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Obama's Libya Speech Put the Best Possible Face on His Policy
Tweet Share on Facebook March 29, 2011 Comment (9)The Nobel Peace Prize winner came face to face with the nation to justify a third war in a short span of time for the United States—this one in Libya.
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Walker, Scott and Christie Steal from the Future on Infrastructure
Tweet Share on Facebook March 22, 2011 Comment (23)My grandfather lived to be 99. He played ragtime on the piano every night and grew a magical raspberry patch in summer. He spent his days working on the highways in Wisconsin for 40 years, starting in the Depressed 1930s as a draftsman. Later came the glory days of the national building boom during the Eisenhower era. My grandfather took pictures of the projects for slide shows, oh, so neatly organized. Some cityfolk in the family thought his devotion to making roads quaint. As my grandmother Eleanor said of her husband Stratton at lunch out in the yard one day: "Strat believes in highways."
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Wisconsin Battle With Gov. Scott Walker Should Spur Democrats
Tweet Share on Facebook March 15, 2011 Comment (27)The "Wisconsin 14" state senators who left the state to save it from a new governor are all profiles in courage. Even though they lost, they gave us pause and cause to reflect on the state of our political souls.
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GOP Freshman Could Force a Government Shutdown
Tweet Share on Facebook March 8, 2011 Comment (10)What would you do if 87 troublemakers came to your town and tried to shut it down?
Think of Washington as "Our Town," my fellow Americans, because it is just that. The federal city, which George Washington himself surveyed on horseback, belongs to all of us. The federal government is "our friend" to the people, not just because it sends out Social Security checks. (Thanks, Franklin Delano Roosevelt!) It delivers our mail, enforces laws of the land, houses millions of books in the Library of Congress, including Thomas Jefferson's collection, protects our food, drugs, air, water, and parklands. It investigates crimes, conducts scientific and medical research, keeps a standing military, directs air traffic, watches over elegant art museums free and open to the public, and regulates the airwaves. Sound good?
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Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, the Mad City Machiavelli
Tweet Share on Facebook March 1, 2011 Comment (36)Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker never graduated from college, though the University of Wisconsin is one of the finest public universities in the land. (Thanks, President Lincoln!)
Walker fancies himself a second coming of President Ronald Reagan--okay, without the charm, looks or political finesse--although he just took office in January as a Republican in a state soaked in progressive history and politics. (Thanks, Sens. Robert La Follette and Russ Feingold!)
Before he dropped out of college, Walker must have read Niccolo Machiavelli's classic Renaissance power tract, The Prince. Give the governor this: he's a formidable opponent, thanks to a grandiose sense of purpose. In a few winter weeks, Walker revealed himself to be a ruthless, calculating and mean-spirited man in a corner hideaway of Madison's state capitol, which has jammed with thousands of protestors inside the rotunda and out there on the square.
