The racist eye doctor debates

Last updated on: April 3, 2004 at 4:49 am By Fred Clark

I missed this Philadelphia Inquirer account of the GOP primary debate for the 13th Congressional District race. One of the candidates in this debate is Melissa Brown, an opthalmologist from Flourtown, Pa., whose losing bid for the 13th seat in 2002 is often delicately referred to as "controversial." All three candidates for the Republican nomination favor reforming and curtailing the Section 8 program that provides low-income families with housing assistance. Yet, despite this broad agreement, the debate on this issue... Read more

Fallujah

Last updated on: April 2, 2004 at 1:23 pm By Fred Clark

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It's taken me two days to post anything about the horrific killing of five U.S. military soldiers and four U.S. paramilitary contractors Wednesday in Fallujah, Iraq. It was a horror show, and I think Paul Bremer and Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said mostly the right things yesterday. Particularly Kimmitt's pledge that the U.S. response would be "deliberate … precise … and overwhelming." ("Precise" here seems to mean "discriminating." Officers really do know their jus in bello criteria.) Here's the exact... Read more

Requiring work requires child care

Last updated on: April 1, 2004 at 1:11 pm By Fred Clark

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The Senate voted yesterday — 78 to 20 — to add more than $1 billion a year over the next five years to funding for child care for TANF recipients. That overwhelming vote in the Republican-controlled Senate in the face of opposition from a Republican White House justifies the headline of yesterday's report by Robert Pear in The New York Times: "Defying Bush, Senate Increases Child Care Funds for the Poor." The Bush administration objected to the increase in child... Read more

The Credibility Gap

Last updated on: April 1, 2004 at 10:40 am By Fred Clark

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Knight-Ridder's Ron Hutcheson talks with a series of observers inside and outside the Bush White House who support the argument I offered below in the post "Blair & Bush: The Difference": Accounts from insiders in the Bush White House describe a tightly controlled, top-down organization that pushes a predetermined agenda, shuns dissenting views and discourages open debate. Tell-all books from former Bush counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke and former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill, as well as accounts from other administration insiders,... Read more

L.B.: Buck deplanes

Last updated on: April 24, 2015 at 3:03 pm By Fred Clark

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Left Behind, pp. 41-43 While we the readers were busy turning the page to the beginning of Chapter 3, Rayford Steele was making a risky and precarious landing on the narrow, smoke-filled runways of Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. I’m sure it was terribly exciting, but LaHaye and Jenkins felt it was best not to let us read about it. As Chapter 3 begins, they pick up where they left off — with an exciting discussion of airport logistics: Hattie Durham and... Read more

Rights & responsibilities

Last updated on: March 31, 2004 at 3:57 am By Fred Clark

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In comments to the post below, Mark brings up this particular scripture passage as one of his favorites: For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: "If a man will not work, he shall not eat." (2 Thessalonians 3:10) Mark suggests that this verse seems to him to rule out "welfare." I'm not sure why. Mark doesn't say, specifically, what he means by "welfare." Clearly he's not referring to assistance programs like unemployment insurance, since to... Read more

Faith & Works

Last updated on: March 30, 2004 at 4:35 pm By Fred Clark

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Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said Kerry's comment "was beyond the bounds of acceptable discourse and a sad exploitation of Scripture for a political attack." That's from this article, "Bush Campaign Blasts Kerry's Bible Quote." Here's what Democratic candidate John Kerry said: "The Scriptures say, what does it profit, my brother, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? … When we look at what is happening in America today, where are the works of compassion?" The... Read more

You might be …

Last updated on: March 30, 2004 at 3:20 pm By Fred Clark

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Following up on this earlier post I should note that the sallow-eyed David Brooks can also be a witty and engaging writer. Today's column, which offers advice to high school seniors as they go through the process of applying for college, is a good example: You are being judged according to criteria that you would never use to judge another person and which will never again be applied to you once you leave higher ed. For example, colleges are taking... Read more

Testify!

Last updated on: March 30, 2004 at 10:12 am By Fred Clark

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National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice will be allowed to testify in public under oath before the commission investigating the failure to prevent the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, an administration official said Tuesday. The official said the decision is conditioned on the Bush administration receiving assurances in writing from the commission that such a step does not set a precedent, said the official speaking on condition of anonymity. It appeared the administration already had such assurances verbally in private and is... Read more

Alistair Cooke (1908-2004)

Last updated on: March 30, 2004 at 9:49 am By Fred Clark

Sad to read this morning of the death of Alistair Cooke (see this earlier post). Cooke's was a long and fascinating life. A keen observer of America, he reported on 12 presidents: … his favorite was Franklin D. Roosevelt. He also respected Lyndon B. Johnson ("An appalling man, but a great president"). His political outlook was probably best reflected by Stevenson. In "Six Men," he compared him to "that estimable order of Americans — Henry Clay, Robert E. Lee, Norman... Read more