Tuesday’s deadline for retailers to dispose of any unsold cribs has come and gone, but won’t soon be forgotten. Americans are speaking out about the unintended consequences of the government’s regulatory efforts. Commissioner Anne Northup of the Consumer Product Safety Commission posted reactions on her blog. Northup and Nancy Nord, a fellow Republican commissioner, sought to extend Tuesday’s deadline when they learned more than 100,000 cribs would need to be trashed. None of the cribs have been deemed unsafe or a hazard to children. Despite their pleas, the CPSC’s three …
We celebrate America’s birth on July 4. Why? It was July 2 that the Continental Congress resolved, “That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.” Shouldn’t that day, as John Adams predicted, “be the most memorable epoch in the history of America”? No. On July 2 we effected our political separation. On July 4 we declared to the world the principles our nation is built upon – a creed that applies to all men and all times. Happy Independence Day! Thomas Sanford is …
The signing of the Declaration of Independence was a glorious day for our country’s history. With a stroke of a pen, our founders sealed an enduring document representing the triumph of liberty over tyranny. And yet, centuries after this, one of the most important events in our country’s history, it’s easy to gloss over the Fourth of July as just another holiday. To appreciate why our independence from the British crown is not only a cause worth celebrating, but also defending, we must remember what our founding fathers fought and …
It’s hard to forget former National Education Association (NEA) General Counsel Bob Chanin’s farewell address during the 2009 NEA national convention. “It is not because we care about children; and it is not because we have a vision of a great public school for every child,” Chanin boasted. “The NEA and its affiliates are effective advocates because we have power.” To kick off this year’s conference, the NEA had several plenary sessions from Monday through Wednesday in advance of the main convention. The sessions were designed to “explore actions that …
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) recently sent a letter to the United Nations and the International Criminal Court enjoining them to initiate an investigation of NATO and its military commanders for potential war crimes related to civilian deaths in Afghanistan and Libya. Kucinich concluded his exhortation: “NATO has repeatedly and wantonly neglected to follow [international] law. The United Nations…has no choice but to conduct an independent investigation of actions taken by NATO and to pursue prosecution where warranted.” The Representative from Ohio is misguided in his estimation that American commanders should subject …
Catching you up on clips, commentary and news of the day. Sign up for the daily email update from Scribe. It Won’t Be Pretty, as the Post-Gates Era Begins at the Defense Department – Jim Carafano Coolidge only president born on the Fourth of July – Julia Shaw U.N. Budget Cuts: Why Not Eliminate the Conference on Disarmament? – Brett Schaefer The Election Deal – Murray T. Bass Here’s a debt reduction plan: Collect billions from tax cheats – Tony Pugh Reax To Appellate Decision Upholding Health Law – Andrew Villegas …
As the White House and Congress continue to work toward a debt-ceiling deal, it appears that opposition to defense cuts is dwindling, even among House Republicans. The Hill reported Thursday that “As few as 30 House Republicans would likely consider voting against a debt-ceiling deal that cuts $300 billion from security spending, according to a GOP aide.” In today’s Wall Street Journal, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld warns that making those cuts would be “a grievous mistake”: With no immediate outward signs of negligence, the political penalties for cutting weapons systems and …
A new chart from Heritage FamilyFacts.org bears good news: Recent marriages are lasting longer. This is great for happily committed couples, and it also represents a boon for civil society because of the social and economic benefits marriage provides. Commitment to marriage steadily declined from 1960 to the early 1980s, but as the chart highlights, this pattern is starting to reverse. Nearly 75 percent of the women who married for the first time in the early 1990s reached their 10th wedding anniversaries. This is a three-percentage-point increase compared to women …
For some partisans—especially those who believe in the “living Constitution”—the Constitution sanctions all they favor and forbids all they oppose. So it is with the debate over the debt limit. All of a sudden, politicians who have never cared much for constitutional fidelity are citing a little-known section of the Fourteenth Amendment as grounds for President Obama to evade the congressionally-imposed debt ceiling. Their goal is to punt on spending reductions that would be part of any debt-ceiling deal and are essential to putting the budget in order. No surprise, …
The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health recently held a hearing to review how Obamacare regulations will affect employers’ ability to maintain health coverage. To illustrate the magnitude of the new regulatory burdens on businesses, subcommittee chairman Joe Pitts (R–PA) displayed a stack of over 3,500 pages of Obamacare rules, notices, and regulatory guidance issued so far by the Administration. This additional burden, the hearing highlighted, will harm employers’ ability to offer health coverage and disrupt coverage for Americans across the country. Among the new regulations are “minimum loss …
