Daniel Oliver
As we mused here a few days ago — in a piece pointing out that deregulation had to begin somewhere — Rome wasn’t burned in a day. (According to the Roman historian Tacitus, the fire, in 64 A.D., actually burned…
In a piece in the Wall Street Journal, President Obama has written that he wants to ensure that federal regulations “protect our safety, health, and environment while promoting economic growth.” He made a similar claim in his State of the…
President Barack Obama’s Friday evening statement on the situation in Egypt reminds us of George Orwell’s comment that sloppy writing leads to dangerous political thinking. “Good evening,” said the president (ritually, if, under the circumstances, inaccurately). “As the situation continues…
Even President Obama’s own cheering squad thinks he flubbed the State of the Union speech, which they find all the more amazing after his performance in Arizona. The country faces a single serious problem (and many lesser ones, of course),…
As Republican politicians look frantically for ways to solve the country’s financial problems, they should not overlook the mountain of gold towering before them. That mountain is the accumulation of federal regulations that now occupies more than 82,000 pages in…
Following the exhibition currently on display at the taxpayer-funded National Portrait Gallery (“Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture”), the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. is planning several additional exhibitions, including one in March on art and literature celebrating adultery,…
The formal reading of the Constitution in the House of Representatives is one of those events that bring a knowing smile to the face of sophisticated liberals, the sort of people who curl up next to an eco-friendly fire on…
Forty billionaires have just pledged to give away at least half their wealth to charity, concerning which a few observations. Scripture says it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich…
Lee Bollinger, president of Columbia University, host to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and newly appointed head of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, says government should get into the business of subsidizing journalism. Like other Obama appointees, he says he…
Speech-less: Tales of a White House Survivor By Matt Latimer (Crown Publishers, 283 pages, $26) Matt Latimer has written this year’s most entertaining book about what goes on — or doesn’t — in Washington. This is a laugh-out-loud book with…
