“After two decades in which U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny — in Bosnia, Darfur, Kuwait, Somalia, Lebanon, Kurdistan, post-earthquake Pakistan, post-tsunami Indonesia, Iraq and Afghanistan — a narrative that says America is dedicated to [...]
The Anti-Defamation League singled out Fox New host Glenn Beck among the mainstream media for promoting hate and conspiracy theories. In its new report, “Rage Grows in America: Anti-Government Conspiracies,” ADL said that Beck has acted as a “fearmonger-in-chief,” and that his conspiratorial claims “create an [...]
The political fight over gun records, and particularly the “Tiahrt amendment” regarding release of gun-trace data, has reached the Fort Hood shooting. In a Washington Post commentary provocatively headlined “Enabling the next Fort Hood?” New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former New Jersey Gov. Thomas [...]
If President Obama decided to visit Wichita, his late mother’s birthplace, to highlight its aviation job losses as part of his year-ending focus on employment, he’d be entering increasingly hostile territory, according to the latest SurveyUSA poll. Last week’s survey, co-sponsored by KWCH, Channel 12, found [...]
A Department of Agriculture survey released last week showed that 17 million American households (14.6 percent) were “food insecure” at some point in 2008. That’s up from 13 million households (11.1 percent) in 2007. What’s even more troubling is that among households with children, the percentage [...]
“I’ve started reading it, but it’s going to take a while.” — Sen. Sam Brownback (in photo), R-Kan., placing his hand on the Senate’s 2,000-page health reform bill at an Olathe town hall meeting
“If you’re the least bit politically active, and the party doesn’t have the governor’s [...]
The similarities between Andrew Jackson, William Jennings Bryan, Ronald Reagan and Sarah Palin are striking. This is not to say that they are alike in every respect. Nor is it to say that Palin’s achievements to date rank with the others’. But it’s nonetheless true that a [...]
Columnist and author Thomas Frank finds it “cosmically correct” that James K. Glassman (in photo), the co-author of “Dow 36,000,” will be the executive director of the George W. Bush Institute at the George W. Bush Presidential Center. “This great Wall Street optimist will oversee the remnants [...]
As if health care, cap-and-trade, the economy and two wars weren’t enough, immigration looms as an unsolved problem, noted columnist Michael Barone. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said the status quo is “is simply unacceptable,” calling for stronger enforcement and some legalization. Barone wrote: “Now [...]
“The Obama administration’s plan for stimulating the creation of green-energy jobs is going in an odd direction,” noted Dallas Morning News columnist Jim Landers. Most of the wind-energy projects seeking money under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act are using foreign-made turbines, often from China.
Meanwhile, [...]
Some administration officials are saying that the progress on health care reform legislation, and the increasing likelihood that it will become law, vindicates President Obama’s largely hands-off strategy to reform. Rather than come out with his own reform plan, as President Clinton did, [...]
What a difference a year has made for Barack Obama and Sarah Palin, mused New York Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin. Last November, Obama was fresh off his historic presidential election and Palin had been sent packing to Alaska. Now, his approval rating is below 50 percent and Palin [...]
Bankers may have the most to be thankful for today, wrote Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank. A year ago, the financial system was near collapse and had to be rescued with hundreds of billions of taxpayers’ dollars. Yet because of its lobbying strength on Capitol Hill, [...]
“President Obama is getting ready to pardon the White House turkey, the Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner. . . . I don’t want to say Geithner is not doing a good job. But today God asked for his name to be taken off the bill.” — Jay Leno
“President Obama pardons the [...]
There doesn’t appear to be any smoking gun so far regarding the thousands of e-mails and documents stolen by computer hackers from the Climatic Research Unit in England — contrary to the conspiracy claims of some global warming skeptics. But some of the documents are embarrassing [...]
The new book “Fly by Wire” contends that Capt. Chesley Sullenberger wasn’t the only hero involved in landing an U.S. Airways jetliner on the Hudson River last winter. Journalist William Langewiesche writes that the unsung hero is Bernard Ziegler, a French test pilot who talked Airbus [...]
Though many people expect China to dominate this century, best-selling author and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman says that America still has a key advantage over China: imagination. “What your citizens imagine now matters more than ever because they can act on their own imaginations farther, faster, deeper [...]
Much of the reaction to Gov. Mark Parkinson’s budget cuts has avoided finger-pointing and aptly reflected the fact that Kansans are all in this mess together. Two phrases in the otherwise appreciative statement from the Kansas House’s GOP leadership team stood out, though: “the unchecked spending [...]
It’s not “the economy, stupid,” that is souring voters, as former President Clinton’s campaign staff used to say. “It’s the stupidity about the economy in Washington and on Wall Street that’s driving most voters berserk,” wrote Forbes columnist Dan Gerstein. He contended that rather than focusing [...]
Lloyd Blankfein, chairman and chief executive of Goldman Sachs, issued an apology of sorts last week for his firm’s role in the subprime mortgage crisis. The investment bank also announced a $500 million program to invest in small businesses. But as McClatchy Newspapers reported, $500 million [...]
With Rep. Dennis Moore, D-Lenexa, reportedly ready to give up his 3rd Congressional District after six terms, is Kansas looking at an all-red delegation in 2011? Moore, who grew up in Wichita and was Johnson County’s district attorney for three terms, has survived aggressive GOP attempts [...]
Kansas Revenue Secretary Joan Wagnon continued to press her case last week that the state has given up enough revenue in tax cuts and exemptions for now — nearly $10 billion since 1993. She advocates banning new sales-tax exemptions and rescinding some existing ones, likening a tax [...]
It’s time to amend the Constitution to allow naturalized citizens to run for president, Pepperdine University law school dean Ken Starr said last week during a visit to the University of Kansas School of Law. Starr, a former federal judge and solicitor general best known for [...]
“President Obama said that the people could lose confidence in the U.S. economy if our debt continues to grow. And Americans were like, ‘Uh, way ahead of you, dude.’” — Jimmy Fallon
“Liz Cheney said on Fox News that her father, former Vice President Dick Cheney, should run for president in [...]
Overall, Kansans seem to approve of how Republican Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts are doing in the Democratic-controlled Congress. In the latest SurveyUSA poll, co-sponsored by KWCH, Channel 12, Brownback had a 52 percent approval rating, up 4 percentage points from September, and 54 percent approved of [...]
Good for Sedgwick County Commissioner Dave Unruh for continuing to question the wisdom of giving an out-of-state consulting firm another 18 months and $228,000 to do the work it has yet to do under an earlier 10-month, $124,616 contract — reduce the Sedgwick County Jail’s population [...]
“What we do as Kansans when we struggle is that we pull together and we work through our challenges. We don’t typically sue each other.” — Gov. Mark Parkinson, to KSN, Channel 3, calling a possible schools lawsuit unproductive
“When you’re half the budget and the budget goes [...]
In the wake of the disputed 2000 presidential election, many Republicans thought that election reform was a nonissue and that Congress shouldn’t be telling locals how to run their elections. Nine years later, with a Democrat in the White House, 52 percent of Republican voters surveyed [...]
From the start, President Obama dispensed with China-bashing and declared the need for a strong bilateral relationship with China to tackle the many problems that confront the world, not least the economic downturn, climate change, nuclear proliferation and terrorism. His two Chinese-American Cabinet members, Energy Secretary Steven [...]
There may be good science behind a federal task force recommendation that women in their 40s don’t need annual mammograms, but it was bad timing for the Obama administration. Coming in the midst of the heated debate about health care reform, the recommendation became instant fodder [...]
Some questions left over from Thursday’s editorial on the Kansas Coliseum’s uncertain future, in the wake of the Sedgwick County Commission’s vote against negotiating with any developer right now:
– How could the committee reviewing the proposals not take into consideration the fact that its [...]
The campaign of Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, looked childish and desperate in sending out an e-mail falsely claiming that Senate rival Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Hays, had been endorsed by the Communist Party USA. But as Washburn University political science professor Robert Beatty hoped, perhaps the incident [...]
Phillip Brownlee, Rhonda Holman
