Citizen Leadership

An ardently pro-Israel Catholic friend regularly takes out his frustration on me. He demands to know why American Jews aren’t outraged at President Obama for his chilliness to the Jewish state, why, when it comes to the existential dangers facing Israel, most Jews don’t seem to “get it.” A partial explanation may lie, surprisingly, in what conservative journalist William Kristol Read More ›

This article, published by the Puget Sound Business Journal, is about and quotes Slade Gorton of Discovery Institute: “When you get old, that’s where you are. Pretty soon I’m not a politician any more. I’m a statesman, just by the passage of time,” said Gorton, who is 82 and is the recipient of this year’s prestigious First Citizen Award from Read More ›

The first of three TV debates in the British national campaign brought Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg to the considered attention of many voters for the first time. He made a strong impression as the reasonable man in beteween two parties that, for various reasons, fail to inspire. By most accounts he “won” the debate. The last time the Liberal Party Read More ›

The start of a new baseball season always comes with odes to the national pastime. But is it fair to say that baseball still deserves that description? Measured by popularity, participation or skill versus other nations, baseball is arguably an American national pastime whose time is past. Jacques Barzun, the French-born, American cultural historian, once wrote that “Whoever wants to Read More ›

This article, published by Seattle PI, is about Slade Gorton of Discovery Institute: Former U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton, who lost his seat in 2000 thanks to King County voters, is to be honored by the Seattle-King County Association of Realtors with their 72nd annual “First Citizen” award. The rest of the article can be found here.

The United States Supreme Court issued a decision that may result in profound changes in the conduct of future elections. During the political campaigns of 2008, a nonprofit organization named Citizens United produced a 90-minute movie titled “Hillary: The Movie,” which is very critical of Hillary Clinton. Citizens United wanted to run the movie during the campaign, but the Federal Read More ›

On March 30, 1981, as President Ronald Reagan lay at death’s door in Georgetown Hospital, and with Vice-President George H. W. Bush in a plane bound for DC but without air-to-ground communication with the White House, Deputy Press Secretary Larry Speakes stood at the podium in the press room of the White House. Asked about who had control of the Read More ›

Civilian control of the military is a cherished principle in American government. It was President Obama who decided to increase our involvement in Afghanistan, and it is Congress that will decide whether to appropriate the money to carry out his decision. It is the president and Congress, not the military, that will decide whether our laws should be changed to allow gays and lesbians to serve in our armed forces. The military advises, but the civilian leadership decides. Yet if not for the actions of George Washington, whose birthday we celebrate, sort of, this month, America might have moved in a very different direction. In early 1783, with Revolutionary War victory in sight but peace uncertain, Washington and the Continental Read More ›

In his Tucson speech at the memorial service for the victims of the horrific shooting attack by a mentally deranged man, President Obama stated that while lack of civility in America’s political discourse did not motivate the shooter, public discourse would be improved were more civility shown by participants in the debate. Liberals instantly blamed the right’s “incivility” for the Read More ›