Friends, I thought I would share this OpEd I wrote for the Kansas City Star, the home paper of incoming National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman and Kansas Senator Jerry Moran. Read it, and tell me your thoughts in the comments. How the GOP can avoid the next Todd Akin By Chris Chocola November 21st, 2012 http://voices.kansascity.com/entries/how-gop-can-avoid-next-todd-akin/ As Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran takes the reins of | Read More »
I said earlier this week that I wouldn’t comment on the RSC’s pulling of the copyright paper until I studied it. Well, I studied it, and they were wrong to pull it. Of course, for saying that, I’m being called some radical opposing the free market.
Meanwhile I’m getting called an ignorant tool of the big media companies because I oppose further market meddling in the form of IRFA.
It’s rare that a bill rises in awareness quickly but then dies hard. But by the time I’d even heard about the new Patrick Leahy power grab, this time spying on emails allegedly, he’s already given up on it. Score one for small government, at least.
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Marco Rubio is getting beaten up by the press for not decisively and convincingly saying he thinks the world is billions of years old. The press gave Barack Obama a pass for largely the same answer. This issue has become the new litmus test in the media for conservative politicians. Believing what was believed to be literally true for a few thousand years is now | Read More »
Unless some yet-to-be named conglomerate steps in to buy the bankrupt banker, along with its liabilities–or Barack Obama nationalizes the Twinkie industry–it looks like this is the end for Hostess and 18,500 mostly-union jobs.
Read More »If she was a guy, I’d be calling said complaints “impotent.” [snip of all the reasons why Susan Estrich reflexively - and, alas, stereotypically - voted for Barack Obama] I did not vote for Obama because I think I am paying too little in taxes. While I think that it’s adorable that Susan Estrich thinks that Barack Obama cares about why anybody did or did | Read More »
We mourn the loss of life and pray for the missing worker. We wish the injured a speedy recovery. I am dismayed by a new development: U.S. board issues subpoena on offshore platform blast (Reuters) – A U.S. industrial accident investigative board served Black Elk Energy with a subpoena on Monday, seeking information about last week’s offshore Gulf of Mexico oil platform explosion that left | Read More »
Ah, the 1950’s – a quaint decade of peace and prosperity. We compare it the 60’s, and mourn our nation’s lost hygiene, oops I mean innocence. Ok, so maybe that sort of nostalgia is overblown and a wee tad derogatory. Yet Dwight Eisenhower warned us of America turning into Amerika and we just didn’t get it. So Paul Krugman rides again to sell us his typically origami* version of economic events.
Read More »For those of us who thought that John Boehner was weak and flaccid in the face of adversity, we might consider rethinking our estimation of him. The Hill has a very informative article out today detailing all of Boehner’s recent power grabs and scorched-earth maneuvering in order to crush conservative opposition in the House. After locking up the top three leadership spots for himself, Cantor, | Read More »
The Republican Study Committee backed off on copyright reform after publishing what was an important paper on the topic. The excuse is that the paper needed further review, but what I fear is that the paper actually went further than rent-seeking allies of squishy centrist Republicans are willing to go. I have no evidence to sustain this. It’s just my gut feeling. The paper went out, industry groups had to have seen it, given all the attention it got. Over the weekend they complained, and down the paper went on Monday.
I have a copy of the paper, and if we go point by point, it’s hard to find a real reason to oppose it though. So if there is another reason, I’d love to hear it.
Read More »On today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, Brad Jackson and Ben Domenech are joined by Patrick Ruffini to discuss the GOP’s failures in the technology sphere during this last election, why Obama’s in-house big data brain trust gave him an advantage, and how the GOP can rebound by 2016.
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The hand wringing continues about the 2012 loss. This time it has moved to “conservative media.” Included in the Buzzfeed article is this: John Podhoretz, the editor of Commentary and a prolific tweeter, rejected the notion that Obama’s reelection represented a failure of the conservative media. But he said that as the GOP tries to widen its tent in the coming months and years, conservative | Read More »
Every person who talks and writes about politics gets stuff wrong. I’ve gotten my fair share wrong. But what I think I got most wrong in Campaign 2012 was the damage Mitt Romney’s “47%” remark would do to him. It may seem obvious, but bear with me. Mitt Romney was talking off the cuff to a supposedly off the record group of donors and muddled | Read More »
So you may have heard that the Republican Study Committee pulled the copyright piece I spoke highly of over the weekend. I don’t have anything to say about this just yet. I’m going to reexamine the piece, to see if it had issues I didn’t notice in my quick read over the weekend. I’m also going to try to figure out just what’s happened. Then I’ll have more to say.
Copyright is ramping up, though. Darrell Issa is getting frisky against DMCA, and is going to push legislation. I don’t know if I support such a bill. The DMCA has issues, but for the most part it was a solid compromise that has served us well. It must not be changed lightly.
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[UPDATE]: Welcome to the wonderful world of ‘unsexy races are harder to track.’ Apparently the NH House and ME Senate race results haven’t yet been fully certified yet, which is why the AP is saying one thing and Ballotpedia is saying another. Looking it over, I’d say that the maps should be changed to NH and ME being made blue on both… which does not | Read More »
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