The French Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defense and the Armed Forces recently released a report called “Ballistic Missile Defense: Military Shield or Strategic Challenge?” This report urges France to take a strong role in the NATO missile defense program and to develop a space-based (exoatmospheric) ballistic missile defense interceptor. This would be a great step in the right direction for NATO and the French defense industry—one the United States should learn from. Space-based interceptors present the best option for a boost-phase missile defense. In the boost phase, ballistic missiles …
This week, President Obama celebrates both a birthday and (maybe) a budget deal. The second looks to hardly to be a cause for celebration. Obama has worked hard to ensure a deal that leaves open the prospects for deep defense cuts. As the debate has progressed, the President’s antipathy toward national security has become more and more apparent. At the height of the debate, Obama appeared all too anxious to abandon the constitutional responsibilities to “provide for the common defense” in favor of protecting food stamps and education spending from …
Advocates of Obamacare often point to Great Britain’s National Health Service as an example of a national health care system that works. But all is not rosy across the pond, as England is beginning to ration treatments for “non-urgent” conditions such as hip replacements, cataract surgery and tonsil removal in order to save money for the National Health Service. Unfortunately, under current law, Obamacare could lead to a health care system similarly plagued by long waits and reduced access to services.
This week the State Department has placed some 64 Russian officials on a visa blacklist that would prevent them from entering the United States. These Russian prosecutors and policemen all played a role in the death of the lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, the most famous whistleblower in post–communist Russian history. While the Foreign Ministry in Moscow loudly protested that the U.S. is being tough on Russia, the imposition of sanctions looks more like the State Department’s pre-emptive way to prevent the Senate’s Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability Act of 2011 …
Put the security of the nation at risk or raise taxes. This is the sour “deal” liberal lawmakers are offering in exchange for insufficient spending cuts, according to reports of this weekend’s debt negotiations in Washington. The framework that Republicans and Democrats are close to approving would raise the debt limit by at least $2.1 trillion and get Obama and congressional Democrats past their target date: Election Day 2012. In return for this generous political cover, Democrats would agree to a modest $1 trillion in supposed cuts spread out over …
Lawmakers in both houses of Congress are moving quickly to vote on the latest debt-limit deal — a plan agreed to Sunday night by President Obama and congressional leaders. Republicans and Democrats negotiating the agreement hailed it last night, but conservatives are less than impressed by the plan. Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), our guest on this weekend’s Scribecast, has even threatened a filibuster. The deal hikes the debt ceiling by $2 trillion while cutting spending at an insufficient level. The plan also features a so-called “super committee” that has the …
The White House and Congressional leaders announced yesterday that they had reached a deal to raise the debt ceiling and have released the details of that deal to the public. The major action in both the House of Representatives and the Senate this week will be the passage of the negotiated debt ceiling deal. Other action in the House this week include a hearing by the House Ways and Means Subcommittee on Select Revenue Measures on “Energy Tax Policy and Tax Overhaul.”
