Who is the man who will be Israel’s ambassador to the U.S.? Read this extraordinary story.
The Chrysler deal sounds fine — until you realize the company will have to make money to survive. “Obama has said he hopes to get out of the car business soon, and he has urged private investors to replace the government as the source of ongoing funds. But no executive in her right mind would take that gamble when it is clear that, in dealing with the government, private capital will always take a back seat to politically powerful entities.”
Befitting his descent into crack-pottering James Baker now says he favors the draft.
Robert J. Samuelson says Obama is hostile to oil and gas jobs. Actually he’s hostile to capital and investors more generally, although Samuelson’s point is well taken.
Wise advice about avoiding affirmative action and political litmus tests for Supreme Court justices: “But this nation — now perhaps more today than ever before — needs this particular branch of government to be full of scholars who are able to step out of the day to day execution of laws, not people whose careers have trained them in the art of compromise and catering to the electorate.”
Orrin Hatch confirms we won’t seek a waiver for another turn as Ranking Minority Chair on Senate Judiciary. It now boils down to Chuck Grassley and Jeff Sessions.
An interesting point: if there are no Republican votes in the Judiciary for the nominee there is at least a glitch in the confirmation process. But only a hiccup I think. Barring a Harriet Miers-like error Obama’s pick will be confirmed.
Howard Kurtz wants to know why mainstream reporters aren’t talking about Arlen Specter’s disloyalty. (Maybe because it wouldn’t dawn on them to think betraying the GOP is a bad thing?)
And meanwhile Specter categorically denies saying he’d be a “loyal Democrat.” We’ll see if Democratic primary voters are impressed.
A lovely tribute to Jack Kemp concludes: “The Kemp-Reagan message was rooted in ideas but it also appealed broadly across ages and incomes because of its buoyant temperament. Jack Kemp’s admirable life shows that it is possible to be a populist intellectual and a capitalist for the common man.”
And E.J. Dionne gets it right, too: “Kemp was the opposite of a hater. He was all positive energy. If there was one thing he did hate, it was racism. Over and over, he tried to get his party to reach out to African Americans — not simply the more affluent in their ranks, but the very poor whom he really did believe would benefit from policies geared toward enterprise, including supply side tax cuts, enterprise zones and tenant ownership of public housing.”
