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AT OUR NEW ANGEL'S CORNER:  READERS BLOG ABOUT THAT LIGHT-BULB LAW (YOU WILL BUY WHAT THEY WANT YOU TO BUY); RICK PERRY; THE DECLINE OF JOURNALISM; OUR DWINDLING DEFENSE; AND THE PRESIDENT.

I'D LIKE TO HEAR FROM READERS IN REGARD TO THE FOLLOWING:

1.  HOW DO YOU LIKE OUR NEW FEATURE, "SHORT TAKES ON THE PASSING WRECKAGE"? 

2.  RIGHT NOW WE'RE POSTING IN THE MORNING AND EVENING.  WOULD YOU LIKE MORE SHORT POSTS DURING THE DAY, ESPECIALLY THE AFTERNOON?  WOULD YOU VISIT US MORE OFTEN IF THIS WERE OFFERED?

THANKS.  READER OPINION MEANS A GREAT DEAL TO US.

I appeared on Silvio Canto Jr.'s talk show from Dallas last night.  It's here.

JULY 18,  2011

LET'S WATCH THIS CLOSELY – AT 9:44 P.M. ET:  The left is up to its usual tricks, and the trick they love the most, it appears, is cutting the defense budget.  Now, true, there are probably significant savings in the Pentagon, especially in the procurement area, but the left will never be satisfied with just that.  These boys have big plans.  From the Washington Times:

The political left is pressing the White House and Congress to inflict a wave of Pentagon budget cuts not seen since the post-Cold War 1990s.

Liberals are citing the debt crisis and troop drawdowns from Iraq and Afghanistan to argue that now is the time for the Defense Department to shed people, missions and weapons after a decade of doubling arms spending after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

They have not noticed the rise of China and the fact that Russia is re-arming.  But these are people who believe that strumming a guitar and singing songs of peace will actually prevent war. 

The proposals, including one from the Center for America Progress, go well beyond President Obama’s call in April for $400 billion in defense cuts over 12 years. The center — run by John Podesta, who served as chief of staff to President Clinton — wants that much in reductions over the next three years and $1 trillion from what had been projected increases over the next decade.

Some House Democrats, led by Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts, also have called for $1 trillion in cuts.

Field Marshal Frank is that well-known military strategist.

“I think this is the time because of a combination of the deficit and the changing way in which we’re going to deal with threats from groups like al Qaeda,” said American Progress’ Lawrence Korb, a longtime defense analyst in Washington.

Mr. Korb said the Obama administration has dumped President George W. Bush’s overall war strategy of preemptive attacks against terrorist states, and he cited just-retired Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates’ warning against any future land wars in the Middle East.

The bottom line is that the center wants projected increases ended and the overall arms budget reduced to $500 billion by 2016, which would be $111 billion below the Pentagon’s already pared-down projection.

COMMENT  These drastic demands will result in many ships mothballed or not built at all, obsolete planes not replaced, and a military with far less capability than we will need to deter war.

The United States had four major drawdowns in the 20th century, and we lived to regret each one.  Yes, find savings where they can be found, but the drastic cutters are looking to cut bone, and somebody's kid is going to pay for it, and not with money.

July 18, 2011        Permalink

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE: 

SAD FINISHES – Two famous names have come on grim times.  Reader's Digest, one of the most famous names in print publishing, has put itself up for sale after emerging from bankruptcy.  And Border's, the book chain, is closing all its stores and liquidating.  Neither organization seemed to be able to keep up with the times.  It's a tough time for print, but the most imaginative and innovative companies will survive. 

GOOD IDEA – Philadelphia will soon be handing out citations to people who walk along texting, and not looking where they're going.  Some readers will disagree, but I think it's a good idea.  That's a dangerous habit that could easily result in a collision with a person or vehicle or lamppost.  We have responsibilities.  I wonder, by the way, if we'll soon need to give citations to presidents who walk along while not knowing where they're leading the country.  Just a thought.

DESPICABLE – Talk about political correctness carried to mad extremes.  The head of one of the world's leading physics labs, at CERN in Geneva, has forbidden his scientists from drawing conclusions from a major experiment.  The reason?  Some of the results could be applicable to the subject of climate change, and may, one prominent science writer charges, not support politically acceptable conclusions.  So, science marches on, but don't tell anyone.

FEAR OF THE POWERS THAT BE? – When have you ever heard of an author refusing to discuss the contents of a new book she's trying to sell?  Something isn't right here.  The author of a new book on Barack Obama's mother is refusing all requests to discuss the newsmaking revelation in the book that President Obama inaccurately (euphemism) claimed that his mother was denied medical coverage for her fatal illness.  The author is Janny Scott, formerly of The New York Times.  She has chosen not to respond to questions about the revelation, except when asked by The Times.  Is she fearful of what the disclosure might do to her career?  Did she underestimate how the press would pick it up?  I have no answers, but I'd love to know what's going on.

July 18, 2011     Permalink

SNIPPET OF THE DAY – AT 7:08 P.M. ET:

From The Smoking Gun – JULY 18--Between her marriage vows and the reception, a Michigan woman was arrested Saturday afternoon on a felony identity theft warrant and booked at the county jail while wearing her wedding dress and veil.  Tammy Lee Hinton, 50, was busted at the City of Zion Ministries church after the conclusion of her wedding. Hinton, pictured in the above mug shot (click to enlarge), was taken into custody by Blackman-Leoni Township cops.

Well, looking at the picture, I'm not sure whether they busted the bride or the groom.

NO STAGE FOR THIS ACCUSED KILLER – AT 9:32 A.M. ET:  A shrewd move by Arkansas has deflated the pretensions of a guy who seems to want bin Laden status. 

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — When Abdulhakim Muhammad killed a soldier outside a recruiting station in Arkansas, he hoped the world would pay attention to the war he had declared on the United States. He took responsibility for the shooting, called it retaliation for U.S. military action the Middle East and claimed ties to al-Qaida.

But when Muhammad goes on trial this week in Little Rock, he won't face any federal or terrorism charges. He complained he's being treated like a common criminal, with a state trial on a capital murder charge. There will be no grand stage for his political beliefs, and if convicted by the state rather than the federal government, he faces a much greater chance of execution.

The U.S. has put three people to death since the federal death penalty was reinstated in 1988. Arkansas executed 27 people in that time.

"This case should be in federal or military court..." Muhammad, 26, objected in a letter to Circuit Judge Herbert Wright in May. "In my eyes it's a sham trial set up only to make sure I'm handed down a death sentence."

Federal officials have mostly kept quiet about Muhammad's case. The U.S. attorney in Little Rock declined to comment. But one person in federal law enforcement, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak before the trial, said the Justice Department and FBI were interested in pursuing charges but allowed the state to proceed after extensive negotiations with Arkansas prosecutors.

Death penalty issues aside, some say prosecuting Muhammad on a capital murder charge has the benefit of deflating his grandiose self-perceptions.

COMMENT:  Memo to Eric Holder:  This may be a smart way to proceed in the future.  Federal civilian trials of accused terrorists will turn into show trials.  A regular capital murder state charge deflates the defendant, especially if it's held far off the beaten media path. 

We know that our earnest attorney general devoutly wishes for civilian terror trials in big cities like New York.   But when he sees 500 reporters outside the courthouse, many from European papers seeking to "understand" the accused terrorist, maybe he'll finally realize why that's a very bad idea.

July 18, 2011       Permalink

A WARNING TO THE GOP – AT 9:01 A.M. ET:   A new poll, even though probably tilted somewhat in the liberal direction, should warn the GOP that it is losing the debt-crisis debate.  We've warned about that repeatedly here.  The president has the big megaphone.  He can call press conferences, and they're covered on national TV.  The Republicans can gather some "leaders," anonymous to most of the country, and give sound bites.  From The Politico:

President Barack Obama is winning the battle for public opinion in the negotiations to raise the debt ceiling, with the overwhelming majority disapproving of the way Republicans are handling it - even most GOP voters, according to a new poll on Monday.

Seventy-one percent of Americans surveyed for a CBS News poll released Monday morning say they oppose how Republicans are handling negotiations, while just 21 percent approve. In contrast, 48 percent disapprove of the president’s role in the talks, while 43 percent approve.

I've noticed that CBS polls tend to oversample Democrats.  I don't know if that's the case here, but, even if allowing a correction, the numbers are alarming.  At the same time, the poll was taken among "adults."  A poll among "likely voters" usually shows more support for Republican arguments. 

Congressional Democrats don’t do quite as well as Obama, but are still polling better than their GOP colleagues, with 48 percent of those surveyed saying they disapprove of the Democrats’ handling of the talks, while 31 percent approve.

Even among Republicans surveyed, the party led by Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) in the House isn’t faring all that well, with 51 percent saying they disapprove of how the party is handling the negotiations. Meanwhile, 32 percent of Democrats say they disapprove of how congressional Democrats are handling the talks, while 22 percent disapprove of the president’s handling.

COMMENT:  Some very idealistic Republicans in the House were quoted as saying yesterday that the debt crisis means more to them than reelection.  That's nice.  We will pat them on their heads.  But a shrewd, astute party knows how to handle its issues and win reelection.

Historically, Americans have had suspicion of the GOP because of its association with "big business" and Wall Street.  That suspicion lingers today.  Obama, one of the best campaigners we've seen, knows exactly how to exploit it.   Republicans should, in the debt talks, go for 75% of something rather than 100% of nothing. 

Ideology rarely wins in American politics.  Be careful, GOP.  Don't throw away 2012 over a battle in which you get the blame if things blow up.

July 18, 2011       Permalink

CRITICISM OF WILD-EYED NINTH CIRCUIT IS VINDICATED – AT 8:32 A.M. ET:   For years conservatives have been complaining about the antics of the San Francisco-based Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the most liberal federal appeals circuit in the nation.  Now, an analysis of Supreme Court decisions pretty much proves that the criticisms are correct.  Even Supreme Court liberals are going after the Ninth.  From the Los Angeles Times:

It was another bruising year for the liberal judges of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals as the Supreme Court overturned the majority of their decisions, at times sharply criticizing their legal reasoning.

Appeals from the nine Western states of the circuit dominated the high court's docket, as usual, supplying more than 30% of the 84 cases taken up by the justices during the term that ended last month.

The Supreme Court reversed or vacated 19 of the 26 decisions it looked at from the 9th Circuit this judicial term, issuing especially pointed critiques of the court's handling of cases involving prisoners' rights and death row reprieves.

Although the proportion of reversals was relatively in line with past years and other appellate circuits across the country, the 9th Circuit was often out of step even with the high court's liberal justices, who joined with the conservatives in 12 unanimous rulings.

In their reversals, the justices often expressed impatience with what they see as stubborn refusal by the lower court to follow Supreme Court precedent. One of the circuit's most renowned liberals, Judge Stephen Reinhardt, was seen by judicial analysts as the main target of the justices' pique.

"It just seems that they are getting a bit frustrated with these criminal procedure cases," said Barry McDonald, a constitutional law professor at Pepperdine University, referring to unanimous reversals of three opinions written by Reinhardt and a decision by another 9th Circuit panel to strike the conviction of a Sacramento rapist who claimed racial bias during jury selection.

In restoring Steven Jackson's conviction for raping a 72-year-old woman, the high court called the 9th Circuit decision written by Judge Johnnie B. Rawlinson and joined by two other Democratic appointees "as inexplicable as it is unexplained."

COMMENT:  There's no way to get the lifers of the Ninth off the court, but the Senate should take a special look at any new nominations to that goofy panel.  When you have the Supreme Court's liberals joining in 12 unanimous rulings against the Ninth, the left can no longer claim that right-wing bias is behind criticism of the Ninth's adolescent antics.  I mean, how do you blame Dick Cheney?

But they will.

July 18, 2011      Permalink

A PRESIDENTIAL ACCOMPLISHMENT – AT 8:18 A.M. ET:  The president has accomplished something.  We rush to bring you the news.  We are fair here.  We are noble.  From the Washington Examiner:

Here's an interesting couple of numbers that emerged during this past week: According to Jim Messina, his campaign manager, through the second quarter of 2011, President Obama now has 552,000 contributors to his 2012 re-election campaign.

And the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced that during the same two quarters, the U.S. economy generated 260,000 jobs.

In other words, Obama attracted twice as many campaign donors as his economic policies created new jobs. That probably explains a great deal about yet a third number that received a great deal of attention this week: Gallup's finding that a "generic Republican" leads Obama by eight points in voter preference for 2012.

COMMENT:  That's good, eagle-eyed reporting by the Examiner.  But at least the president can point to an accomplishment.  No, no, they can't take that away from him.  (Hat tip to Ira Gershwin.)

July 18,  2011     Permalink

JULY 17,  2011

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE:

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO HILLARY?  – The secretary of state is on a world tour, but does anyone care?  Even her fans in the press don't seem to notice.  Hillary Clinton seems to be fading away as a major factor in this administration.  Maybe she's serious when she says she wants to leave public life.  We see no sign of any real influence that she might have over American policy.  My guess is that Obama will be glad to see her gone, as she constantly polls more strongly than he does.

THE SARAH WATCH – Just as political watchers are anticipating Rick Perry's entry into the presidential race, they wonder about Sarah Palin.  It is hard to imagine Sarah jumping in if Perry gets in.  They occupy the same space ideologically, and I'd imagine that Perry would come off as the stronger candidate.  In that case, Sarah might be wise to live to fight another day, and perhaps seek another office, like U.S. senator, or work her way into a cabinet appointment in a Republican administration.  She's young.  She has many presidential races ahead of her.  For the 2028 election, she'll only be 64. 

PROGRESS? – A major producer's organization in Hollywood has passed a resolution condemning ideological bias in the film industry, meaning bias against conservatives.  That sounds good, in the same way that the Soviet constitution sounded good.  We'll see if it has any impact.  Ben Shapiro, the conservative writer who's written about the blacklisting of conservatives in Hollywood in his new book, "Primetime Propaganda: The True Hollywood Story of How The Left Took Over Your TV," has brought the issue to the fore.  Someday I'll write about my own encounter with left-wing political correctness in Hollywood.  It is not a joke.  It is modern-day McCarthyism of the worst sort.

July 17, 2011       Permalink

JAPAN WINS – AT 5:45 P.M. ET:  Japan has won the women's world soccer cup, in a photo-finish victory against the U.S. on penalty kicks.  The match was held in Germany.  Hmm, Japan beating the U.S. in Germany?  Kind of gives me the creeps. 

I'm not a soccer fan and rarely watch.  I watched this time because of all the hoopla over the world cup.  If the U.S. had won, it would have been the only women's team ever to win the world cup three times.  But it was not to be.

Both teams are to be praised for hard playing and good sportsmanship.  What is not to be praised is the appalling quality of the sportscasting.  The sportscasters were knowledgeable enough, and gave a good play-by-play.  But the basics of sports journalism were simply ignored.  Americans are not huge soccer fans, except perhaps at the school level, and most don't know the rules of the game.  I want those rules explained to me.  I want to know what referee calls mean.  I want to know how the penalty-kick system works.  And, most of all, I'd appreciate ESPN getting a good on-screen game clock that actually tells me something, not simply one that gives a minutes-elapsed reading.  How many minutes remain?  Exactly.  One sportscaster, incredibly, was actually reduced to saying "About seven and a half minutes to go."  About?  ABOUT?  In a world championship match?

I grew up on Red Barber and Mel Allen.  We're skating fans and we were "taught" by Dick Button and Peggy Fleming.  Okay, I'm a bit spoiled.

But, as in news journalism, basics count.  ESPN has work to do. 

July 17, 2011       Permalink

MORE HYPOCRISY – AT 11:45 A.M. ET:  One thing about ABC's Jake Tapper – he's a straight shooter.  He gives you the news, in the old tradition.  So Tapper now points out some of Obama's recent gaffes, a notation not found in most of the rarefied precincts of mainstream journalism.  Can you just imagine what the press response would be if George W. Bush or Sarah Palin committed any of these?  Can you just imagine?

Obama's Senior Moment: 'I'll be turning 50 in a week.'

Actually…he’ll be turning 50 in three weeks. His birthday is August 4, two days after the debt ceiling deadline. Senior moment?

He messed up Malia’s birthday, too, calling her 13 when she was at the time 12 and still days away from becoming a teenager.

In fact, this just scratches the surface.  I would suggest that Obama is the most gaffe-prone major politician we've had in years, but few if any news outlets make a point of his blunders.  He once said America had 57 states, maybe confusing it with Heinz foods; he said that Austrians speak Austrian, when they speak German; he told us that Joe Biden is called "the sheriff" in the White House, when no one else could recall any such label; he informed us this week that 80% of Americans favor higher taxes, an absurdity; he got the story of the creation of Israel almost completely wrong in a speech in Cairo; he told us, with a straight face, that he sat in a church pew in a particular church for 20 years, but didn't know the anti-American beliefs of the pastor; and his comments about the energy-saving virtues of certain steps like tire inflation were wildly overstated.

And that's only the start.

Barack Obama is one of the great fiction writers of our time, a true novelist who hasn't yet found his calling.  But let Sarah, George or Michele misinterpret one historical fact and the press screams "ignorant," "unqualified," and worse.

But Republicans must understand that this is the way it is, and work around the media.  You have to have a strategy in dealing with press bias, not merely a gripe.

July 17, 2011        Permalink

AN ARREST IN BRITAIN – AT 10:46 A.M. ET:  A key figure in the News Corporation "phone hacking" scandal has been arrested.  From WaPo:

LONDON— Rebekah Brooks, a top executive in Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. media empire before resigning Friday in the wake of a phone hacking scandal, was arrested Sunday by Scotland Yard in a broadening probe into illicit newsgathering.

Police confirmed a 43-year- old woman was taken into custody Sunday on charges of conspiring to intercept communications and on corruption allegations, a reference to bribes made to police officers for news tips. David Wilson, Brooks’ spokesman, confirmed the woman as Brooks, making her the highest-ranking News Corp official yet to be arrested in the case.

COMMENT:  The hypocrisy and phoniness in the press continue.  Yes, this is a serious matter, and, if Brooks is guilty, she must pay the price.  But note two things:  There is a constant reference to "Rupert Murdoch's" News Corporation, but with no balancing statement that not a single piece of evidence has been put forward showing that Murdoch knew anything about the phone hacking charges.  He's a smart guy.  I doubt very much if he'd go along with anything so loopy as hacking into the phones of news sources. 

Second, note the refusal of the press and broadcasting outlets, in reporting this story about journalistic ethics, to practice any on their own.  We need statements informing readers that News Corporation publishes newspapers, and runs broadcast networks, that are direct competitors of those covering the scandal, and that these competitors have a great deal to gain from the News Corporation's decline.  It is imperative, for example, that CNN run the following when reporting the story:  "News Corporation owns Fox News, our strongest competitor.  Viewers have a right to know that CNN stands to gain financially if Fox News is damaged and loses viewership or advertising."  I've seen no ethically required statement at all.

Jennifer Rubin, at Contentions, sums it up:

...while it is also understandable some in the media would get up on their hind legs and huff and puff about how awful this scandal is, the fact that the alleged hacking really is terrible stuff is no excuse for some of the hypocritical criticism doled out by those who don’t work for Murdoch.

One comical example was a piece published in the Washington Post on Friday by, of all people, pornographer Larry Flynt. The idea the publisher of Hustler could teach anyone a lesson about the ethics of journalism is so bizarre you might have thought it was a parody.

Far worse was Joe Nocera’s anti-Murdoch rant in the New York Times on Saturday. Nocera’s interest was in bashing the Wall Street Journal and claiming that Murdoch had destroyed a once-great paper, not commenting about the scandal. The Journal had no role in the hacking, and despite Nocera’s carping, the changes Murdoch wrought at the Journal have been widely praised for bringing new energy and improved features to a paper directly competing with the Times in a way that it has never done before.

Well said. 

A major British pol, Ed Miliband, is calling for a breakup of News Corporation.  Ed Miliband is a leftist.  News Corp is conservative.  You don't think politics is playing a role, do you?

July 17, 2011       Permalink

A VERY PERRY SUNDAY – AT 10:20 A.M. ET:  Governor Rick Perry of Texas is giving every indication that he'll soon jump into the GOP presidential race.  As governor of Texas, the nation's second most populous state, and the nation's longest serving governor, he becomes an instant heavyweight.  From The Politico:

In one of the hardest indications yet that he's a likely candidate, Rick Perry gave an interview to the politically important Des Moines Register last week, in which he said he is beginning to feel a "call" to run for president:

“I’m not ready to tell you that I’m ready to announce that I’m in,” Gov. Rick Perry told The Des Moines Register. “But I’m getting more and more comfortable every day that this is what I’ve been called to do. This is what America needs.”

Another big-name potential Republican presidential candidate who is still on the sidelines, Sarah Palin, told Fox News in May that she has “that fire in the belly” to run. It remains a question whether Perry does.

“I’ll be real honest with you, I don’t wake up in the morning – never did and still don’t today – and say, ‘Gee, I want to be president of the United States,’ ” Perry, 51, said by phone last week.

But his wife, Anita, and hundreds of people nationwide say they want him to run, he said. He said he would likely decide in two or three weeks.

Looks like the guy is in.  I mean, when they start talking about feeling a call, you can expect the announcement soon.  After all, what is going to say a couple of weeks down the line, "Uh, they stopped calling"?  Have you ever heard of anyone, in all history, who's said he's heard the call, but that it went away?

Reader Chris Corbett, at the new edition of our Angel's Corner, muses about a Perry-Rubio ticket, the Rubio being terrific Senator Marco Rubio of Florida.  That is a winning combination.

I've also heard buzz about a Perry-Bachmann ticket.  Well, maybe, but I don't think so.  No matter how you feel about Michele Bachman – and she can be magnetic – the Sarah Palin experience will weigh heavily.  Bachmann has a history as a loose cannon, which is exactly what a presidential candidate doesn't want in a running mate.  Of course, if she proves herself a spectacular competitor in the presidential race, and demonstrates fierce discipline, that factor can fall away.

July 17, 2011     Permalink