Overview for FF Spotlight

The Math on Social Security Doesn't Add Up

Social Security politics is like malaria—it never really leaves the body politic and it flares up without warning. Thus, the absolutely unsurprising “ revelation ” in the Washington Post that demographics and economics have combined to begin the inevitable drain of the “surpluses” in the …

Written by Steve Bell on Monday October 31, 2011

Malcolm Wallop RIP

In the inimitable style of the British obituary, the Daily Telegraph remembers Malcolm Wallop, who represented Wyoming in the US Senate from 1977 through 1995: [Wallop] was born on February 27 1933 in New York City, son of Oliver Wallop, the younger son of the 8th Earl of Portsmouth – …

Written by David Frum on Sunday October 30, 2011

Europe's Debt Solution is Forced Unification

In my column for the National Post I discuss how the solution to the European debt crisis is going to force a closer union between member states: If the euro is not to bust up, it must be saved. Friday morning, The Globe & Mail reproduced on its front page one plan to save the euro. …

Written by David Frum on Saturday October 29, 2011

More Corporate Speech, Less Rancor

I couldn't agree more with Joe Trotter's points about corporate speech . (For a variety of other reasons, I think that we should not tax corporations either.) I'd actually go a step further: more corporate speech would be good for the political tone of the country. Contrary to the claims of …

Written by Eli Lehrer on Friday October 28, 2011

An Idea For Republicans

In the 1990s, many Republicans took the problem of hard-core poverty seriously. (One of those poverty-conscious Republicans was Sen. Rick Santorum, now the one presidential candidate who takes seriously the data on faltering upward mobility in America.) In 1999 and 2000, candidate George W. …

Written by David Frum on Friday October 28, 2011

How Pepsi Won the Cola Wars in Russia

Pepsi’s love affair with Russia dates way back to the early days of the cold war. It all started with Nikita Khrushchev taking a harmless sip of the drink at an American trade exhibition in Moscow in 1959. Donald M. Kendall, himself Former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of PepsiCo recalls …

Written by Robin Tim Weis on Friday October 28, 2011

After Gaddafi's Rule, Libya Gets Sharia Law

If George Bush's adventures ended up handing Iraq on a silver platter to America's enemies in Iran, President Obama's softer and gentler imperialism has been the catalyst that stands to deliver North Africa into the hands of the anti-American Muslim Brotherhood. Dumb and Dumber could hardly ask …

Written by Tarek Fatah on Friday October 28, 2011

Don't Praise the Greek Debt Deal

Whether today’s announcement that holders of Greek sovereign debt have agreed in principle to a 50% haircut on the face value of the instruments raises some critical questions. On the surface, with the notion of first-loss guarantees of new debt taking shape, this addresses the problem of …

Written by Jeff Cimbalo on Thursday October 27, 2011

Perry's Plan: Politics not Policy

In my column for The Week I explain that Rick Perry's tax plan is designed to appeal to voters in the Republican primary, not to policy wonks who care about whether or not the plan makes economic sense: The wonks point out that (as conventionally scored) Perry's tax plan would blow a giant …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday October 26, 2011

Where Are the Anti-Semites at Occupy Wall Street?

Back in late 2009, when many still believed that Sarah Palin was the future of American politics, left-wing filmmakers Chase Whiteside and Erick Stoll took their camera to a Borders book store in Columbus, Ohio, where the former Alaska governor was signing copies of her book Going Rogue . …

Written by Jonathan Kay on Wednesday October 26, 2011

To Achieve Social Peace, Overturn Roe

David has made what I think is an interesting analogy about abortion but I think follows the wrong path. He has taken lumps on comparing drink to feticide but the main point needs to be addressed, is abortion comparable to drink or to slavery? David says we won’t have a war over abortion …

Written by John Vecchione on Tuesday October 25, 2011

There is Nothing Simple About Perry's Tax Plan

Rick Perry's proposal to make his flat-rate tax plan optional seems like a political master-stroke: it lets him propose the type of flat-rate, broad-based tax plan that most economists like while simultaneously promising that nobody will need to pay more. Nice as this sounds, however, it …

Written by Eli Lehrer on Tuesday October 25, 2011

Bumbling Joe

"When he rises to speak, he does not know what he will say. As he speaks, he does not know what he is saying. When he sits down again, he does not know what he has said." That old House of Commons joke about a certain kind of garrulous parliamentarian applies to America's own Joe Biden. CNN …

Written by David Frum on Tuesday October 25, 2011

A Future for the Pro-Life Movement

Matthew Schmitz of First Things registers a complaint by Twitter about my CNN column hoping that the abortion controversy may someday be de-escalated: "It is chilling that @davidfrum doesn't have a spare second to consider the morality of abortion. Politics trumps all." For the …

Written by David Frum on Monday October 24, 2011

Mob Rule Comes to Libya

If there was any doubt in my mind that the so-called Arab Spring was nothing more than a backdrop to a long winter freeze, that doubt was set aside by the gory scenes of the death of Col. Gaddafi, played again and again on TV networks. The mad dog of the Middle East was dead, but not before he was …

Written by Tarek Fatah on Monday October 24, 2011

A Clownish Killer

It is perhaps a shame that no one will have a chance to interrogate Gaddafi and find out the details of his regime’s involvement in crimes like the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103, the equally appalling but less cited bringing down of UTA Flight 772 in 1989, the bombing of the Berlin discothèq…

Written by Jonathan Foreman on Friday October 21, 2011

More Problems With Ron Paul's Budget

Kenneth Silber is right to criticize Ron Paul’s proposal to abolish five federal agencies. That said, the specific example he picks, weather satellites, is, to me, only modestly compelling. Private companies are already involved in both the satellite launch business and the weather …

Written by Eli Lehrer on Friday October 21, 2011

Perry's New Gambit

Perry’s chances of winning the Republican nomination depend entirely on his ability to sell himself as a Teastablishment candidate. Perry has a ten-year record in Texas that shows an interest in governance, and he has way with sharp rhetoric (“treason”) that sends thrills up the leg of your …

Written by Zac Morgan on Friday October 21, 2011

Mitt Romney: Constitutionalist

On the Las Vegas stage, Anderson Cooper asked the candidates about the role of faith generally and then specifically to the disparaging comments about Romney's Mormonism by the pastor who introduced Rick Perry at the Values Voters Summit. Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich used the opportunity to …

Written by David Frum on Wednesday October 19, 2011

They Wouldn't Occupy if They Had the Votes

If the Occupy Wall Street protestors represent ‘the 99%’ then why don’t they already dominate our government? Regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum, the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street protests should create some concern. These are not the products of healthy politics. …

Written by Chris Ladd on Tuesday October 18, 2011