The Romney tax ‘plan’ and election strategy

During the campaign and the debates, whenever the Romney-Ryan camp has been repeatedly told that there is no way that they can find ways to balance the budget if they give an across-the-board cut in the marginal tax rates by 20%, unless they raise taxes on the middle class in other ways, such as eliminating the deductions that benefit that group more. They have countered that six studies have shown that it can be done. [Read more…]

The menace of Sesame Street

The Obama administration has had shifting explanations for the attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya that resulted in the death of US diplomats. After initially claiming that it was the result of spontaneous anger over the Innocence of Muslims film, it then said that it was a planned attack by al Qaeda that used a demonstration generated by that anger as a cover. It now appears that there was no demonstration at all. [Read more…]

Conservatives losing the fight on same-sex marriage

The notable silence by the Republicans on the issue of same-sex marriage during the current election campaign is a sign, if one needed one, of how rapidly sentiment has shifted on this issue. In 2004 opposition to this was very potent and was used to galvanize voters to go to the polls and vote for George W. Bush. Daniel McCarthy argues in The American Conservative that it is one more sign of the retreat of religion in the face of modernity. [Read more…]

Religious barbarians

Taliban gunmen in Pakistan shot a 14-year old girl Malala Yousafzai in the head and neck. Her offense? They claimed that she had ‘promoted secularism’ on the blog or diary she wrote for the BBC starting in 2009 when she was just 11. But all she was doing was chronicling the anxiety and tensions of a child living in a danger zone. She had written under a pen name but her identity was exposed. [Read more…]