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On Medicare, Democrats Sound Like 1990s Republicans
Tweet Share on Facebook June 30, 2010 Comment (2)My word, how things have changed. Ryan McNeely, co-blogging with Matthew Yglesias, proudly brandishes a Center for American Progress memo detailing how the new healthcare law will save substantial taxpayer dollars by slowing the growth of Medicare.
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The Recession and the National Debt Are Separate Problems
Tweet Share on Facebook June 28, 2010 Comment (2)You have to feel sorry, if only a little, for the Obama administration and congressional Democrats right now. They’ve lost any and all ability they had after the 2008 election to frame debate about the economy.
And, rhetorically speaking, Republicans have successfully conflated short- and long-term considerations: Amid persistently high unemployment, the economy is taking scarcely perceptible baby steps toward recovery. And there is a large and growing national debt. In reality, these two phenomena have little to do with one another.
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Louis Armstrong, Not Michael Jackson, Broke the Pop Color Barrier
Tweet Share on Facebook June 24, 2010 Comment (7)If anyone was under the mistaken impression that I’m above rank self-promotion, here’s my review for The American Conservative of Terry Teachout’s wonderful biography, Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong, just now available to nonsubscribers.
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BP Spill Responsibility Highlights Republicans' Tea Party Problem
Tweet Share on Facebook June 17, 2010 Comment (37)By Scott Galupo, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Georgetown University’s Patrick Deneen has an excellent recap of a couple of recent symposia in Washington, D.C., on the Tea Party movement, populism, and what it all means for conservatism.
You should read the whole thing, but here are a couple of key points:
Strikingly, throughout the two-and-a-half hour discussion, it wasn’t suggested once that Tea Party populism might have a legitimate anti-corporate animus.
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The Changing Economy Means College Isn't for Everyone
Tweet Share on Facebook June 15, 2010 Comment (6)By Scott Galupo, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Let me commend to your reading attention two fine feature articles that are begging to be twinned—Hanna Rosin’s “End of Men” cover story for the Atlantic and a piece by the Washington Post’s Carol Morello on the apparent movement of college-educated males into skilled trades like plumbing and carpentry.
Rosin writes of a “role reversal” underway in American society, with the postindustrial economy rewarding “thinking and communicating” above “physical strength and stamina.”
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Business Background Not Needed to Fix National Problems
Tweet Share on Facebook June 9, 2010 Comment (5)By Scott Galupo, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Last night’s primary elections yielded few surprises. I’ll focus on the apparent allure of ex-CEOs in California--gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, who is challenging for the Senate seat Barbara Boxer currently occupies. Let’s throw probable GOP presidential contender Mitt Romney into our analysis, too.
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Why Tom Campbell Should Win the California Republican Senate Primary
Tweet Share on Facebook June 2, 2010 Comment (4)By Scott Galupo, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
As a traditionalist on social issues, I tire pretty quickly of the media’s—and much of official Washington’s—never-ending quest for more fiscal conservatives with moderate social views. As my friend Ramesh Ponnuru often notes, social conservatives, especially evangelicals, are the GOP’s most dependable bloc of fiscal conservatives. And so-called moderate Republicans, like the fading Arlen Specter once was, are as likely to cross party lines on spending, not just on abortion.
But in coastal states like Massachusetts (see Brown, Scott) and California, flexibility on life issues and marriage, as a practical matter, is hard to quibble with. So it’s a bit troubling to read Jim Carlton’s report in the Wall Street Journal detailing Republican Senate candidate (and former House member) Tom Campbell’s apparent stall in Tuesday’s primary against Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore. (The winner gets to face Sen. Barbara Boxer in November.)
