Everyone May Now Board, Except You By Froma Harrop
The boarding pass typically lists two times: the time of departure and the time of boarding. For many airline passengers, the only significant one is time of departure.
Political Commentary
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July 8, 2014
July 4, 2014
Supreme Court Slaps Down the Obama Administration By Michael Barone
Seldom in American history has the Supreme Court unanimously rejected positions advocated by presidents' administrations.
But in this respect at least, President Obama has produced the fundamental transformation he promised in his 2008 campaign. Over the last three years, the Court has rejected Obama administration positions repeatedly in unanimous 9-0 decisions.
July 3, 2014
Is the Medium the Menace? By Froma Harrop
An aspiring rapper posts his lyrics on Facebook, suggesting a Halloween costume with his estranged wife's "head on a stick."
He goes on: "I'm not going to rest until your body is a mess, soaked in blood and dying from all the little cuts. Hurry up and die, bitch, so I can..." and so on and so forth.
Anthony Elonis insists that he was merely engaging in artistic expression per his right to free speech. His wife disagreed. She saw his writings as a real threat of bodily harm, a crime not protected by the First Amendment.
July 2, 2014
"Crapitalism!" By John Stossel
There's capitalism, and then there's "crapitalism" -- crony capitalism.
Capitalism is great because it lets entrepreneurs raise money so they can scale up and get their products and services to more people. If there is free competition, innovators with the best ideas raise the most money, and the best and cheapest products spread far and wide.
But it's crapitalism when politicians give your tax money and other special privileges to businesses that are "most deserving of help." Often those businesses turn out to be run by politicians' cronies.
July 1, 2014
Why Government Isn't Working and How to Make it Better by Michael Barone
Government just doesn't work very well. That's the persuasive thesis of three important books published this year.
July 1, 2014
Was Cochran's Win Good for Blue America? By Froma Harrop
From the happy reports, you'd think that liberals had only to celebrate the tea party's recent Mississippi defeat. True, Sen. Thad Cochran's winning strategy -- reaching out to Democrats, in particular African-Americans -- made for an especially gratifying runoff victory.
June 27, 2014
Liberals Champion Freedom of Speech -- Except in Politics By Michael Barone
I'm old enough to remember when American liberals cherished the freedom of speech guaranteed by the First Amendment. They celebrated especially the freedom accorded those with unpopular beliefs and protested attempts to squelch the expression of differing opinions.
June 26, 2014
The Right's Mistake Was Waking the Others by Froma Harrop
The tea partyers made a serious blunder in Mississippi, costing them a runoff win: They carelessly slipped their magic passion potion to the opposition.
June 26, 2014
Republicans: “Thank God for Mississippi!” By Larry J. Sabato, Kyle Kondik and Geoffrey Skelley
Establishment Republicans across the country are saying “Thank God for Mississippi,” but not in the derisive way that political scientist V.O. Key describes it above. The state’s Republican voters, and probably quite a few Democrats, allowed the GOP establishment to fend off a Tea Party challenge to a sitting senator. In the process, they kept Democrats from potentially expanding the Senate’s general election playing field in November and from giving anti-establishment forces in the Republican Senate caucus another ally.
Mississippi, a state often ignored by the national political world, managed to do something rarely seen in politics: Produce two upsets in the same race in a three-week span. And it bucked a trend of generally pathetic turnout in primaries nationwide to produce the second and then first-largest primary turnouts in the history of Mississippi Republican politics.
Mississippi, a trailblazing leader in voter participation? It has been a very odd primary season indeed.
June 25, 2014
Omission Control By John Stossel
Reporter Sharyl Attkisson's story sounds familiar to me: A major network got tired of her reports criticizing government. She no longer works there.
June 24, 2014
Hispanics Sour on Obama as Young Illegals Surge Across Border By Michael Barone
What should Republican lawmakers do about immigration? That's been a simmering source of controversy ever since George W. Bush's push for so-called comprehensive immigration legislation, with legalization and enforcement provisions, in 2006.
Most liberals and many economic conservatives argued that support for such legislation was a political imperative for Republicans. Otherwise, they would continue to lose Hispanic voters, an inevitably increasing segment of the electorate, by 2-1 margins.
June 24, 2014
Should Amazon Just Take Over? by Froma Harrop
It's the darnedest thing. Only a select few sites grace the bookmark bar topping my Web browser. Amazon.com is one. And Amazon is the only retailer to make the cut.
That it lets me buy ant traps online in 40 seconds, gets them to my house in two days and charges a good price for it all is kind of miraculous, don't you think?
Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Web page at www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2014 CREATORS.COM
June 23, 2014
Benghazi: What New Details Reveal About 'Scandal' -- and Its Promoters By Joe Conason
In the years since the terrorist attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens, his aide Sean Smith and CIA officers Tyrone Smith and Glen Doherty in Benghazi, Libya, on Sept. 11, 2012, President Barack Obama's congressional critics have complained long and loudly about his failure to immediately apprehend the perpetrators. Republican experts like Ted Cruz and Darrell Issa, along with the right-wing media machine, even insinuated that Obama might not really want to catch the Benghazi perps.
June 20, 2014
Are the Two Political Parties About to Crack Up? By Michael Barone
America's two political parties seem to be coming apart.
June 19, 2014
Use Your Hands by Froma Harrop
Have you stopped using your hands? Do your fingers struggle to sign your name? Is chopping an onion with a knife hard work? Must you call someone to fix a cabinet door off the hinges? Is it agony to sew on a button?
For many, computers and laziness have sapped our manual skills. This is not progress.
Follow Froma Harrop on Twitter @FromaHarrop. She can be reached at fharrop@gmail.com. To find out more about Froma Harrop and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Web page at www.creators.com.
COPYRIGHT 2014 CREATORS.COM
June 19, 2014
Picking Your Primary Poison By Sean Trende
Analysts are noticing the Democrats’ efforts to meddle in Republican primaries. In a Wall Street Journal article from last month, Janet Hook writes “Democrats increasingly are running ads against GOP candidates even before they win their party’s nomination. By attacking GOP candidates while they are still embroiled in a primary election campaign, some Democrats have seen an opportunity to promote the GOP candidate they think is easiest to beat, or to weaken the one they consider strongest.”
June 18, 2014
Here Comes Tomorrow By John Stossel
Ray Kurzweil -- inventor of things like machines that turn text into speech -- has popularized the idea that we are rapidly approaching "the singularity," the point at which machines not only think for themselves but develop intellectually faster than we.
At that point, maybe we no longer talk about "human history." It will be "machine progress," with us along for the ride -- if machines keep us around. Maybe they'll keep us in a zoo, like we do with our monkey ancestors.
June 17, 2014
Obama Follows Polls in Foreign Policy but Public Turns Against Him By Michael Barone
Polls show that most Americans wanted the United States to withdraw from Iraq. Barack Obama did indeed withdraw U.S. forces from Iraq, not troubling to negotiate a readily negotiable status of forces agreement that would have left a contingent of American soldiers there.
June 17, 2014
So Mixed Up on Immigration By Froma Harrop
Right-wing primary voters booted Eric Cantor over signs he might back "amnesty" for illegal immigrants, it is said. If so, the partisans are once again taking a position totally opposed to what they claim to want. Legalizing the status of most undocumented foreigners is the condition for closing the door on future illegal immigration. There is no other politically passable road to get there.
One may err in assuming that the hard right actually desires to solve the problem, punishing others being the more satisfying activity. The targets would include both Republicans not dancing to the right's dissonant tune and brown people in general.
June 16, 2014
As Iraq Implodes, Hawks Still Have No Plan -- Except 'Blame Obama' By Joe Conason
Divided between neoconservative ultra-hawks and libertarian isolationists, today's Republican Party is hardly a steady influence on American foreign policy. But there is one thing that can be reliably expected from every right-wing faction in Washington: Whenever disaster threatens, they eagerly cast blame on President Barack Obama -- and utter any falsehood that may be used to castigate him.
