Featured Articles — July 11, 2009

July 11, 2009 by Jonathan Movroydis | Filed Under Featured Articles 

Interesting Takes From Home And Abroad:

Campaign Finance And Corporations By Stuart Taylor Jr., National Journal
The justices should excise the unconstitutional Wellstone amendment while leaving the restrictions on business corporations and unions intact.

Honduras and Constitutional Democracy By David Fontana, The New Republic
Here in the United States, the removal of President Manuel Zelaya of Honduras has prompted disparate reactions from the political right and political left. Conservatives (fearing the influence of Hugo Chavez and his authoritarian brand of politics, with which Zelaya had aligned himself) have tended to side with the coup leaders. Liberals (fearing a return to the era of Latin American military coups) have tended to side with Zelaya.

Why We Don’t Want a Nuclear-Free World By Melanie Kirkpatrick, The Wall Street Journal
‘Nuclear weapons are used every day.” So says former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, speaking last month at his office in a wooded enclave of Maclean, Va. It’s a serene setting for Doomsday talk, and Mr. Schlesinger’s matter-of-fact tone belies the enormity of the concepts he’s explaining — concepts that were seemingly ignored in this week’s Moscow summit between Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev.

McNamara: The Smartest Fool By Richard Reeves, RealClearPolitics
In the military, after action or a mission, officers are required to file “Lessons Learned” reports, basically reviewing what worked and what did not. From 1961 to 1968, the most important of those reports were sent to Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, possibly the smartest fool ever to serve at the highest level of government in the United States.

Bashing George W. Bush still politically potent By Jonathan Martin, Politico
Vice President Joe Biden was standing by Jon Corzine’s side when the New Jersey governor kicked off his reelection campaign last month, but it was hard to tell from Corzine’s remarks that there was a new administration in Washington.

The American public remains resistant to big-government liberalism. By William Kristol, The Weekly Standard
The air is seeping out of the Great Liberal Hot Air Balloon. American liberals have been hoping, wishing, and praying–okay, maybe not praying–for over a quarter-century for an end to the ghastly interlude of conservative dominance ushered in by Ronald Reagan. Surely it was all a bad dream, a waking nightmare, a bizarre deviation from the preordained path of history.

Sotomayor Girds for Hill Showdown By Robert Barnes, Michael D. Shear and Perry Bacon Jr., The Washington Post
White House officials spent hours this week preparing Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor for what they anticipate will be a concerted Republican effort to portray her as an “activist” jurist and will counter that her 17 years on the bench are a display of judicial restraint.

Honduras Coup Reveals Deep Divisions in Latin America By Jens Glüsing, Der Spiegel
The coup in the small Central American nation of Honduras reveals the deep divisions in the region. The triumphal march of the leftist followers of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has provoked the established elites. The knee-jerk reaction in Honduras has been, yet again, to stage a coup.

A Dose of Realism in Honduras By Edward Schumacher-Matos, The Washington Post
President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton are on the verge of achieving their own coup in Honduras and advancing American interests with a deftness not seen from Washington in many years.

Clash of Imams By Alastair Crooke, The New York Times
The troubles that have followed the Iranian presidential elections were not a frustrated East European-style “color revolution”; nor was presidential candidate Mir Hussein Moussavi’s movement an uprising of liberal Westernized sympathizers against the principles of the Iranian Revolution — albeit there were surely some who are hostile to the Revolution among his supporters.

Bush Deserves More Credit on Iran By John Hannah, The Wall Street Journal
Defying their regime once more, Iranians have renewed their protests in the streets of Tehran. Last month, when the protests began, the New York Times ran a story hinting that Iran’s demonstrators may have been inspired by an “Obama factor.” The article suggested that President Barack Obama’s diplomatic outreach, unlike his predecessor’s approach, emboldened Iranians to rise up against their regime, demanding it repair relations with America and the world.

Comments