After all, handgun ownership is not allowed in the city of Chicago, which has one of the strictest gun control laws in the country, and Scott killed himself with a .380-caliber sidearm.

Unlike most Chicagoans, Scott could have been a legal handgun owner. Because he had it before the ban was enacted, he was allowed to register and keep it....]]> Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0600 The 19th century American writer Henry Adams said the descent of American presidents from George Washington to Ulysses S. Grant was enough to discredit the theory of evolution. The same could be said of the pantheon of conservative political heroes, which in the last half-century has gone from Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan to Sarah Palin. That refutation may be agreeable to Palin, who doesn't put much stock in Darwin anyway.

You can confirm all this by looking at what the three wrote. Goldwater, the 1964 Republican presidential nominee, made his reputation four years earlier with an eloquent and intellectually coherent volume, "The Conscience of a Conservative," which laid out...]]> Sun, 15 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0600 Opponents of same-sex marriage waxed triumphant recently when voters in Maine rejected a measure allowing gays to wed. Maggie Gallagher, head of the National Organization for Marriage, crowed, "This victory in Maine interrupts the cultural narrative that was being manufactured, that somehow American opinion is shifting on the gay marriage issue."

But she and her allies are the political equivalent of a Minnesota Vikings fan, gazing upon Brett Favre's middle-aged gridiron wizardry. They had better enjoy it now, because it's not going to last.

What got overlooked on Election Day was the victory for gay rights on the other coast, in Washington state -- where the electorate...]]> Thu, 12 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0600 Mass murders are usually a mystery. When Maj. Nidal Hasan allegedly committed one last week at Fort Hood, though, there was no time wasted in solving the mystery by blaming the massacre on his religion, which is Islam.

Maybe Hasan is just a homicidal lunatic set to work by fevered demons inside his brain. But post-9/11, you can't be a killer who happens to be a Muslim. If you're a killer, it has to be because you're a Muslim.

In this case, the claim of a religious motive has some evidentiary basis. Hasan had contacts with an extremist imam. The Army psychiatrist had been known to rail against the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and to argue that Muslims should be allowed...]]> Sun, 08 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0600 Communism was the greatest catastrophe of the 20th century, and one of the greatest in human history. Twenty years ago, suddenly and improbably, it fell into its death throes.

The end began the night of Nov. 9, 1989, when the Berlin Wall was opened, allowing East Germans to leave the prison that constituted their country. Throughout Eastern Europe, one Communist regime after another disintegrated. Within two years, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was not only out of power but banned by law. A system soaked in the blood of millions was gone.

It was the most dramatic, life-affirming and miraculous event of our time. And for those of us in the West, it is one from...]]> Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0600 Barack Obama held out hope of overcoming partisan divides, lowering the temperature and bringing Americans together. How's that working out? Not well, it appears. One year after he was elected, Americans look more polarized than ever.

In a special House election in upstate New York, a Conservative Party candidate, backed by Sarah Palin, took on a moderate Republican whom his supporters called a "radical leftist," forced her to withdraw and then lost to the Democrat. It's entirely possible that in the Senate, not a single Republican will vote for an administration-supported health insurance overhaul.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., laments that "it makes news when Democrats and...]]> Sun, 01 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0500 I have seen the future of American politics, and it is big. Big and fat.

You can get a glimpse of it in the New Jersey governor's race, which pits the slim, distance-running, Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine against Republican Chris Christie, who is built for comfort, not for speed. Corzine ran a TV ad accusing the challenger of "throwing his weight around" to beat traffic tickets, accompanied by footage that did not attempt to conceal Christie's bulk.

"Mr. Corzine's campaign is calling attention to his rival's corpulence in increasingly overt ways," reported The New York Times a few weeks ago, noting that his "television commercials and Web videos feature unattractive...]]> Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 If Medicare were a bank, federal regulators would be closing its doors, selling its operations and sacking its managers. Thanks to soaring costs, the program is fast running out of money -- even though it pays such low fees that many doctors refuse to take Medicare patients. Meanwhile, Medicare fraud costs taxpayers some $60 billion a year, according to a report by CBS's "60 Minutes," making it among the most profitable fields for felons.

That's our experience with government-run health insurance for the elderly. So what do congressional Democrats propose to do? Offer government-run health insurance to everyone else.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid capitulated to his...]]> Mon, 26 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 If you've been following the health care debate over the last couple of years, you may have heard the grim tale of Nataline Sarkisyan. Just 17 years old, afflicted with leukemia, she needed a liver transplant, but the insurance company Cigna refused to cover the surgery. After being picketed by nurses and the family, the insurer relented, but too late: She died that same day.

When he ran for president, John Edwards used the girl's experience as proof of the need for reform. Her parents went to Cigna headquarters to charge the company with killing their daughter to make money. Lately, a liberal group called Americans United for Change has used her in a TV spot to dramatize its...]]> Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 In 1973, Robert Randall was going blind from glaucoma when he discovered that smoking marijuana seemed to help his condition. That didn't matter to police when they found the Washington, D.C., resident growing cannabis and arrested him. Preferring to keep his sight, Randall sued the federal government, arguing that he was entitled to smoke pot as a "medical necessity."

It was a far-fetched argument -- but it worked. In 1976, a court ruled in Randall's favor. Before long, the federal government found itself in the strange position of supplying marijuana to him and a handful of other patients under a "compassionate use" program.

The compassion didn't go very far. The first...]]> Sun, 18 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 When inflation hits, every dollar in your bank account is worth less each day. Deflation is just the opposite: You put your feet up and watch your money grow in value. The latter is what is happening now to America's seniors. And politicians think they should not have to stand for it.

The other day, the federal government announced that for the first time since cost-of-living adjustments were begun in 1975, Social Security recipients will not get an annual raise in their monthly checks. This decision is not the result of a fit of fiscal austerity or a sadistic desire to punish old people. There won't be a raise to offset inflation for the simple reason that there has been no...]]> Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Watching Washington policymakers in action, I sometimes think they make mistakes because of unrealistic goals, flawed thinking, blind obedience to party or dubious information. And sometimes I think they make mistakes because they are -- how to put this? -- clinically insane.

There is no other way to explain what is going on at the Federal Housing Administration, which provides federal guarantees for home mortgages. Given the collapse in real estate prices, the weak economy and the epidemic of foreclosures, banks are acting with more caution than before. They now commonly require home buyers to make down payments of 20 percent to qualify for a loan. But the FHA often requires only...]]> Sun, 11 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Obese people and public-health scolds have one thing in common: a compulsion to keep behaving in a way that does not produce helpful results. The obese tend to keep eating too much and exercising too little regardless of what others say. Disciples of maternal government persist in meddling in individual choices whether it works or not.

One of the pet campaigns of the second group, ostensibly on behalf of the first one, is forcing restaurants to provide accessible nutritional information about their offerings. In 2008, the city of New York passed a law mandating calorie data on fast-foot menus and menu boards, on the assumption that better knowledge would make for healthier...]]> Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Since he's under attack for allegedly being a covert socialist, you would think President Obama would get some love from the overt socialists. But they sound about as enamored of him as Sean Hannity is.

"Obama's a market guy!" fumed Frank Llewellyn, head of the Democratic Socialists of America, in an interview with Politics Daily. "He's not any kind of socialist at all. He's not challenging the power of corporations. The banking reforms that have been suggested are not particularly far-reaching. . I mean it's laugh out loud, really."

In the past, Republicans had a damning word for their opponents. In 1988, George H.W. Bush denounced Democrat Michael Dukakis, as a "liberal."...]]> Sun, 04 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Abraham Lincoln was once asked how he liked being president. Bedeviled by secession and war, he recalled a story about a man who, when tarred, feathered and ridden out of town on a rail, commented that "if it was not for the honor of the thing, he would much rather walk." Chicago didn't get the honor of hosting the 2016 Olympic Games, but it should be grateful.

Athletes who make the games face the challenge of outdoing talented peers from all over the world. Cities that host the games face the challenge of putting on a massive and highly visible two-week extravaganza without spending themselves into the poor house.

That's why plenty of locals had serious reservations about...]]> Thu, 01 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0500 If Shakespeare had ever written a play about Afghanistan, it would have been a tragedy, not a comedy. For the United States, Afghanistan has been one tragedy after another, with more looming ahead.

In that part of the world, the only thing more dangerous than failure is success. It was America's success in helping the mujahedeen rebels defeat the Soviet Union that spawned later troubles. In the vacuum left by the departure of the Red Army, civil war broke out among competing factions, with the fanatical Taliban coming out on top.

Their theocratic regime eventually found common cause with al-Qaida after it moved from Sudan to Afghanistan. From that safe refuge, Osama bin...]]> Sun, 27 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 At least since 1994, when seven tobacco executives testified before Congress that they didn't think cigarettes were addictive, the public has not put great trust in those who sell carcinogens for a living. What Americans may not realize is that they also shouldn't believe the people who are supposed to protect us from tobacco. When it comes to cigarettes, the federal government can blow smoke with the best of them.

That became clear the other day, when the Food and Drug Administration announced it was prohibiting the sale of cigarettes with candy or fruit flavors. "These flavored cigarettes are a gateway for many children and young adults to become regular smokers," said...]]> Sun, 20 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 A new president, pursuing policies well within the political mainstream, evokes weirdly angry and intense denunciations from opponents -- a reaction hard to explain in terms of anything he has actually done. Does that suggest, as Jimmy Carter insists, that their true motivation lies in racism?

No, it doesn't, because I'm not talking about Barack Obama. I'm talking about George W. Bush and Bill Clinton -- both of whom, from the day they took office, managed to convince a minority of Americans that they were not just wrong but illegitimate, dangerous and thoroughly evil. Obama's troubles are not exactly unprecedented.

It's generally forgotten that on Inauguration Day in 2001,...]]> Thu, 17 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 For years, I've been wishing for another Ross Perot -- a leader who would awaken the American people to the dangers of living beyond our national means through huge federal budget deficits. Now, at last, we have that leader. His name is Barack Obama.

Perot ran for president in 1992 as a third-party candidate, and an unlikely Pied Piper he was -- a short, crew-cut scold with a thick twang and a cranky manner who proposed to raise taxes. But his complaints about Washington's chronic overspending struck a chord with the public. A few months before the election, he was leading both incumbent George H.W. Bush and challenger Bill Clinton in the polls.

Only his bizarre decision to...]]> Sun, 13 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Republicans fault President Obama for plans that would greatly expand federal outlays on health care, enlarge the federal role in the provision of medicine, doom private insurance and wrestle Aunt Sally into the grave. They have some valid points. But while they're heaping blame on Obama, they need to save a share for someone else: themselves.

His GOP critics in Congress, after all, have proposals to help the uninsured and curb health care costs. During his speech to Congress Wednesday, they waved their own bill at him. But for four years under President Bush, we had not only a Republican president but also a Republican Congress.

And what happened? Nothing. Republicans left...]]> Thu, 10 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 On Tuesday, as children in many places went back to school, the world's most prominent black leader undertook to expand a worshipful cult of personality as part of a systematic effort to achieve absolute power. You may have heard about it: Oprah Winfrey kicked off her 24th season on the air by taking over Chicago's Michigan Avenue for a live show in front of thousands of adoring fans.

Oh, there was also that business involving the president of the United States going on TV to urge students to work hard and stay in school. In the end, Barack Obama's televised speech didn't quite evoke the sight of Red Guards cheering Mao Zedong in Tiananmen Square. But the more inflamed reactions...]]> Sun, 06 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 People don't always get what they deserve in this world, so it is gratifying to see when someone does. It happened Wednesday when a California parole board insisted that Susan Atkins, a 61-year-old amputee with incurable brain cancer, live her few remaining months in prison rather than the embrace of her loved ones.

This may sound like pointless excess inflicted on someone whose crime, committed 40 years ago, is ancient history. But even to mention Atkins without first mentioning her victims is an affront. In 1969, she repeatedly thrust a knife into an innocent woman who was eight and a half months pregnant, killing her and her unborn child.

It's a crime that might be...]]> Thu, 03 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0500 On Oct. 7, 2001, the United States launched one of the most stunningly successful military operations in its history. Just four weeks after terrorists directed from Afghanistan killed nearly 3,000 people on American soil, we struck al-Qaida and Taliban government targets with aircraft, missiles and Special Forces soldiers. By early December, the Taliban was out of power, al-Qaida had fled into the mountains and victory was ours.

But that was eight years ago. Did anyone expect back then that we would still be in Afghanistan today, with more troops than ever? The war we thought we had won is not only dragging on but getting worse.

Already, 2009 has been the deadliest year of...]]> Sun, 30 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Barack Obama came into office championing change, and he apparently assumed that if Americans voted for him, it was because they wanted the future to be different from what went before. Actually, what they wanted was a future much like the not-so-distant past -- before the financial crisis, before the recession, before the Iraq war, before the most unpopular president since the invention of polling.

If voters had wanted a sharp ideological shift, they could have voted for Democratic candidates more identified with Great Society-style government -- Hillary Clinton, John Edwards or even Dennis Kucinich. Obama got the early endorsement of Ted Kennedy, but like Bill Clinton before...]]> Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Americans are practical people, which is why they tend to pay heed when Dick Cheney says the harsh methods used by the CIA on suspected terrorists were not merely efficacious but indispensable. The intelligence derived from these interrogations, he assures us, "saved lives and prevented terrorist attacks."

Did they really? The report released Monday, done by the CIA's inspector general back in 2004, didn't support Cheney's claim. It said "there is no doubt" that the detention and questioning of detainees "has been effective."

But the report reached no judgment on "enhanced interrogation techniques," saying, "The effectiveness of particular interrogation techniques in...]]> Sun, 23 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 The American medical system has the latest technology, the greatest variety of new drugs and unparalleled resources. But anyone who thinks we're getting something great for our dollars inevitably encounters a two-word rebuke: infant mortality.

The United States is the richest nation on Earth, but it comes in 29th in the world in survival rates among babies. This mediocre ranking is supposed to make an irrefutable case for health care reform. If we cared enough to insure everyone, we are told, we would soon rise to the health standards of other modern nations. It's just a matter of getting over our weird resistance to a bigger government role in medical care.

But not every...]]> Thu, 20 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Opponents of same-sex marriage reject it on religious and moral grounds but also on practical ones. If we let homosexuals marry, they believe, a parade of horribles will follow -- the weakening of marriage as an institution, children at increased risk of broken homes, the eventual legalization of polygamy and who knows what all.

Well, guess what? We're about to find out if they're right. Unlike most public policy debates, this one is the subject of a gigantic experiment, which should definitively answer whether same-sex marriage will have a broad, destructive social impact.

Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire have all decided to let gays wed....]]> Sun, 16 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 A hammer is a marvelous tool, but only for the right job. If you took an expensive watch to a repairman and he pulled out a hammer, you would be extremely nervous, if not aghast. Maybe he could find a way to do some good with that implement, but you would be more focused on the damage he could cause.

A similar scenario is playing out in the public anxiety over health care reform. Plenty of people think the existing system is in need of repair. But when they hear about expensive plans that require a more powerful and intrusive federal government, they fear that what is best in our approach to medicine may get smashed in the process.

What is best in our approach is the...]]> Thu, 13 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 The British Parliament consists of the House of Commons, which is elected by the people, and the House of Lords, which is not. How different that is from our Congress. We have the House of Representatives, which is elected by the people, and the Senate, which is . well, mostly elected by the people.

The unfortunate truth is that four of the 100 members of the Senate got there without the consent of the governed. They were appointed to fill seats abandoned by someone who moved on to another job (including Barack Obama and Joe Biden). In the House, by contrast, vacated seats can be filled only by special elections.

The number of unelected senators will soon rise. Republican...]]> Sun, 09 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Cash for Clunkers has been a thrilling moment for advocates of expanded government, who say it proves what we can accomplish when our leaders put their minds to it. They are absolutely right. The program proves the federal government is unsurpassed at two things: dispersing money and destroying things.

Of course, it already proved that in Iraq. But for sheer rapidity of confirmation, this program is hard to beat. Cash for Clunkers managed to go through a billion dollars in about four days, vaporizing a fund that was supposed to last until Halloween.

The spectacle was particularly heartening to supporters of President Obama's fiscal stimulus plan, who had been disconsolate...]]> Thu, 06 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Wisconsin calls itself America's Dairyland, and anyone who travels there soon learns the unofficial state motto: "You want cheese on that?" In the old days, it tried to discourage the use of nondairy spreads. You could buy margarine, which is naturally white, and you could buy yellow food coloring. But you could not buy margarine that contained yellow food coloring.

If that sounds like a sensible policy, you will have no trouble with a campaign to stamp out beverages that contain both caffeine and alcohol. Some people like a combination of the two ingredients, in the form of bourbon and Coke, whiskey and coffee or NoDoz with a beer chaser. But professional paternalists think the...]]> Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Everywhere you look, states are being crunched by fiscal emergencies that range from painful to excruciating. California, which has been paying bills with IOUs, is now preparing to close state parks and furlough state employees -- which is what you have to do when your budget deficit is bigger than the entire budget of some states.

It's not alone. "At least 39 states have imposed cuts that hurt vulnerable residents," trumpeted a recent report from the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. California, New York and Delaware have approved income-tax increases, and Pennsylvania and Illinois are considering doing likewise.

We all know the reason for the squeeze: An...]]> Sun, 26 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Barack Obama got to be president because he had qualities Americans were yearning for after the bitter tumult of the Bush years. He was calm, sober, fair-minded, and guided by facts rather than emotions. He didn't jump to conclusions, he didn't ignore inconvenient evidence and he didn't blunder into messes. That was the guy we elected last year, and right now, a lot of people miss him.

He was absent Wednesday when a reporter asked his views on the arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates. At first, Obama sounded like himself. He acknowledged that Gates is a friend, "so I may be a little biased here" and pointed out helpfully, "I don't know all the facts."

That set him...]]> Thu, 23 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 The federal government is trying to strengthen the U.S. auto industry. So here's a great idea for what it can do: Tell the Big Three to raise their prices across the board.

That would help in some obvious ways. Higher prices would mean bigger profit margins on every sale. Bigger profits would mean more jobs. More jobs would mean more workers buying new American cars.

But anyone can see that raising prices wouldn't work, because it would dry up sales. If American consumers were willing to pay more for American cars, dealers would already be charging higher prices. This is such an obviously boneheaded idea that no one would ever dream of doing it.

But in the realm of...]]> Sun, 19 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Millions of Americans tuned in last week to Sonia Sotomayor's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee. What did they learn?  "Nothing," Harvard Law professor Laurence Tribe told The New York Times.  Actually, we did learn something -- that we should stop inviting Supreme Court nominees to testify in confirmation hearings.

Sotomayor is reputed to be a lively woman with strong opinions and a sometimes aggressive demeanor on the bench. But appearing in place of the veteran federal judge was an android copy of her, lacking any recognizably human quality except extreme caution. She makes Ben Stein look like Jim Cramer.

Her appearances before the committee...]]> Thu, 16 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Some statements are inherently unbelievable. Such as: "I am an official of the government of Nigeria, and I would like to deposit $60 million in your bank account." Or: "I'm Barry Bonds, and I thought it was flaxseed oil." And this new one: "I'm Barack Obama, and I favor more competition in health insurance."

That, however, is the claim behind his support of a government-run health insurance plan to give consumers one more choice. The president says a "public option" would improve the functioning of the market because it would "force the insurance companies to compete and keep them honest."

He has indicated that while he is willing to discuss a variety of remedies as part...]]> Sun, 12 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 The Clinton administration was famous for obsessing about tiny, innocuous issues, like promoting school uniforms and opposing TV violence. But the era of trivial government came to an end on Sept. 11, 2001, when Americans got a reminder that their government has some truly vital duties and that it might be worthwhile to concentrate on them.

As far as I know, al-Qaida has yet to surrender, and a few other formidable problems have presented themselves since then. But having failed to solve the big, critical problems, our leaders are once again inclined to focus on inconsequential ones that happen to be none of their business.

Rep. Dan Lipinski, D-Ill., for example, thinks it...]]> Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 In October 2005, when President Bush announced his nominee for the Supreme Court seat being vacated by Sandra Day O'Connor, conservatives who had been loyal to the administration rose up in perfectly reasonable fury. Harriet Miers was not their idea of a Supreme Court justice. She was, they noted, intellectually undistinguished, ill-qualified for the job, lacking impeccable conservative credentials and inept in handling basic constitutional questions.

All those things, of course, could also have been said about Sarah Palin. But just as quickly and vigorously as conservatives rejected Miers, they embraced Palin. Even after her bungling performance in the 2008 campaign and her...]]> Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Public schools are filled with eager, fresh-faced youngsters, and prisons contain many rough-looking adults with uninviting personalities. But put aside that difference and you find some important similarities between the two places -- government-run facilities where individuals are held for a specific number of years without their consent, at the mercy of their custodians.

For years, the Supreme Court has been doing its best to further blur the distinction by giving public-school officials the same powers as the warden of San Quentin. So it was a mild surprise last week to learn there are some abridgments of freedom and invasions of privacy inflicted on children that the justices...]]> Sun, 28 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 By now, it's clear that Mark Sanford has about as much of a future in politics as he does in sumo wrestling. His confession of adultery was all it took to demolish any hopes he had of running for president -- and perhaps even to force him to step down as governor of South Carolina. But why?

After all, we've had presidents who are revered by posterity despite being unreliable husbands. Hardly anyone even remembers now that Franklin Roosevelt had a mistress, that Dwight Eisenhower may have had one, or that John Kennedy had several.

In the intervening decades, we've also become far more aware of just how common such behavior is among officeholders -- not only Gary Hart, Bill...]]> Thu, 25 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 A tyrannical government is by nature in a constant state of war with its own people. There are periods of truce, but none of real peace. We in the democratic world generally think of government as an institution established by the people to serve their needs, even if it often fails. But the rulers in a place like Iran are more like conquerors presiding over a subject people.

Sometimes, like right now, that fact becomes inescapable, even to subjects who had imagined they were in the care of humane and benevolent guardians. Iranians who voted for Mir Hossein Mousavi, only to see their votes disregarded, now discover their country is ruled by an organized-crime gang that is prepared...]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 The great judge Learned Hand once said, "The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right." If so, the tobacco regulation bill recently passed by Congress indicates that the spirit of liberty is even scarcer than usual in the halls of government.

What motivates advocates of stricter tobacco regulation is the unassailable assurance that they are not only completely right but that their opponents are a) wrong and b) evil. This invigorating certitude makes it possible to justify almost anything that punishes cigarette companies, even if it does no actual good -- or does actual harm.

One of the main purposes of the new law is to reduce the number of...]]> Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 Last summer, the Supreme Court, for the first time ever, said the Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a gun for self-defense. It was a historic decision that put real limits on gun control. But gun-rights advocates complain that someone didn't get the memo -- someone named Sonia Sotomayor.

Exhibit A is her decision in January to uphold the guilty plea of a New York man for possession of fighting sticks called nunchakus. He said the law violated his right to keep and bear arms. But in a unanimous decision joined by Sotomayor, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals found "it is settled law that the Second Amendment does not apply to the states and therefore imposed no...]]> Sun, 14 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 It's been 15 years since President Clinton's health care reform plan went down to defeat, and the problems it was supposed to fix have only gotten worse. Costs have soared, the number of uninsured has risen and public dissatisfaction has mounted.

But now, at last, we are all ready to do what must be done. As President Obama puts it, "I really think that the stars may be aligned here."

Don't bet on it. The Clinton plan lost partly because Americans were not willing to accept that you can't have it all. From everything that has occurred since then, it's apparent they are still unwilling.

The Obama administration understands this crucial point, which is why it has...]]> Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0500 President Obama and his critics have a major disagreement. He says his accelerated economic stimulus efforts will create 600,000 jobs by the end of the summer. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, however, doubts "the spending binge we're on is going to produce much good." Both can't be right. But neither has to fear being proved wrong.

Why not? Because there is no persuasive way of determining the effect of implementing the president's policies. No matter what happens, each side can claim vindication.

If the economy improves and unemployment drops, Obama can take credit. If it fails to improve and unemployment rises, though, he can say he averted an even...]]>