The Opinion Blog

Let's have a show of hands on who's married (not you, guys)

Ripped from the wires ... Here's a 10th amendment conundrum for y'all to chew on. Gary Gates notes that the Census Bureau won't be tallying same-sex marriages in California, Massachusetts and New York because, in the bureau's view, federal law trumps state's rights:

By Gary J. Gates

When same-sex couples wed in California and Massachusetts, they do so believing that their marriage licenses mean that their relationships finally count in the eyes of the state. Unfortunately, they won't count in the eyes of the U.S. Census Bureau.

POINT: Planet will suffer unless U.S. acts

Ripped from the wires ... Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair explains why Americans must embrace and attack global warming:

By Tony Blair

The climate change bill that senators are to begin debating next week is a hugely important signal of intent on behalf of U.S. legislators. Yes, negotiations could still alter the legislation. But the bill's core proposition is correct: Unless the United States radically reduces its greenhouse gas emissions, along with other major emitters, the damage to the climate will be irreversible.

Radical reduction is unlikely to happen through voluntary action alone. Measures in the bill, through a mandatory cap-and-trade scheme, would reduce emissions 70 percent from 2005 levels by 2050. These cuts would be based on a carbon market incentive system that moves with the grain of action around the globe.

COUNTERPOINT: Global warmists talk through their hats

Ripped from the wires ... Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer shows how the "Church of the Environment" promulgates its faulty global-warming dogma:

By CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER

I'm not a global warming believer. I'm not a global warming denier. I'm a global warming agnostic who believes instinctively that it can't be very good to pump lots of CO2 into the atmosphere, but is equally convinced that those who presume to know exactly where that leads are talking through their hats.

Predictions of catastrophe depend on models. Models depend on assumptions about complex planetary systems -- from ocean currents to cloud formation -- that no one fully understands. Which is why the models are inherently flawed and forever changing. The doomsday scenarios posit a cascade of events, each with a certain probability. The multiple improbability of their simultaneous occurrence renders all such predictions entirely speculative.

Ron Paul revolution transcends 'normal' politics

For Daniel C.

Friends:

While perusing the New York Times style section yesterday, I can across an interesting piece on the continuing Ron Paul revolution, on which our friend Daniel Cochran has been keeping us informed. Because the piece was written by a lifestyle reporter rather than a political reporter or pundit, it has an especially poignant and friendly feel. Check it out. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Cheers, dc

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/25/fashion/25ronpaul.html?_r=1&ref=style&oref=slogin

Comments?

We owe our national politicians bigger salaries

Ripped from the wires ... Leonard Pitts Jr. explains why George W. Bush and members of Congress should receive fat pay raises.

By Leonard Pitts Jr.

I think George W. Bush deserves a raise.

You're waiting for the punchline, I know. You're figuring with a setup like that, about a president whose popularity lives down where moles and earthworms do, the payoff's got to be a doozy.

Sorry, but there is no punchline because that wasn't a setup. I think the president should get a raise. Congress, too. And yes, I know Congress' approval ratings are similarly subterranean.

But see, the argument I'm making has nothing to do with this individual president or Congress. It is, rather, about us, about what we want and deserve in our leadership. Here's the short version:

You get what you pay for.

Uh oh: McCain joins global warming cult

Ripped from the wires ... Cal Thomas takes issue with John McCain's recent declaration that humans are influencing climate change and must help fix the problem:

By CAL THOMAS

In an effort to win over those "moderates'' who believe that global warming is about to destroy the planet, Republican presidential candidate John McCain spoke Monday at a Portland, Ore., training facility for Vestas Wind Technology. He claimed, "The facts of global warming demand our urgent attention, especially in Washington.''

There certainly is more "hot air'' on this and a lot of other subjects in Washington, but that isn't what he meant. The era of big government is so not over, as Bill Clinton claimed it was in 1996. It is just beginning and increasingly the political contests seem to be about who will manage its growth, not who will reduce its size, cost and reach.

Past time to repay our troops' courage, sacrifice

Ripped from the wires ... In an editorial Tuesday, the Miami Herald called for a more generous GI Bill of Rights:

In 1940, during the Battle of Britain, Prime Minister Winston Churchill celebrated the daring crews of the Royal Air Force with stirring words: "Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.'' Today, something similar could be said about the men and women wearing the uniform of the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan. Never have so few U.S. soldiers been asked to sacrifice so much while so little was asked of the rest of us.

Wasn't England was supposed to gone by now?

Ripped from the wires ... Columnist-economist Walter Williams explains why it's a bad idea to ground public policy in "scientific" environmental predictions.

BY WALTER E. WILLIAMS

Now that another Earth Day has come and gone, let's look at some environmentalist predictions that they would prefer we forget.

At the first Earth Day celebration, in 1969, environmentalist Nigel Calder warned, "The threat of a new ice age must now stand alongside nuclear war as a likely source of wholesale death and misery for mankind.'' C.C. Wallen of the World Meteorological Organization said, "The cooling since 1940 has been large enough and consistent enough that it will not soon be reversed.''

Government crackdowns beget heroic smugglers

This one's for Richard ...

Ripped from the wires ... In a piece slated for publication in the newspaper Wednesday, columnist Walter Williams explains the curious economics of confiscatory taxes on items such as -- you guessed it -- cigarettes

BY WALTER E. WILLIAMS

While it's politically popular to impose confiscatory taxes on America's 40 million tobacco smokers, there are a number of consequences one might consider, but let's start out with a quiz. If a carton of cigarettes sells for $160 in New York City, and $35 in North Carolina, what do you predict will happen? If you answered tons of cigarettes will be going up I-95 from North Carolina to New York City, go to the head of the class.

Stealing from illegals no big deal in tomato country

Ripped from the wires ... Here's a piece, by Robyn Blumner of the St. Petersburg Times, that illustrates perfectly the tragedy and cynicism of illegal immigration -- the ease with which Florida tomato growers exploit illegal workers, and the passivity with which workers accept their exploitation.

By Robyn Blumner

IMMOKALEE, Fla. -- It is hard to believe that this is America in 2008. It seems more like Upton Sinclair's turn of the century Chicago stockyards or Edward R. Murrow's "Harvest of Shame'' of 1960. But it is today that the tomato pickers of Immokalee, Fla., toil under oppressive, retrograde conditions.