Chile's Cautionary Lesson for the US

Mary Anastasia O'Grady writes about communist stirrings in prosperous Chile, the poster child for Chicago-style liberalism.  That's university-of-Chicago style, not Mayor-Daly-like-Chicago style.

Chile's Presdident, Sebastian Pinera (pictured above), is channeling his inner compassionate conservative much to his country's detriment.  He saps the nation's moral and material resources while failing to placate his insatiable critics.

Mambo Gallego

Pictured above are Armand Assante, Antonio Banderas, and Desi Arnaz, Jr. from the 1992 film "The Mambo Kings."  I loved the movie for its music, scenes of the Palladium, fine acting, tortured love triangle and sheer stylishness, but had to fast forward through too many pointless skin scenes to recommend it.

It nevertheless features my favorite movie dance.  Set to Tito Puente's "Mambo Gallego" (Galician Mambo) it is sultry without being trashy, and dynamic without being flashy.

Impressions of Miami

Years ago, I thought I'd discovered paradise on earth in Locarno and Lugano, Switzerland, which enjoyed the benefits of Italian culture and Swiss efficiency.  Beautiful people rode trains that ran on time.

I experienced something similar last week in Miami, which is considered the capitol of Latin America.  Happily, it is in the United States where things mostly work correctly, and opportunity (traditionally) abounds.

In Praise of Statism

You'll never here it from me.  I fall on the liberty side of the private-public divide--the private side, which includes civil society to care for those who fall through the cracks through misfortune, injudicious use of liberty or any other reason.

The title is merely a pretext for sharing an amusing video that's gone viral.  It is a Reagan-Obama encounter that teaches a lesson delivered often, but evidently never enough.

Faust Visits the Insurance Lobby

Insurers are concerned that the Supreme Court will strike down ObamaCare's individual mandate, which provides them with a steady new supply of mandated and subsidized customers.  Without it, ObamaCare gives them less than they bargained for: new rules to comply with, profit caps and price controls with no corresponding advantage.

Those who place more trust in free markets than in government omniscience, and who despise crony capitalism for the self-serving hypocrisy it is, can be forgiven for thinking that it serves them right.

Obama's Campaign Will Take the Low Road

Karl Rove underscores one of President Obama's least attractive features, one which explains why he so roils the nation's anger, provokes its consternation and deepens its divides.  The multitudes who find his unprecedented push towards Statism and government hegemony objectionable, and moreover who don't want to pay taxes or interest on burgeoning debt to support it, oppose his aggressive overreaching because....  they intend evil.

Demolishing Paul Ryan

Daniel Henninger writes about the Left's warning to any who might challenge its ideological fortress, e.g., the Supreme Court, should it overturn ObamaCare.  Other shots are presently being fired across House GOP Budget Chairman Paul Ryan's bow.

You may have heard of his cruelty and black heart.  He's the one that Democrats and the President accuse (this week) of social Darwinism, Trojan-horse deception and historical anachronism.

Mr. Ryan justifies the GOP's proposed budget--which increases this year's federal outlays of $3.6 trillion (yes, you read that correctly) to a mere $4.9 trillion in 2022 rather than the President's proposed $5.8 trillion (yes, you read that correctly, too)--on rather different grounds than the President alleges: Catholic Social Doctrine.

Mother of Five Boys Has Never Worked A Day In Her Life!

“Guess what, (Romney’s) wife has actually never worked a day in her life," said Democratic strategist and CNN contributor Hilary Rosen.  Thankfully, she has experienced fierce blowback from all quarters including President Obama, and has since apologized.

As the clip below illustrates, Rosen was in the middle of deprecating Ann Romney's bona fides as a woman in touch with the economic concerns of less wealthy women. What she revealed is that Democratic Party apparatchiks don't consider child-raising and home-making real work.

The Exploitation of Trayvon Martin

Shelby Steele wades into the Trayvon Martin quagmire to opine that agitators for justice--vigilante, if not kangaroo--are appealing to poetic truth, a deviation from actual truth.

Rather than correspond to reality, poetic truth is crafted to preserve an effect.  The poetic truth at stake is that white America is ferociously bigoted.