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May 11, 2010

In Britain, a Cautionary Tale for U.S. Parties By Michael Barone

LONDON -- We Americans may have declared our independence from Britain in 1776, but there are still similar rhythms in British and American politics. Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan both came to power amid the ruins of the 1970s and restored their nations' economies and spirits in the 1980s. Bill Clinton and Tony Blair both developed "third-way" politics that transformed unelectable left parties into center-left political colossuses in the 1990s.

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May 9, 2010

Arizona Law Also Happens To Be Good Politics By Debra J. Saunders

Critics of Arizona's tough new immigration law, which makes illegal immigration a state crime, have called supporters of the bill "racist," "mean-spirited" and "un-American." Here's the newsflash: The measure is also good politics, not only in Arizona, but nationally.

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May 7, 2010

Lessons from the Times Square Dud By Debra J. Saunders

Eventually, even a stupid terrorist can get lucky. So why are so many people who think they're so smart so quick to dismiss the very dangers that threaten American lives?

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May 7, 2010

Stopping the Streak By Isaac T. Wood

The last time a Democrat lost a special election for a U.S. House seat, George W. Bush was still president and gas was almost $4 a gallon. It was way back on May 3, 2008 when Hillary Clinton was still battling Barack Obama tooth-and-nail for the Democratic presidential nomination.

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May 7, 2010

In Downcast Britain, a Pox on All Three Parties By Michael Barone

British voters go to the polls today, and it appears likely that they will boot out the party in power for only the second time in 31 years. Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives ousted a Labor government in May 1979, and Tony Blair's "New Labor" party ousted the Conservatives in May 1997.

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May 6, 2010

What We Learned from Times Square By Joe Conason

Within hours after the car bomb fizzled in Times Square, the nonstop noise resumed on Fox News and talk radio, warning that the Barack Obama administration is failing to protect us. Evidently, the president and his aides don't say "terror" and "terrorism" sufficiently often to make it go away, according to the professional noisemakers. If you believe that kind of nonsense, then you are listening too much to the professional noisemakers and may have caused damage to your mental health.

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May 6, 2010

A Spend-and-Borrow Debt Mess By Lawrence Kudlow

The ink was barely dry on the $150 billion European Union/International Monetary Fund bailout of Greece, when world stock markets tanked on two major fears.

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May 6, 2010

WI-7: David Obey’s Departure By Isaac Wood

David Obey’s retirement announcement reshuffles the House deck for both parties. Democrats are scrambling to ensure other veteran Democrats do not follow suit, after thinking that the retirement tide had been stemmed. For Republicans the odds of a House majority do not look quite as long now that one of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s key allies has sidestepped a November reelection battle.

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May 6, 2010

Preparing for the Bomb That Goes Off By Froma Harrop

It was the best possible terrorism outcome: several heroes and no victims. A prime suspect sitting in cuffs, and chinks in the national security armor exposed for correction. But while the attack on Times Square failed, the perpetrator did manage a small psychological victory -- re-stirring the public's fear. We should cut that win down to size.

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May 5, 2010

Russia and America: Turning the World Upside Down By Howard Rich

A little over a year ago, a columnist for the newspaper that once served as the official communications organ of the Central Committee of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) had some choice words for what remains of America’s free market economy.

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May 5, 2010

Smaller Government, Anyone? By Susan Estrich

Maybe not this week.

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May 5, 2010

Boot the Boot Metaphor By Tony Blankley

In the opening hours and days of an unanticipated event -- such as the current off-shore oil leak, usually not much can be reliably learned about the details of the intruding event -- but much can reliably be learned about the humans responding to it.

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May 4, 2010

Latino Giant to Change U.S. Politics By Froma Harrop

SAN ANTONIO -- It was over frozen lattes three blocks from the Alamo that Lydia Camarillo and I discussed the wave of Latino voters expected to change politics in Texas -- and America. Camarillo is vice president of the Southwest Voter Registration Education Project, a group that signs up new Hispanic voters and spurs them to the polls.

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May 4, 2010

Whitman Can Spend, but Can She Govern? By Debra J. Saunders

"Meg 2010, Building a New California," the glossy 40-plus-page "policy agenda" for former eBay CEO and GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, is so slick that it sat on my desk for weeks before I could finish it. I would pick it up, think that, like her candidacy, it is overly packaged, and toss it back on the pile of papers that litter my desk. It does a great job of laying out California's financial woes and suggesting possible reforms -- but it leaves out how she'll get things done in Sacramento.

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May 3, 2010

The Left Loses Its Way by Abandoning 'Third Way' By Michael Barone

Left parties are in trouble in the Anglosphere. Here in America, Democrats are doing worse in the polls than at any time in the last 50 years.

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May 2, 2010

Obamacon Doves vs. Hard-Money Heartland Hawks By Lawrence Kudlow

President Obama has appointed three new doves to the Federal Reserve Board, thereby taking command of the nation's central bank. But there's a split developing inside the Federal Reserve System: The Reserve Bank presidents, appointed by their own district boards of directors, are increasingly likely to wage a battle royale against the central-bank headquarters in Washington and its free-money, ultra-easy policies.

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May 2, 2010

A Year for Desperate Measures By Debra J. Saunders

Robert Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies, has become my go-to guy for good-government issues. His wife, Joan, he recently confided, calls him "the Sisyphus of reform."

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April 30, 2010

Midterms Past: The '66 Parallel By Rhodes Cook

For months now, this election has been compared to that of 1994, when Republicans scored huge gains and won both houses of Congress. It is a decent model. But given the recent passage of health care reform – something that did not happen in ’94 – this might be a good occasion to look at another midterm election for instruction, that of 1966.

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April 30, 2010

America's Political Grand Canyon By Debra J. Saunders

Let me lead with what should be an unremarkable observation: Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer did not write federal immigration laws that require permanent residents to carry green cards, employers to check documentation or limits on the number of legal immigrants admitted each year. Washington did.

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April 29, 2010

Is the Sunbelt Ready for Urbanity? By Froma Harrop

HOUSTON -- Houston faces a crossroads, or to be more precise, a five-level stack interchange. Is it going to nurture compact walkable neighborhoods? Or is it going to do what it has always done -- stand back and watch developers build anything anywhere?

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