Wednesday, September 16, 2009
A Test for Iran
THE OBAMA administration has chosen to support international negotiations with Iran next month in spite of Tehran's declarations that it will not discuss its nuclear program. The White House says the United States and its five partners will insist on raising the U.N. Security Council's demand for a...
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Thursday, September 10, 2009
The president offers more specifics on health reform but ...
"THE TIME for bickering is over," President Obama declared Wednesday night. Perhaps that will work better on members of Congress than it does in some families of our acquaintance, but we have our doubts. Mr. Obama spoke Wednesday night to a nation skeptical of his health-care plans and a Congress...
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Thursday, September 3, 2009
The right response is not a retreat.
LAST MONTH we expected that Afghanistan's elections would mark a modest step forward for the country. Now it appears that they could be a major reverse. Though the election campaign was positive in many respects, Election Day itself is emerging as a disaster of relatively low turnout and massive...
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Friday, August 28, 2009
Useful literature on school vouchers
PRESIDENT OBAMA reportedly has a hefty reading list while vacationing this week, but I would like to offer two additions, both hot off the presses. One is an article by the education expert who studied the D.C. voucher program; the second is a study on school safety in the city's public and private...
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Thursday, August 27, 2009
A legislative master who bucked political tides
TED KENNEDY once said that his own legislative record was one he'd love to run against. A number of people tried, of course, and lost. But then, they weren't Ted Kennedy. Mr. Kennedy spent 46 years in the Senate hewing pretty steadily to his course while others trimmed their sails or just plain...
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Friday, August 7, 2009
An inspiring ascent, a historic vote.
AT 3:15 P.M. Thursday, Aug. 6, the nation witnessed the confirmation of its first Hispanic justice to the Supreme Court. By a vote of 68 to 31, Sonia Maria Sotomayor, daughter of the Bronx and Puerto Rico, became the 111th person and only the third woman to join the highest court in the land. The...
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Friday, July 31, 2009
Will there be any consequence for Venezuela's material support for Colombia
WHEN THE Colombian government last year unveiled extensive evidence that the government of Venezuela had collaborated with a Colombian rebel movement known for terrorism and drug trafficking, other Latin American governments and the United States mostly chose to look the other way. The evidence was...
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Thursday, July 30, 2009
Why Obama's battle against Jewish settlements could prove self-defeating
ONE OF THE MORE striking results of the Obama administration's first six months is that only one country has worse relations with the United States than it did in January: Israel. The new administration has pushed a reset button with Russia and sent new ambassadors to Syria and Venezuela; it has...
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Monday, July 27, 2009
Interrogations and Prosecution
IN APRIL, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. declared that it "would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department." He was speaking, of course, of CIA operatives and other government interrogators who...
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Friday, July 24, 2009
Transparency at the central bank is a serious question.
THE FEDERAL Reserve Board's independence is a bit like the judiciary's independence. Absolutely vital for the institution's proper functioning, it nevertheless depends on Congress and the president to respect decisions with which they disagree. In such cases, the best protection for either the...
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