Archive By Section - Other Views
Eco-friendly efforts cost less than exterminator
The nastiest looking insect I've ever seen crawled out of a hole near a dead stump in my garden the other day. I was weeding there, and I'm sure I disturbed it. To be honest, I was scared. This thing looked like it could bite me and it would hurt. I briefly considered the possibility that it was benevolent. Was it a spider? I tried counting its legs - six, not eight.
President Obama the merciless
"President Obama has been among the most merciless presidents in the history of the United States," political science professor P.S. Ruckman wrote on his blog, "Pardon Power," over the weekend.
Rand Paul & America’s drone law
I'm not your usual Rand Paul fan. But intellectual honesty is a pretty refreshing trait in Washington, and in this case, it had the added attraction of being a much-needed jolt to a sort of complacency about civil liberties under a nice Democratic administration that seems to have overtaken the left.
Same-sex marriage needs voters' stamp
As a conservative with gay friends, nothing would make me happier than to watch Californians pass an initiative to legalize same-sex marriage - preferably with protections for religious objectors. Polls suggest it would pass today. Then the issue would be settled, and Californians - not a court in Washington - would have determined their own marriage laws.
ABC's porn pinup for teen girls
Sometimes it's hard to measure the distance between the supposedly established, respectable press and the seediest corners of hardcore pornography. On March 1, ABC's "Nightline" celebrated a porn star named "James Deen" (real name: Bryan Sevilla). The apparent "news" hook is his role in a forthcoming movie with the ever-more pathetic Lindsay Lohan.
Dennis Rodman gets hammered
Former NBA star Dennis Rodman traveled to communist North Korea, a trip financed by a documentary filmmaker. Rodman appeared neither officially nor unofficially as part of the U.S. government.
The Republican Party platform of 1956
Here's some unexpected news. It comes from what purports to be an official document of the National Republican Party. And - wow - the policy positions it contains show that party leaders really are serious about coming to their senses and rejecting the far-right wackiness that has stained their recent electoral campaigns. Right at the top, this 18-page manifesto proclaims that, "Our government was created by the people for all the people, and it must ...
There is no sequester catastrophe
President Obama may be backing away from his doomsday spending-cut predictions as the sequester goes into place. But the new party line is that while there will be no impact in the first few days, there'll be a slow, downward slump after that.
Sequestration and stupidity
WASHINGTON - The screeching you hear in Washington is the sound of politicians slamming their mouths into reverse as they back away from their previous positions on the misnamed "budget sequester." For weeks now, we have been told that an $85 billion reduction in the rate of increase in federal spending - a 2.4 percent cut - will have devastating consequences for our nation.
Give the Post Office a break
The Postal Service says it's going to stop delivering mail on Saturdays. This won't happen until August, but the overseers of our postal workers in Congress are already swooning.
The Borking of ‘Zero Dark Thirty’
Weeks before the Oscars, Sony Pictures, the studio behind "Zero Dark Thirty," put out this statement: "We are outraged that any responsible member of the Academy would use their voting status in (the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences) as a platform to advance their own political agenda. The film should be judged free of partisanship. To punish an artist's right of expression is abhorrent. This community, more than any other, should know how ...
America’s organized sports racket
While we sports fans regularly lionize the stars of pro baseball, football, basketball, etc., it's time to acknowledge that the team executives and owners are also great athletes of a different sort. They routinely make dazzling off-the-field moves.
How do you maintain dog’s quality of life when you ‘re away?
DEAR DIDI: I got my amazing dog, a Dalmation, five years ago. My husband and I were not blessed with children, so Dougy has been cherished. With the change in the economy I was forced to rejoin the work force last year. I am concerned about Dougy staying home alone every day and his quality of life but can't imagine our life without him either. Any suggestions? -Lots of Spots in French Camp
The politics of sequestration
Inside the Beltway, everybody's talking about sequestration - and not only about whether it will happen (various supposed "high-level" sources say they are not optimistic that it will be avoided) and what it will mean, but also - it being the Beltway - which side of the aisle will pay the price.
Woodward-Sperling flap may turn tide
There is a rule in Politics 2013 that's evident in the flap about a White House aide's maybe threatening or not threatening Washington Post veteran reporter Bob Woodward. The rule: The more superficial the brouhaha the bigger its impact.
Articles by Section - Other Views
Too much information is leaking
As a journalist, I am not supposed to admit this, but: I sympathize with the Obama administration's frustration over national security leaks. After a spate of leaks last year - notably, The Associated Press' reporting that national security officials foiled an underwear bomb 2.0 attempt last May - Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein joined Republicans to denounce the Beltway's proclivity for leaking classified information. "This has to stop," quoth DiFi. "When people say they ...
Obama’s legacy? Scandal
The Obama scandals started piling up on top of each other in the last few days. The civil servants who testified on Benghazi were heartbreaking. Then the IRS admitted a punitive agenda against tax exemptions for groups with "tea party" in the name or groups that "educate about the Constitution."
The art of inequality
Monumental gifts to museums are coinciding with the erosion of arts programs at the nation's public schools.
Benghazi Cover-up matters
Last Sept. 11, a terrorist attack left four Americans dead at the Benghazi, Libya, diplomatic mission. The next day, a State Department official wrote in an email, "The group that conducted the attacks, Ansar al-Sharia, is affiliated with Islamic terrorists." Days later, however, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice went on Sunday talk shows and blamed an anti-Islam video for the violence, even though others in her own department knew better.
That ‘pretty white girl’ comment
Three young Cleveland girls missing and presumed dead turned up alive and in good health. A hero of the story is a neighbor, Charles Ramsey, a black man who helped free the girls from the home in which they were apparently imprisoned for some 10 years.
Free speech & conservative students
It sounded like a freedom-of-religion case when a Columbus, Texas high school relay-race team was disqualified from the state track championship because Derrick Hayes pointed heavenward after his team won the race. That would seem odd in a red state like Texas. It turned out that officials were so strict, they warned runners to make no hand gestures after the finish line. Hayes had apparently pointed forward, and then upward, and for that he was out.
Big ag chokes on its own scam
Amy Meyer was curious. Then she was appalled. Then she was charged with the "crime" of using a cell phone to video what appalled her.
How we pay for CEO ‘performance’
Federal unemployment benefits for 400,000 Californians out of work since last fall recently dropped 18 percent, a $52 cut out of weekly checks that average $297. Similar cuts are rolling out in other states.
The drunk guy in the parking lot
The report from the Arlington, Va., Police Department is, on its face, hardly newsworthy:
Obamacare: Train wreck ahead?
Obamacare was supposed to be a big success by now, according to predictions made by liberals who railroaded it through Congress in 2010. Instead, as admitted by one of its leading architects, Democratic Sen. Max Baucus, it's heading for a "train wreck" later this year.
PC mentality and the NBA
Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III started tongues wagging when he posted this cryptic message on Twitter: "In a land of freedom we are held hostage by the tyranny of political correctness."
Whitewashing eight awful years
Gosh, it seems like only yesterday that we saw George W. Bush on TV reading The Pet Goat to some second graders. Now he's all grown up and has an entire , super-duper, king-sized library filled with big books and other neat stuff - all dedicated to him.
Is it a Bay Bridge of cards?
After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake shook loose a big chunk of the Bay Bridge, local politicians did not signal that they wanted to take decades to build a new eastern span, so commuters should get used to driving on a span expected to crumble in a big rumble. Instead, they made grandiose promises about a "world-class" structure. Then-Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown demanded a tony design; then-San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown stood up for Treasure ...
Thoughts on a gay man in the NBA
It is almost unbelievable that this is a first.
Tolerance cuts both ways
Compared to the hell Jackie Robinson went through, Jason Collins is getting a ticker tape parade.
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