. Just as he has chosen to borrow and spent trillions of dollars on social and economic programs in the hope of improving the U.S. economy.

To govern is to choose. And Obama is choosing.

He and followers flatter themselves by claiming their choices are not ideologically driven but are made on facts and facts alone. Really? What "fact" led Obama's Energy Secretary and phyicist Steven Chu to suggest that by 2100 there would be no arable land left in California thanks to anthropomorphic global warming?

That is not a fact. That is an untestable, non-scientific prediction.

What "fact" led Obama's top science advisor John Holdren to predict (wrongly) back in the 1980s an "age of scarcity" due to over population? Back then Holdren, the co-director of the graduate program in energy and resources at the University of California, Berkeley, bought into Paul Ehrlich's famous "Population Bomb" theory. Ehrlich's predictions of world-wide food shortages and natural resource depletion were universally wrong. (See NYT science writer John Tierney for more on this.

The point is a president doesn't have to politicize science when he hires politicized scientists to advise him.

That's a choice too.

UPDATE: Princeton's Robert George and Eric Cohen have more to say on this in today's WSJ

The Swarthmore College student missing since last week has has turned up.

Hey Goofball, next time you go on a camping trip, tell somebody.

T. Coddington Van Voorhees VII defends conservatives from pirates and their Captain Hook.

Much has been written about the fate of the conservative movement in the months since last I corresponded with you. I won't belabor the barrels of ink expended in the printing of its obituary, nor will I bore you with further reading of its entrails. Suffice it to say the grand old ship is in the doldrums, adrift in the electoral currents, with nary a harbor on the horizon. But it is time we leave such map room mopery aside and navigate a bold new course for the conservative armada. One needn't have a 400-year old heirloom scrimshaw sextant for this task; but, fortunately, I do.

Cap and Trade: Who pays? You do.

The days of "animal house" parties are over for failed bank executives, says John Kerry.

No wind surfing either.

Meanwhile, the White House is party central.

My print column on how not to put out a "fire" is up.

Sally Pipes explodes a few of the Democratic talking-points/ myths about health care reform.

Krauthammer on Obama's dishonest, deceptive budget. He is less than thrilled with it.

Obama claims that lack of health-care reform, dependence on foreign energy and too few college graduates led us to the situation we are in today.

Wrong.

Money Q:

At the very center of our economic near-depression is a credit bubble, a housing collapse and a systemic failure of the entire banking system. One can come up with a host of causes: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pushed by Washington (and greed) into improvident loans, corrupted bond-ratings agencies, insufficient regulation of new and exotic debt instruments, the easy money policy of Alan Greenspan's Fed, irresponsible bankers pushing (and then unloading in packaged loan instruments) highly dubious mortgages, greedy house-flippers, deceitful homebuyers.

The list is long. But the list of causes of the collapse of the financial system does not include the absence of universal health care, let alone of computerized medical records. Nor the absence of an industry-killing cap-and-trade carbon levy. Nor the lack of college graduates. Indeed, one could perversely make the case that, if anything, the proliferation of overeducated, Gucci-wearing, smart-ass MBAs inventing ever more sophisticated and opaque mathematical models and debt instruments helped get us into this credit catastrophe in the first place.

In short, when your roof is on fire you don't talk about it being a good time to redecorate your living room.

A protester in England throws green custard in the face of a British official.

Question: Why was she not arrested and charged with assault or at least punched in the face in self defense?

Broomall's Janet Greenberg, whose hobby I wrote about last summer, will be featured on Channel 10 News tonight at 5 and 11.

She's the old gal who peruses the unclaimed property listings from the state and calls people who have money waiting for them in some bank account somewhere.

After the column appeared Janet was made an honorary "ambassador" by the state Department of the Treasury.

Her daughter Bonnie wrote to give us the heads up on tonight's broadcast. Thanks Bonnie.

Mickey Kaus says Obama might "blink" on vouchers.

That would be good news to the 1,700 D.C. kids already in the program. As for the ten of thousands of kids left out?

Screw 'em.

Doug Ross wants to know if President Obama is intentionally trying to destroy the free-market system so that government can take its rightful place as distributor of all goods, services and wealth in America.

We doubt it (unintentionally, is more like it), but we like the photo. The Hindenberg is a nice touch.

Is this the new "smart" foreign policy: Kick your friends, be kicked by your adversaries.

Headline: US Treasury secretary attacks oil, gas tax breaks.

Gee, did oil and gas attack him for the tax break he gave himself.

Listening to "The People," Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, will raise taxes and fees instead of cutting services.

Brilliant. Will the last businessman to leave the city please turn out the lights.

Radnor's township manager is being crap-canned allegedly for giving himself and his employees bonuses, not approved by township supervisors.

That'll do it.

Steve Chapman misses Bill Clinton.

Hey, things could be worse. You could be living in Venezuela.

Of course, people who live in Darfur dream of living in Venezuela.

Robert Bryce explains why "renewable" energy sources (wind, solar, hydro-electric) just won't get the job done when it comes to America's energy needs.

It's pretty simple math.

My print column on National Problem Gamblers Awareness Week and it "guest speaker/junkie" is up.

Vegas defended.

What happens in Chicago doesn't stay in Chicago. It goes to the White House and scolds people.

Obama tax proposals uniting the opposition, including some from his own party.

As I said in a previous column, I don't root for the death penalty anymore. But if anybody every deserved it, it's this guy.

Obama revealed.

Money Q:

This is not merely the rejection of "trickle-down economics," it is a weakening of the theoretical basis for capitalism -- that free individuals are generally more rational and efficient in making investment decisions than are government planners.

Our colleague Tony Phyrillas notices something about the DOW since the Dems took over congress.

Coincidence? He thinks not.

Finally, Blago gets his pay day.

Bill McGurn challenges Obama to stand up for D.C.'s voucher kids.

Beholding to teachers unions, Democrats, like Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, wants to kill the program that helps 1,700 poor kids attend private schools; schools like Sidwell Friends, the very same school Obama's daughters attend.

Instead of killing it, Obama should doubling or tripling funding for such a worthwhile program that benefits mostly black kids.

Will he?

Wanting Obama's liberal schemes to fail. Horrors!

Alexis de Toqueville warns of democratic despotism in America - in 1840.

This new sovereign:

... does not break wills but it softens them, bends them, and directs them; it rarely forces one to act, but it constantly opposes itself to one's acting; it does not destroy, it prevents things from being born; it does not tyrannize, it hinders, compromises, enervates, extinguishes, dazes, and finally reduces each nation to being nothing more than a herd of timid and industrious animals of which government is the shepherd.

Look familiar?

Right-of-center "moderates" are finding themselves suffering buyer's remorse thanks to Barack Obama's gargantuan budget ($3.1 trillion) that spends money on every liberal program under the sun.

Christopher Buckley, George Will and now, David Brooks.

They said nice things about Obama before the election. They were fooled by his smooth talk of "smarter" (not bigger) government.

As Obama's Leviathan now approaches intergalactic size, they are shocked, SHOCKED! at what he has proposed.

"The wa-wa-wa-world is heating up. Wa-wa-wa-we're all going to da-da-da-die," they said shivering.

Iowahawk reports on the NYU students' takeover of the White House.

DOW soars 1100 points.

Money Q:

After the takeover, coup leader and presumed acting US President Skyler Lozano appeared on a White House balcony to unfurl a "Free Gaza" banner and recited a list of the group's demands, including "cruelty-free consensus," "vegan lunchboxes," "end of the corporatist empire," and "free Wi-Fi in all dorms." Newly appointed US Secretary of Drum Circles Rachel Morgenthau then ordered all federal employees to go on a general strike until "we reach a democratic consensus on meeting a timetable for agreeing to a community framework for a collective demand consensus."

Isn't it pretty to think so.

The ever reasonable Robert Samuelson says Obama and the Democrats have it wrong on housing.

So what else is new?

... I'll make it as easy as possible."

We still can't get over Dr. Not So Smart. He adverstises his crimes on Craigslist and doesn't think he'll get caught.

Next up in the personals:

Armed robber seeks accomplice in holding up a local bank. Will train. No experience necessary. Must have own gun, mask and driver's license.

Bankers, loose money, and politicians, taking the DOW under 7,000. Doing what the Islamic jihad couldn't.

They've come a long way, baby.

Pounding the economy into shape with other people's money.

Was she multi-breasting?

March coming in like a lion.

And now HE knows the rest... of the story.