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Thank you for your kind (and unkind) letters from the Canada, America, Britain and Australia. Mark reads all the letters, but especially enjoys the vicious ones. Drop a line to Mark's Mailbox and if you're chosen to be the one and only Letter of the Week you'll join our roll of winners from four Continents and receive a copy of Mark Steyn "From Head To Toe". It would help if you could indicate your city or town, or, at least, your state, province or country. Failing that, your continent or hemisphere would do.
Letter of the Week
HE COMES IN PEACE
Why can't Pres. Obama just get it over with and get aboard one of the Space Shuttles, fly to the Space Station and make a Speech to all mankind via satellite.
In this way every network will cover it, all will hear him, he'll be immortal.
Abinabad Virouet
Re: Conservative talk radio in the dock
AUDIENCE SHARE
Jerry Taylor wants Rush Limbaugh read out of the conservative movement?
OK. When he gets a bigger audience than Rush, we'll think about it.
MPT
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
RUSH NEEDS A REAGAN
Perhaps we could all agree that the current problem is a scarcity of Reagans, not a superabundance of Limbaughs.
Rush is primarily an entertainer, and a bit of a bomb-thrower at times. He would be a great part of a strong, vital Republican/conservative movement.
Unfortunately, at present, well. The movement has looked healthier.
I think Mr. Limbaugh would agree with Ms. Pelosi that someone like himself should NOT lead the Republican party.
Samuel Mize
SECOND-ORDER EFFECTS
One also needs to consider second- and third-order effects. Rush reaches "only" 20-odd million on a regular basis. But those listeners can have considerable influence on others who do not hear him. I've been an NR subscriber since about 1990 and a Rush listener since 1993 (only that late due to an overseas posting). Both NR and Rush crystallize into words the ideas that run around our heads but have trouble placing into persuasive arguments. We can make those arguments to others without including "Rush says" and have the idea dismissed out of hand.
If Rush wasn't on the air, all those 20 million would not stay home from the polls or start voting Democratic. But they would not be as motivated themselves or as influential with others as they might be, and those second- and third-order contacts may drift away from conservative thinking over time. Especially if they are only exposed to George Will, P.J. O'Rourke, or other luminaries Jerry Taylor mentioned as substitutes.
A substantial fraction of the population may dismiss or dislike Rush. But they talk to Rush listeners and are getting the benefit of his ideas without necessarily knowing the source.
If Rush took on George Will's style, he might have higher approval ratings but less overall "market penetration" of his ideas. He'd be liked better, but there'd be less conservatism in the country overall. Or roughly what the Republicans have done over the last several years. How's that worked out?
Mark Conner
NO COMPROMISE AT CATO
Jerry Taylor, was I believe a Ron Paul supporter. Really all you need to know, if you read what that group of Anarcho-Capitalist think about Rush and “modern conservatism”, it’s not hard to see how someone from CATO could come to these conclusions after nearly two yrs now of being influenced by this fringe group. In their alternate reality, there is zero room for compromise and Rush, Mark Levin and the “neo-conservatives” are really liberals in disguise. They on the other hand are the “true conservatives” here to save the day, even though what they stand for not even the Founding Fathers agreed with nor "Old Conservatism" as they like to frame it.
This is a reason why that whole campaign of “rEVOLution” and Lew Rockwell's website was such a cancer to conservatism and a great aid to the Democrats/Socialist. This is the same group of people that WFB kicked out of the circle a long time ago (see Murray Rothbard, their idol).
Jonathan Philbeck
THE DEMS ARE NEVER SO DISLOYAL
I was really flummoxed by that post by Jerry Taylor. I'm thinking lately the Corner is trying to be too big a tent all on its own, but never mind that either, it is about the only thing I've still got the stomach to read in these days of "Obamanation". However, I do, and I think this is your point, still listen to Rush and Sean, 6 hours a day, 5 days a week. And I cannot abide watching our own side turn on them like hyenas as provoked by Barack and Co. If we are so stupid that we can't see through this nonsense we don't deserve power, we don't deserve even to complain, because really we must be quite as stupid as our "elite" leaders seem to think we are, which is to say too stupid to find our way out of a paper bag. I never see disloyalty like this among the Dems, NEVER.
Anyway, thanks for your post, you are THE BEST!
Jessica
Jersey City, New Jersey
TALK RADIO REINFORCES CORE PRINCIPLES
Thanks for defending Rush and Sean. Even if Mr. Taylor's criticisms of them are valid, it doesn't make sense to muzzle the only mass media outlets Conservatives have.
Some critics seem argue that talk radio simply attacks Obama blindly and wants to reapply everything Reagan did without changing a word. But frankly speaking, that's talk radio's job, they're not supposed to be proposing new policies for the GOP, that's Mr. Taylor's job. Talk radio reinforces core principles and keeps up the morale of the base. The think tanks should formulate the specific ideas we need, and when they take the lead, Rush and Sean will almost certainly back them, explaining them in simple sound byte terms that the rank and file can support.
In the meantime, let Obama attack Rush all he wants, at some point people will realize that it's silly for the most powerful man on Earth to waste his breath picking on a talk show host (Bush never went after Air America, he would've looked foolish). If conservative talk radio is alienating independents, then the masses of conservatives that Rush and Sean keep pumped up will win them back come campaign time (they weren't there to give McCain a good ground game and reach independents because McCain couldn't make them care a whit).
Jonathan
LET’S CALL A CEASEFIRE
Conservatism needs both the left- and right-coast college-educated elites as well as high school educated common folks here in flyover country to succeed. While Rush and Sean don't appeal to that first demographic, many of which write for and read NRODT and NRO, they do have a loyal following amongst the latter. I've been a NRODT reader for well nigh on twenty years, and an active NRO reader for five years, so I think I understand the tone of these two. Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity do sound very different, especially if you only listen for a minute or two. Jerry Taylor and others apparently equate Rush and Sean as the equivalent of Rachel Maddow and Keith Olberman, and wish them to be gone. But if you take the time to listen to Rush and Sean, while their tone can be belligerent and bombastic, at least they explain why they believe what they do and cite the facts behind those opinions. So before conservatism unilaterally disarms, let's call a cease fire and listen to each other for a while.
A NRODT/NRO Reader
TIRED OF THE DRIVEL
Well done, Mark. I'm tired of certain people of the right trying to earn street cred with the left by Rush-bashing (or Sean-bashing or whatever), and I'm damn tired of Jerry Taylor's drivel at The Corner. I have no idea why he's allowed to post there, but he adds very little to the discussion and he seems to be much more about getting attention for himself by being a contrarian than he does about actually making a point. God help The Cato Institute if he's among their best and brightest.
You, on the other hand, keep up the good work. Now if we could just get you to be Rush's permanent guest host the way Jay Leno was for Johnny Carson many years ago
Erik A. Heter
Austin, Texas
Re: Waziristan of the North
CURLING IN COLORADO
Do not be harsh on Madame Napolitano. She makes a lot of sense.
Here in Colorado we're overrun with Manitobans and Saskatooners. They're everywhere, and beginning to piss me off. They are polite in traffic, actually letting merging traffic get in the road ahead of them. They take jobs that Americans won't do such as Department of Motor Vehicles clerks (one said, "eh?" to me the other day. the lady in the next booth had to translate it.)
And the National Curling Championships were held in an arena just down the road from me. There are more than two real Americans who play curling? I doubt it. And of course the INS didn't come close to that supposed "championship."
Turn on the radio - there are stations that play nothing but Gordon Lightfoot, Anne Murray, and their ilk.
Yes, turn them Predators on these wanderers in search of the mythical Del Sur.
But really, if you down enough Labatt's the Napolitano story could be out of The Onion.
Paul Strasser
Westminster, Colorado
(soon to be known as the Winnipeg of the South)
THE VERY UNREAL FEELING..
".the very real feeling among southern border states and in Mexico that if things are being done on the Mexican border, they should also be done on the Canadian border."
BS. Nearly nobody feels this, not even Mexicans (those left in Mexico).
Sane Americans are likely more concerned with the Mexican border. The others do not want anything done on either border.
William B Slate
INDIAN TERRITORY
Of course, it would also be political suicide to even remark aloud that the border passes through the St. Regis Mohawk Indian reservation, which permits anyone wishing to enter the U.S. illegally to merely request "where can I buy cheap cigarettes around here?", and then simply continue south. Tribal law (the only law) does not appear to pose any restriction as to whom, and with what, may exit the reservation into New York State, and the State Police have been very careful not to even question cigarette purchasers as they enter lest they feel the full weight of Indian casino influence on local government (and of course, immigration law is completely out of the question).
Such vague terms as "porous" hardly describe a border with a hole in it 6 miles long, immune to government scrutiny, and protected by what is essentially a band of smugglers claiming quasi-national sovereignty whose interest is to encourage unsupervised entry and exit from both countries.
Jeffrey Diamond
Senior Court Clerk
Supreme Court of New York County
(Ret'd.)
MEXICANS TO MASTERMIND SECURITY
Gee, does this mean that the US also intends to do away with the policy of having Canadians serve as NORAD-NORTHCOM command directors, protecting the security of the entire North American continent? Or will the US instead have Mexico -- not a signatory to the treaty that gives us NORAD, by the way--provide senior members of their military to serve as command directors? What a concept! Since NORAD-NORTHCOM also monitors drug interdiction operations, perhaps those officers could use the info to help the drug smugglers better understand the existing limits of that monitoring and become more effective! A win-win all around!
Jeff Tschida
NO ACCOUNTING FOR TASTE
Thank you for the unmanned drone line in your recent Corner posting. Believe it or not, there are a few of us left who get the joke. Or maybe it's just you and me. Regardless, I'm doing my best to pass such knowledge and related humor to my two replacement-rate daughters: my five-year-old loves Judy Garland, Ginger Rogers, and Julie Andrews. Her three-year-old sister prefers Ann-Margret, but I've tried to look on the bright side and use it as a vehicle for explaining that there's no accounting for taste.
Oh, about the sales I got you on "America Alone"-- you're welcome.
F X Durkin
Arlington, Virginia
KINDERGARTEN COPS
Apparently, "Everything I Need to Know, I Learned in Kindergarten" is the operations field manual for this administration.
Patrick Higgins
MORE VETS
To be fair, Canada does have more known Al Qaeda vets than Mexico.
Barney Krebs
Re: A land fit for superheroes
SUPERHERO SEALS
Instead of griping, why doesn't Mark ask his Hollywood bigwig friends where the "Lone Survivor" movie is? True story of Navy SEAL team where 3 out of 4 of them die, taking 50+ Taliban with them, because they refuse to dishonor their country by shooting civilians(who then go straight to the Taliban and inform on them)? Fourth gets blown off a cliff by a rocket launcher and then hikes miles across Taliban territory until he finds shelter in a friendly Pashtun village which repeatedly hides him from the vengeful Taliban? It is almost incomprehensible to me that this book has not already been turned into a movie; it could be personal objections on the part of the families of the SEALs involved, but other than that I have no freaking idea. Even in Hollywood they must know that Black Hawk Down was a blockbuster.
Roy KocZela
Re: Song of the Week
THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES
I was five or six years old when I saw a flickering black and white short of Ghost Riders in the Sky at the local movie house, with my mum. I remember being immediately caught by the song, liking Vaughan Monroe's voice and the cinematic effects in the short, and of some final scene of VM sitting at a piano holding some lovely in his arms, though I can't remember why, or think how, such a wrap-up scene would be relevant. (I do remember I was definitely becoming aware that I was what is now referred to as straight, so maybe I imagined the ending...)
Other songs I was introduced to at the local movie house at about the same time was Big Rock Candy Mountain, and later The Song of the Volga Boatmen. All of them remain special today, as does Singin' in the Rain, and some movie in which either Fred Astaire or Donald O'Connor danced on the walls and ceiling, during which I had to be repeatedly shushed from exclaiming at and questioning the wonder of it all.
Your article nudged all these memories. Thanks.
Robert Fournier
NICE EFFECTS, SHAME ABOUT THE SINGING
Hi, Mark. Thanks as always for the great piece in your Song of the Week. I've always been fond of "Ghost Riders in the Sky" since I heard a Roy Clark instrumental on one of my dad's 8-tracks -- I don't remember which album, but it also featured a song with the excellent C&W title of "Thank God and Greyhound You're Gone."
One worth mentioning, but not for good reasons, was the cover in the horrendous film "Blues Brothers 2000," which featured some nice special effects and some terrible singing by Dan Ackroyd. That film taught me two things: 1) There was a reason Belushi had done most of the singing in the old days, and 2) The only two men in America who did not get the first film were Dan Ackroyd and John Landis.
Mark Amundsen
HEARD THAT TUNE BEFORE
Like most great folk songs, even newly written ones, the melody is somewhat familiar. It is, in its essence, "When Johnny Comes Marching Home", or as the Irish wrote it, "Johnny We Hardly Knew Ye".
My radio co-host wanted to use the Gene Autry version as our show's theme song. Unfortunately it runs about 4 1/2 minutes and bears no relation to the show. We're sticking with The Good, The Bad and The Ugly for now.
TheJudge
MOST POPULAR
You failed to credit "The Outlaws" for what is, in my opinion, the most popular version of Ghost Riders in the last 30 years. Thank you for a super article.
Bruce Klasens
HURLY BURLY
Mark said, " A little Burl Ives goes way too long with me."
Me, too. I guess I just hated his voice -- sort of a Wilfred Brimley sound. To me, he showed just how little musical ability it finally took to get in on the folk movement.
I disliked dreck like "A little bitty tear let me down." And he ruined "Big Rock Candy Mountain" for me for decades. He was about the most un-musical musician I ever heard, apart from Lawrence Welk.
But I don't think anybody could quarrel with his acting, in movies like "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" -- or at least I couldn't.
Larry Eubank
MEN IN TIGHTS
I'm a rabid fan of yours, and found your remarks on Lionel Bart were very interesting. However, in describing the factors that finally caused Bart to go broke, you left out a biggie: the musical flop Twang!! This formless disaster, based on the Robin Hood legend, featured some of the strongest players from Joan Littlewood's theater company, including James Booth and Barbara Windsor. But everything else about the show- - story, songs, costumes, scenery - sucked, partly because Bart was perpetually distracted by the joys of LSD. He had invested his own fortune in Twang!!, and when it failed, so did his finances. You can read more about this on my James Booth fansite .
Diana Blackwell
THE MANE MAN
Absolutely masterful column on The Lion Sleeps.
My credentials for the above compliment include:
- Very ex folksinger;
- Married a folksinger;
- Writer of humorous articles and semi-humorous mystery novels;
- Read all of George Bernard Shaw's writings on music (you are better);
- I was acquainted with Wilfred Sheed - you are the only writer I know who tops him on music.
So there. Deal with it.
Joe Hanna
Re: Conservatives always face uphill climb
A 6TH GRADER AT THE SPELLING BEE
Mark: Your evisceration of Powell was complete. Indeed he is not up to scaling a mountain. What a pathetic man.
I remember vividly his UN presentation, with George Tenant seated behind him for "credibility". I was very surprised at the strength and vehemence with which he made the case against Saddam. (Recall that he had just been sandbagged by our supposed allies in Old Europe, giving him cover to actually support his own administration on this ocassion.) In the days immediately following he received broad praise, much of which was to the effect that here, finally, was a clear voice for the bumbling Bush administration's policy. I never saw him do what he should have done, namely point out that he was a member of the Bush administration, and that Bush and others had been making an equally strong case for months. No, instead, he gushed, like a 6th grade spelling bee contestant who had just gotten Aardvark right. He had no problem being exalted by the press as the unique star of his team.
He's since become, of course, one of the misled dupes. I wonder, when he looks back on that event, whether his shame at carrying water for the evil Bush administration overcomes his pride at just being so damned bright and articulate.
John Primmer
South Ryegate, Vermont
PROPER PERSPECTIVE
I just read your column on Colin Powell. I stopped trusting his judgment on human nature while he was still Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Bush the Elder. During that time, Powell kept a quote by Thucydides on his desk, which read:
"Of all the manifestations of power, it is restraint that impresses men most."
It sounds high-minded at first, but when applied to reality it quickly falls apart because it's missing one key part: the word "reasonable" before "men."
Anyone who pays even a little attention to human nature figures out before long that tyrants, thugs, criminals, bullies, etc. always interpret "restraint" as "weakness." This is especially true when the ones exercising the restraint have the power to crush those doing the provoking, but are too afraid to use that power. They're not impressing anybody, they're cultivating contempt.
So when I hear Powell tsk-tsk-ing Republicans - for being too "mean," I just recall that he's the same guy who thinks that you can "impress" folks like Assad, Chavez, Putin, Kim Jong Il and the Iranian mullahs with "restraint." That puts him, and his thinking, into proper perspective.
Taylor Lake
Albany, Oregon
THROW IN THE TOWEL WITH POWELL?
"Is Conservatism over ?" Tough, frank piece. Thankfully, you ended on an optimistic note: “conservativism does do mountains". While I'm not even as mildly optimistic as you are, I am not yet ready to throw in with Powell. ( For the unitiated, that's Right-speak for "throw in the towel"). It seems a little strange that Cautious Colin has developed a streak of audacity while sitting on the sidelines. Too bad he he directs his shots at people like Rush Limbaugh and others on the Right, people who NEVER referred to him as a "house nigger" while he was at DOD and DOS under Bushes 41 and 43, respectively. BTW, did Cautious Colin EVER respond to that "house nigger" crowd, some who might well be serving today in the current administration of the junior president from Chicago? I doubt that he ever took them on, but I'd welcome some countering evidence.
For good or, all too often these days, for ill, conservatives seem compelled to put on display their "free-thinker" gene. Liberals don't have that particular gene - they carry the group-think marker. They even pass it on to their offspring. Have you ever heard of one of the Kennedy broods taking a Right turn, or even being mildly critical of liberals. Is there even a closet conservative in the Cuomo family ? Don't bet on it. Group-think prevails, gen to gen. Conservatives on the other hand, are almost delighted to display the free-think kids of their high-profile pals...even when they're kooks like Ron Reagan, Chris Buckley, McCain's Valley-Girl, and so on. Pathetic stuff at times, but it comes with the free-think territory. The gene difference is even more evident among the op-ed pundits. Even the most casual consumer of media punditry has to be impressed by the solidarity of the liberal chatterers, as compared to the frequent feuding on the conservative side. When I'm in the mood to take in a good scrap, I often go to The Corner (National Review). Is there a similar site where liberal thinkers go at it once in a while. If there is, I bet they get more clicks from Righty types than Lefties. "Conservative" David Brooks called Governor Palin "a cancer". Did he EVER describe Joey Biden as a "buffoon" or some such? Is the Pope Jewish?
Incidentally, good thing Sarah asked for a second opinion. She's doing just fine, thanks. To be fair to liberals, however, we should note that Paul Krugman at the NY Times has annoyed a few of his liberal colleagues, apparently, because he is mildly critical of the Candy-Bam's distribution of the recession goodies. Not enough of it, maybe? ( Wish I could provide more details here, but I doze off when I see him talkin' on TV... and when I try to read his stuff, I'm in a coma by the first comma).
oops..BREAKING NEWS : And now we have Jeb Bush telling the Right they have to consign Ronald Reagan to posterity's oblivian bin. Nice. For more information on dumping the RR legacy , call 1-800- APOLOGY. If the lines are busy, try 1-800- SURREND.
John Gross
Quebec
FAMILY MATTERS
Powell also, as Secretary of State, declined to support pro-democracy, pro-US demonstrations in
Iran on at least two occasions. He explained, "Let's not get involved in a family quarrel."
Stephen Bassion
NEVER AS CONSERVATIVE AS WE HOPED
Your recent column concerning Colin Powell got me thinking about conservatism and the last 30 years. More specifically, the Reagan Revolution. I think few in the GOP circa. 1981-1985 would believe that in less than 30 years their "revolution" would be over. Colin Powell's remarks about a "big tent" GOP may have more of a glimmer of truth than we would care to admit. The genius of the President Reagan and his advisers was to mask an apparent long-term strategic weakness. Conservatives, while gaining short term tactical victories from 1981-1985, overall failed to produce a long-term counter weight to a trend that has been going on since 1933. If one takes a cool, rational view of both the political and social trends of this nation it is easy to see that the "moderates' within the GOP controlled the agenda, or at least watered down those proposals that were needed to continue what the conservatives started in 1981. Both President Bush's are good examples of this.
In short, this nation was never as conservative as many had wished for. The demographic trends which you constantly point out are overall signs of a larger problem that unfortunately has no answer vis-a-vis a government program. The government cannot force couples to have more children. That inducement can only come from the immediate family and religious institutions. Likewise, the kind of conservative reform of our civic and social institutions many wish for cannot come about by just voting for conservative candidates. This can only come about by a socio-religious renewal that lies totally outside of politics. Well, it should anyway. President Obama appears to many to offer just that. But that is another story. The point being is that for 30 years we have lived off the inherited fat (to use George Will's words) of previous generations (this includes the generation of JFK and Reagan). The "moderates" in our party are just evidence that we have pretty much feasted down to the bone.
How this renewal will come about is anyone's guess. Your highlighting the family (or at least the fruits of the family-namely children) serves to remind us that politics is of secondary importance. Keep up the good work.
JP
FRAUD
Mark, good job! Really enjoying you on the Rush show.
Colin Powell is a fraud just like all of his Leftist friends. When asked about running for President, he couldn't decide whether he was Republican or Democrat. The only reason the Republicans were wooing him is because of their MISTAKEN belief that he would draw votes from blacks. What a fallacy! A "Republican" black will never get votes because our U.S. corrupt and dishonest news media will never allow any black with an R behind their name to get a lot of votes.
Gene
BRAZEN CONSERVATIVES NEEDED
I am inspired by your article. Thank you for calling us to be more conservative. Thank you for not proposing kicking the social conservatives out of the tent. We need more brave courageous people on our side, particularly those running for office.
I want candidates for office in 2010 and 2012 who are brazenly conservative and have a long record of being conservative. Not retreads like Romney, McCain, et al.
William Chadwick
DEATH BY COMPROMISE
Why Conservatives fail -
It's really simple - the Conservatives are willing to compromise, and the Liberals are not.
Every concession the Conservatives grant to the Liberals moves the Conservatives farther to the left.
But, because the Liberals don't compromise, there is never a move back toward conservatism, only a steady slide toward the liberal side.
So, as long as the Conservatives continue to compromise, they are doomed to failure.
John Kernkamp
Sacramento, California
NEW ZEALAND’S LOOKING GOOD
All the GOP have to do is look at the sorry sorry state of the Conservatives here in UK, I have a close friend who has got involved in the party during the past decade to try to save our sorry selves and country, she will be standing this next election as a candidate (DV) however her observations of the lack of principles and resolve are excruciating to listen to, instead of having principled positions from which to discuss the "party" seems to think they are due back in power by not being controversial, they worry about losing votes by being anti EU, raising any questions about immigration, taxes, spending cuts etc etc. In fact they are frightened about discussing anything for fear of having to debate it, something they can no longer do because they have no fundamental principles underlying their positions. Unfortunately as predicted by my late father who saw the same happen in Europe in the last century all that happens is that people turn to either the fascists or the communists. Unfortunately only Lord Tebbit seems to still have any sense of principle, everyone else seems to have followed you and have left the country. This will probably be my last general election in the UK all things considered and whilst America has been a love of mine for many, many years I think NZ is now looking good (thinking small country, small population, no unhealthy neighbours new conservative government, still a fundamentally religious christian population and finally they can't be big government with 4 million people) , but hey this next election I'll be voting for UKIP though I think the election will be a major shock for more than the Labour Party.
Adrian
CUDDLING UP TO THE MSM
I think that by listing Meghan McCain with Colin Powell and Lincoln Chafee, you're giving her way too much credit. While riding Daddy's coat-tails to "stardom," she's demonstrating the writing ability of a 12-year-old D-student in her blog, and the vulgarity of Howard Stern for the amusement of the "ladies" of The View (I don't like what Colin Powell has been saying lately, but at least he would be able to rebut someone without resorting to saying, "She can kiss my fat ***."). I think the only ones who are seriously paying attention to her are the members of the MSM. The rest of us are just laughing at her sorry attempts at popularity with the Liberal Media.
Kathy Caliando
Re: Spring Collections
INCEST IN CHICAGO
As for Giannoulias, with your Chicago connections, couldn't you comment on his connection to the Broadway Bank, Obama, and our old friend, Rezcko? The connections in Chicago are just incestuous. I was born and raised there and it still amazes me how the "City that Works" really works.
I like Taylor but give it to him on Rush. I really think we need to leave the base alone (I am part of the base) and get back to being a party of strong defense, cutting taxes, and most of all, cutting spending. We have not done that since 1994. After that time I quit calling myself a Republican. I am a full time conservative.
Lou Gregorich
SPIFFY
They are really good suits.
Peter Zavodnyik
Chicago
TROUBLE ON BROADWAY?
Mark Hemingway reported on Giannoulias' ties to Rezscko and organized crime last October.
Lou Gregorich
Re: Intrusion of reality
WHEN WHITEHALL KNEW BEST
I read with interest your article about Thatcher and her legacy. You make the point that part of that legacy was trying to move away from the principle that the man (or indeed woman) in Whitehall knows best.
It's always intrigued me then that she was so opposed to devolving power to Scotland, Wales and the regions of England. On this level she really did believe central government knew best.
Michael
Re: Hillsdale piece
THE STAGES OF DECLINE
Great piece... particularly defining the various stages of decline. Most of us (the huddled masses) just don't get it, though. Too often, we trade choice for comfort. Too late, we find that comfort is too costly.
I share my newsletters with a former left-wing loon at work. He'll love this one to be sure.
Keep up the great work. Your book (America Alone) is dog-eared on the shelf, and will soon be highlighted to the point of premature page yellowing from another reading.
SFC Steve McCane
Denver, Colorado
(My wife hails from Dover, NH. Her 83 year-old mother still lives there.)
COMMUNICATE THIS WITH OUR NATION
I have just read your lecture at Hillsdale College in the Imprimis publication. Outstanding! Thank you for the insight and your thoughts. Please provide those of us who are paying attention ideas on how to communicate this with our nation. I feel we are "tilting against windmills".
Tom Scott
THE BEST COLUMN I HAVE EVER READ
Your lecture from Hillsdale in the April 2009 Imprimis ("Live Free or Die") was possibly the best column that I have ever read. It was brilliant and perfectly accurate. I guess you wrote it before you got "Steyn Flu".
Charlie
THE CIVILIZED WORLD’S GREATEST CHALLENGE
While I have always enjoyed and agreed with much or your writing, your lecture at Hillsdale College strikes me as the most important piece I have read. You clearly and descriptively articulated the greatest
challenge, not only of America, but of the civilized world.
We are at a very desperate moment in history and, frankly, I am feeling a little powerless to stop the inertia towards socialism (infinite power vested in the Democrats, a compliant media, and feckless Republicans).
Your message inspires me to try to overcome the sense of powerlessness.
William Shephard Holland
Madison, Wisconsin
LIES REPEATED
Just received the April copy of Imprimis and greatly impressed with your lecture and thoughts presented therein. At age 89 I have lived to see the negative changes in the culture and direction that our country has embarked upon and which have become basic educational curriculum in most public schools and universities in the USA. If lies are repeated often enough they become gospel and most difficult to reverse - some of our children and grandchilden have taken the bait and I worry about what their futures will bring.
Robert Starck
THE CHANGE WE ARE WITNESSING
Mark Steyn's "Live Free of Die" article in Imprimis is is probably one of the best articles I've seen that captures the type of "change" we are now witnessing. I hope it gets well circulated and that freedom loving Americans recognize where we are headed, and do so quickly.
Rick Jory
Highlands Ranch, Colorado
I THOUGHT YOU WERE PLUMP
I've heard you filling in for Rush on several occasions and enjoyed you tremendously. All Rush's fill-ins are good, but my favorite before you was Tony Snow, who is now in a better place; which puts you into my number one slot. I love your quick wit with serious implications. While listening to you on radio, I formed an image of you as a plumpish, 60ish, average looking affable gent.
THEN, OH MY!! I received my copy of Imprimis! Shattered my image!!! You are drop dead, movie star handsome! I'm not sure I can abide with this!
Can I bring myself to read the article with this shattered image? Surely I will.
Kathleen
Re: The Rush Limbaugh Show
ONLY WIMPS EAT KETCHUP
Hey Mark, I put dijon mustard on my burgers too you foreign pussy! Only children and wimps put ketchup on their burgers, hot dogs, etc. And by the way, when you're trying to make the point that someone is elitist for putting dijon mustard on a hamburger, it helps not to pronunciate it like a foreign elitist windbag. This issue you and other conservative swine have with dijon mustard is just another example of how detached conservatives are from us common folk. We use dijon too. Kraft produces it and puts in squeeze bottles for godsakes. But keep on swilling your vacuous and pompous manure. Most of us see right through your lies and distortions and cry-baby whimperings.
Jay Miller
West Linn, Oregon
P.S. I was raised on a farm, butchered countless animals, own guns, eat meat everyday, hunt and fish, have a college degree, read 4 to 6 books a month, and will take any conservative blowhard to task.
BUSH LIKES DIJON, TOO
President and Laura Bush's Deviled Eggs Recipe
12 large eggs, boiled hard and peeled
1 Tbsp (plus) soft butter
1 Tbsp (plus) mayonnaise
1 Tbsp Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp Yucatan Sunshine Habanero sauce
Salt to taste
Tom B
THANKS, TYPIST
Even through the reporting of George Soros's typist you are witty and to the point. In fact his "clever-clever" comments show your words in an even better light! So there George!
Jeannie L'Esperance
Ottawa
THERAPEUTIC TERMINOLOGY
I heard a good bit of your spot, filling in for Rush Limbaugh, and you noted that the left is constantly using therapeutic terminology suggesting that conservatives are mentally deranged (e.g. "homophobia"). Well, turn about is fair play - try the following, as a 'fear of freedom': liberphobia.
This was not my invention. I found it here.
Bud
CONTROLLING THE LANGUAGE
re your discussion on controlling the language, here is a nice word - "repatriation".
Barry Bunch
A SHOW OF YOUR OWN
I want to tell you that I enjoy listening to you as you sit in for Rush. You really need a show of your own!! I did not realize you were so darn cute as well!! Let's get you on the television shall we!! Thank you for your insight to our political and social process here in America. I will pick up one of your books very soon! Have a great day!
Patti Cozby
West Chester, Ohio
UNIQUE PERSPECTIVE
Just wanted to say, love it when you fill in for Rush. Wish you had a national radio show, so we all can hear your unique perspective and humor on a daily basis. Keep up the good work!
John Moran
Round Top, New York
Re: Beam me anywhere else
KIRK FOR PM
It's always sad when you see once cherished and outgoing actors reduced to smaller and smaller bit parts to make a living.
James Versluys
IS SPECTER A BORG?
You write, in part:
"I like a little more Shatneresque static cling around the nipples myself, but he certainly wears it better than, say, Arlen Specter would. His wife, also an NDP Member of the Canadian Parliament, has a matching outfit."
Wouldn't you agree that Arlen Specter was beamed off of the starship Enterprise a couple weeks ago? Actually, the way he talks after leaving the Republican Party, it's like he's just been recently assimilated by the Borg:
“I am Specter of the Democrats. Lower the volume on your talk radio. Your ideology and principles, as you've known them, are over. Your philosophy will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile.”
Neal Pierson
P.S. Love the columns. Keep up the good work.
INSUFFERABLE AND WEIRD
I loved the Jack Layton photo in Star Trek regalia. Ha. I'd forgotten about that. I used to live in his Danforth neighborhood back when he was in city politics and heading for the big times, and I agree --insufferable, and weird. One time I was riding my bike on Queen St E, heading downtown. Jack cut me off on his bike and then flipped me the bird when I yelled a mild expletive at him. He thought he was anonymous, but I knew who he was. I never voted for the pompous arse.
Name withheld
Re: Iggy’s morally contemptible words
ENOUGH OF THE IGGY LOVE-IN
Thank you, thank you for this column - a breath of intelligent air. I was getting sick and tired of Macleans seemingly love-in with Michael Ignatieff who is barely a Canadian in my opinion. As for what he said about imagining Canada, as you quoted him I had to think, and I am sure I speak for many Canadians when I say, HUH?
What happened to those little girls was heinous, horrible and beyond tragic. It doesn't bear imagining what those little girls had to go through that night and for Mr. Ignatieff to sweep that away by hoping their death mercilessly quick and using them to bolster his vague point? Words cannot begin to wrap themselves around this horrible action and it has only reduced Mr. Ignatieff in my eyes. And he didn't have much stature to begin with.
At any rate, I want to thank you so much for your honesty. Much appreciated and I want to encourage you to keep speaking your mind.
Carolyne Aarsen
TRUDEAU BEATS IGNATIEFF
How about PE Trudeau's December 1981 unctuous approval of the declaration of martial law by the Polish Communist party and the subsequent attempts to crush the solidarity trade union movement and arrest of Lech Walesa ...
... I was living in Edmonton at the time and well remember my deep disillusion and despondency...
... if I drudge up any actual quotes, I'll send them along.
I enjoy your work ... tho, it does often leave me "deeply despondent".
Michael Kozlowski
Summit, New Jersey
ADDICTED TO THE NANNY CRACK
You write: “Yet this dead, desiccated language has become the only acceptable form of public discourse about Canadian identity—even though, as that poll demonstrates, it’s at odds with how actual Canadians think of their country.” Really now, eh? So why's Iggy up in the polls? We've got the best PM in living memory, a man who stands out as superb when positioned beside most other leaders in the world today, and Canadians just don't find much in him to like. He speaks well, he's got a great family, his wife's cute, his kids are nice, he's composed, super-smart, and all-round decent as far as anyone can tell. But it looks like the old beavers are going to elect a sappy talking-head who has never lived in Canada for his adult life, and who traipses on up north to put a notch in his belt and a line on his CV, 'Prime Minister of Canada'. Think of the job offers Iggy will get having that one on his resume!
Harper has stewarded Canada through rough times; we've come out of the global mess much better than almost all countries. But Canadians don't care. They're truly addicted to that nanny crack you speak of. So I'd say that either Canadians are mentally retarded (which is quite possible, and therefore your prattle about self-reliance becomes highly problematic) or they are in fact rather liberal, even if they don't go as far into the hot schmaltz as Iggy, that bloated pig. They'll pull the lever for the Liberals come hell or high water is what it seems. Someone in show business once said that you never lose money underestimating the masses.
Jasper
Re: One singular sensation
FAVE FED HOTTIE
Regarding Hatemonger's Shakedown Night on the Town in Ottawa,
I agree with you, Rona Ambrose is my favorite federal hottie too. Ah, Edmonton - it's a great city. If I were the PM I would have kept her on in the Environment post and let her run with the "globull warming is a crock" theme. As it is, pandering to the CO2 believers hasn't earned the Party anymore support anyway and is perhaps incurring the wrath of former solid Party supporters and donators like yours truly. Minister Prentice talks a good line on cleaning up carbon dioxide emissions but it makes me wonder how the PM squares his belief that Canada will be the next "energy exporting powerhouse" with implementing policy that discourages investment in energy production. Go figure.
BTW the 'Viva Steyn' T shirts are great - wonder how the lefties in our office will like them on casual day? Will I get tarred by that infamous 'Hatemonger' brush? Just curious, why was Ezra wearing those Liberal cufflinks??
Brian Sumner
Winnipeg
IN THE DARK ON ‘LIGHTS OUT’
Considering that you are a Canuck, I find it curious indeed that your new book Lights Out apparently can't be purchased here in the People's Republic (at least not from Chapters.ca, Amazon.ca or other mainstream bookstores). It took quite some time for America Alone to be available here as well, if I recall correctly.
Mark Porter
Re: Just for the Record
JACQUI’S ‘THOUGHT’ PROCESS
Your comments on Jacqui "Jack-Boot" Smith's motives in excluding Michael Savage, the radio Shock Jock, gave her and her awful government too much credit for having a coherent, albeit repellent, view of the brave new world which they wish to create.
In fact, the reason why Mr Savage is on the list of excluded perons is this. Ms Smith is under pressure to exclude suicide bombers and suchlike and her thought process went as follows:
1. Right, who has recently incited murder and genocide?
2. Okay, put them on the list.
3. Oh dear, lots of Muslim names there.
4. Blah blah Islamophobia blah blah racism blah blah BBC blah blah the Guardian.
5. Better shove some other hate mongers on there to make us look even-handed.
6. Excellent, put that odd Jewish fellow down there.
7. Hmm, we need a Christian fundamentalist. A Yankee would be perfect.
8. Google 'people the Democrats hate.'
Come to think of it, that's more or less how the country's been run since 1997. God help us...
Edward Harris
London NW1
HELLO AND GOODBYE
Does all this mean the U.S. can refuse entry to Jacqui?
Here's hoping.
Matt Fleming,
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
CLOSE COMPETITORS
Jacqui Smith, Harriet Harman & Janet Napolitano are in a close competition to be declared the most vacuous, puerile, & unserious person ever to hold a post in government.
John Schedler
Seattle, Washington
SAVAGE FANS
I wonder if the Brits know just how many Americans they let pass through their customs every day who happen to agree with what Michael Savage has to say.
I for one, have had no problem entering the country on many occasions...
Paul
Re: Population data
AN ANSWER TO THE BABY BUST
The answer to this is to Just cut off people's tv's, internet access and lights:
Love your work on National Review (and NRO).
Michael Maham
Cedar Park, Texas
THE URGE TO ASSIMILATE
You ignore the whole issue of assimilation.
My mother is French. In France I have met 2nd generation Palestinian and Lebanese who are as French as you like: Completely assimilated, very middle class, very French.
True, the larger the immigration wave the longer the assimilation. That was true in the U.S. in the early 20th century when very large Italian colonies (as an example) remained Italian for a fairly long time. But assimilate they did, and today I don't know a single Italian-American who can speak Italian. I taught school in inner city Los Angeles for a time. A lot of my students were recent immigrants from SE Asia, Mexico and El Salvador. I can tell you that among 12 and 13 year olds the urge to assimilate is overwhelming. Kids are very good at this.
Rusty Scalf
Oakland, California
RELIGIOUS DUTY
I am not swayed one bit by Mr. Walker's arguments, and the reason is quite simple. While current European Muslim birthrates may be falling toward the lower birthrates of the native European populations, I have little doubt that if the call went out from mosques across Europe that it was the religious duty of every muslima to bear several children, Muslim birthrates would reverse course & rise again. And that call will certainly eventually emanate from mosques throughout Europe. I am reminded here of a 1974 speech to the U.N. by Algerian president Boumedienne in which he declared that, "One day, millions of men will leave the Southern Hemisphere to go to the Northern Hemisphere. And they will not go there as friends. Because they will go there to conquer it. And they will conquer it with their sons. The wombs of our women will give us victory."
Tim Schwarzmann
A MAGIC LAND OF PEACE
Two things struck me while reading the Martin Walker happy talk. First, even though Walker was obviously bending every effort to spin the approaching horror show in Europe as a Disney animated feature he could not help but echo your comments with respect to China, Russia and the rest of the world. On his telling, Europe is the only place in the world where ethnic conflicts over control of resources will not occur. It is a magic land where peace through banality reigns.
Second, was the laugh out loud funny suggestion that because the United States experienced a near one to one ratio of "dependents" to producers in the early to mid-60s, Europe will have no difficulties coping with a similar ratio in the coming decades. Maybe, but I tend to think that there are dependents and then again there are other dependents. It was hard enough for the United States to cope with the coming of age of the boomer generation when the "dependents" he describes were the producer's own wives and children. We will see what happens when half the "producers" are members of a different ethno-religious group and are at least partially influenced by an ideology which authorizes them to subdue others. Gives a whole new meaning to that word "dependants."
Bryan McBurney
WHITE FRIGHT IN OZ
Perhaps of some interest./
Love hearing you on Rush,
Richard
Re: Obama looks moderate, acts radical
THE DEMOCRAT ADVANTAGE
In your OC Register column you say: "The theater of thoughtfulness is critical to the president's success."
Sorry, but what's critical to Obama's success is a Democratic Congress! With a Republican majority, Obama would have spent the last 100 days trying to figure out how many bills he could veto before running out of political capital. We ain't gittin' there any time soon, alas.
Push back against the feds can only come from one place, and anybody who doesn't know where that is isn't a conservative -- or a Republican. You can wring your hands in print till kingdom come, but if you really want to help, make covering/debating innovative state initiatives, and even things like sovereignty resolutions, sexy in the national press. You're one of a very few with the wit and range to do it.
State based solutions don't come from Senators in Washington -- where being the Party of No ought to be a plus -- and it's not corporations who defend market based solutions when there's money in submission. Imagine the 100 days equation had we been able to plug in serious resistance from the state of Michigan. I'm not so sure Obama would be running the auto industry, are you?
Democrats are peeling off states like North Carolina in our cities and their suburbs. Urban collectives are predisposed to collective solutions! Conservatives need to convince them that what flies in Sacramento would be bad news in Raleigh-Durham. I don't see anybody even trying. Folks aren't just going to intuit that on their own. The Democrats' demographic coalition gives them a natural advantage. Republicans are an ideological coalition, and, unfortunately, ideological principles are always harder to sell than bread and circuses. Social conservatives are a high profile part of that coalition because everybody knows exactly what their issues look like in everyday life, not because they are necessarily conservative
politically.
I adore your columns, but Obama, himself, is the distraction.
JM (Judith) Hanes
THEATER OF POLITICS
"The theater of thoughtfulness."
What a perfect line to describe Obama's style (the operative word being "theatre", of course)!
Thanks for coming up with that!
Tom Diffee
ACTING PRESIDENTIAL
I just finished reading the above, via Hot Air, with mixed feelings: "Yes, this is the best article he has ever written, so from this point will all to follow be on a descending scale?". Well, whatever happens so be it. You nailed it...or him. When he disowned Rev. Wright I thought that was an act. And for me anyway, his first 100 days are not only proof that he was in his pew every Sunday, but taking copious notes to boot. We find it articulated subtlety overseas but at home he does it Frank Gorshin style through his pen.
Craig Lennox
Elverson, Pennsylvania
Re: Aquarius
THE AGE OF AL-SCARING-US
When Lunatics are in the White House.
And Stupid Gore maligns my car.
Then greenies will rule the planet.
Self-love will guide the stars...
This is the dawning of the Age of Al-scaring-us!
the Age of Al-scaring-us!
Al-scaring-us!
(bridge)
So, let the sun shine!
Let the sunshine in!
Where the sun don?t shine! (background: in Two thousand ten & twelve)
(Repeat 357 times, then get nekkid)
Gregg S Sotack
Re: Obama and the Holocaust
TRAGIC EVENTS
Well, I think we can all agree that we'll Never Again let Neville Chamberlain let Adolph Hitler annex the Sudetenland. And I'm sure that Obama will Never Again let certain other things happen -- like let the White House fly Air Force One and some F-16s low over New York for a photo op, or let Joe Biden, VP, MD, run the pandemic response team.
As for Tibet and Darfur and the Swat Valley and certain other benighted parts of the earth, I'm sure Obama will some day come to deplore the tragic events that unfolded before the world could act together to discuss them. Maybe after he's saved the American medical system.
Eric Sharf
Ottawa
Re: Subprime demography
POSTAGE STAMP PROPERTIES
I spent a couple of years around Japan. A lot of their arrangements look odd from our point of view, but fall into place when you see the setting. Not just the climate that makes those fussy Japanese Maples perk up and act like great patriarch oaks, and ditto the centipedes.
Elbow room is an interesting topic, too. I saw houses just about big enough to hold a VW bug (Our size, not the super size). But it looked like their choice, so the rest of the postage stamp property could be used for garden space. What, you think most people can afford to buy the produce?
A big fact of life there is that 98% (guess) of the people only live on the coast. The hills are too darn steep for construction of any size. Hiroshima doesn't sprawl now any farther than it did 60 years ago. It's all built on the tiny flat delta. Osaka's recent airport could only be constructed by dredging a brand new island in the bay just to hold it. Japan's railroad is close to everybody, automatically, because nearly nobody is more than a mile from the coast in the first place.
The farms are built in the valleys, all right. Tiny valleys. None of those is big enough to need much of a tractor. The alternative is those picturesque rice paddies built by hand on thin-soiled hillsides. Those aren't much of a feature in Japan.
Even on the coast, there are a number of villages with no beach. Built on more of a cliff. Too steep to handle anything resembling a car. But what a view!
When we talk blithely about elbow room and Japan, I doubt most of us understand how that generally plays out on the ground.
Robert
THE FUNDS ARE NOT AVAILABLE
An entitlement report comes out today showing that the Social Security and Medicare trust funds will be exhausted a combined six years earlier than last year's report predicted (that's 2017 for Medicare and 2037 for SS). Such evidence demands bold action and the best our representatives can do is offer a resolution recommending forming a bipartisan committee to possibly discuss potential methods that might could be proposed for general floor debate in order to conceivably be voted on to address the onrushing entidalment wave.
And we're seriously, right now, as I write, considering turning our health care over to these clowns?
Presenting...from the same people who brought you the New Orleans levees, the DMV, the government school system, the USPS, Amtrak, Fannie and Freddie, Walter Reed, and that all time great, the IRS...a new bigger, better creation: Gummint Health Care!
How is this even being considered? What is wrong with our citizens. Again, I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Well, on the bright side in a few months at least they'll be government subsidized crazy pills.
James Bailey
PLAYING MONOPOLY
Thank you for all you do. I have a question/ request:
I am reading B. Obama's autobiography, "Dreams From My Father," and have reached the section where he recounts his experiences as a community organizer attempting to secure better living conditions for the residents of Altgeld, the housing project run by the Chicago Housing Authority.
I am wondering why no one to my memory has discussed the obvious lesson that Mr. Obama should have drawn from his own proud experience there: that public housing (which amounts to a government monopoly over that sector of society and economy in south Chicago) was the cause of the anomie/ hopelessness/ dead-end attitudes of so many people he met and whom he tried to rouse from their slumbers. I mean, in his early '20s, in his first professional position, Mr. Obama came to see the negative consequences of a government monopoly. Why then does he envision an expansion of that monopoly into other sectors of our society and economy (auto production, health care, etc)?
name withheldTHANKS FOR THAT, IRAN
In 2005, you wrote "There has always been a slightly post-modern quality to sovereignty in the transnational age: We pretend the Syrian foreign minister is no different from the New Zealand foreign minister."
Well, since then, things have got even more surreal. At the UNHRC's periodic review of human rights in New Zealand, "Iran noted that New Zealand's human rights protection is fragile in the absence of a comprehensive constitutional document and that New Zealand is not fully consistent in incorporating international human rights standards in domestic laws."
Let me get this straight: Iran (181st in press freedom, "not free" according to Freedom House, UN HDI below China and Ukraine) gets to sit in judgment on human rights in New Zealand (9th in press freedom, top-ranking in civil and political liberties according to FH, UN HDI of 0.950)
Funny world we live in.
David
SAME-SEX PAIRS
Speaking of gay rights, will there be same-sex pair skating at the winter Olympics in Vancouver?
Maeve
RIGHT, SAID FRED
I write TheRexReport. As a fellow-laborer in the cause of saving our nation from the onslaught of secular progressive ideation, I admire the National Review. I was recently sent an email that contained your quote: "My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the history of the world. I hope you'll join with me as we try to change it." I gather that it is attributed to Barrack Obama. If so, this is the fodder that I live for.
A Brief explanation: I have a neighbor that owns three houses in my neighborhood. Last year he rented a machine to rooter the sewer line in one of the houses. Two hours later, as I was going to the store, he was at the house next to mine, and he told me that while "not stopped-up," he decided to use the rooter on that line as well. About an hour after that, I heard a loud machine running. His foolish attempt to "fix what wasn't broken" had rendered the rooter hopelessly caught in the sewer pipe, and the loud noise was a backhoe that he had rented. When I stopped him, he had dug across the property line -- through my 30 year old Holly hedges -- destroying one of them, and then boldly announced to me "John, I'm going to have to cut all these trees down to replace this line." My response was a stern "Nay neighbor!"
Let's review this: 1) he was "fixing" what wasn't broken 2) he got himself into a predictable mess 3) he decided that somehow, rather than taking the responsibility for his mistake (and buying the store a new rooter snake), that I somehow deserved to have my woods destroyed to cover his butt. 4) finally, in his Democrat liberal way of thinking, I was somehow the "bad guy in this story!
Now, doesn't this all sound just like the liberal mind? I have to agree with Michael Savage: "Liberalism is a mental disorder."
If you could please confirm that the Obama quote is correct, I would appreciate it. Snopes denies that it is real. Personally, I tend to believe that Obama would say something just this stupid. If you can point me in the right direction, and perhaps hook me up with the source, I would greatly appreciate it.
John Rex
JREX -- TheRexReport
Panama City Beach, Florida
MAILBOX EDITOR WRITES: For the origin of that quote, see factcheck.org. As Mark has explained, the quote originated with our regular correspondent John Gross.
CANADIAN-STYLE HEALTHCARE
Will sitting for hours in a doctor's waiting room be classified as "torture?"
Peggy Lindow
Houston, Texas
THE GIG IS UP
How long before the trial lawyers catch on that their malpractice gig is up?
William Pittman
WATCHING THE TIMES EXPIRE
Why wouldn't Murdoch just sit back?
With the WSJ and the Post in his pocket, he'd have anti-trust problems buying the times. Besides, wouldn't it be easier for him simply to destroy a highly leveraged absentee-owned times through competition than to make it work?
Mark Feldman
LAST WORD
Your comments as to who pays for everything is a sermon I have preached for years. Economics 101 tells us that the term for this "the point of incidence" It is the place in the market where all bills are paid. Corporations do not pay taxes, we do when we purchase their products. Any increase in taxes or minimum wage ultimately redounds back to the consumer. Thanks for doing all you do and for doing such a great job standing in for Rush.
Steve Hill
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