THE WASHINGTON TIMES

EDITORIAL: The special-interest president

Hardly a week goes by without President Obama accusing Republicans of being beholden to special interests. On Wednesday, he told students at Cuyahoga Community College in Parma, Ohio, that Republicans want to "cut regulations for special interests." Just two days earlier, he told union members that Republicans would "have those special interests riding shotgun, then they'd hit the gas, and we'd be right back in the ditch." Published September 9, 2010

EDITORIAL: Burn flags, not Korans?

On Sept. 11, 2001, radical Islamic terrorists committed the most deadly and destructive foreign attack on U.S. soil. Nine years later, the American people are being told that the country overreacted to the whole thing. President Obama last year declared that Sept. 11 is to be a "national day of service." Others in the administration seem to think that means it is a day upon which Americans should rise up to protect the Koran. Published September 9, 2010

EDITORIAL: 50 years of promoting freedom

The Tea Party movement is in many ways a reaction to the politicians, both Democrat and Republican, who have forgotten why they ran for office. Without a core set of principles to guide them, these elected officials push for ever bigger government because enacting new programs, regulations and laws is the easiest way for them to establish their relevance. Activists unhappy with the current state of affairs would do well to look to the words penned 50 years ago that inspired a generation of conservatives. Published September 9, 2010

EDITORIAL: The world according to Dick

Imagine a Middle East with a friendly Iran and no terrorism. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote in his autobiography, "A Journey," that former Vice President Dick Cheney dreamed big when it came to the Middle East. According to Mr. Blair, Mr. Cheney "would have worked through the whole lot, Iraq, Syria, Iran, dealing with all their surrogates in the course of it - Hezbollah, Hamas, etc." He said the vice president believed "the world had to be remade after September the 11th." Published September 8, 2010

EDITORIAL: Killing jobs with stimulus spending

Obama officials claim government "stimulus" spending and trillions in deficits saved America from higher unemployment and a depression. Their numbers have been spun too much and don't add up. Published September 8, 2010

EDITORIAL: Privatizing Virginia’s liquor stores

Gov. Robert F. McDonnell yesterday unveiled his plan to privatize Virginia's state-run liquor empire. It's a big business. Residents drank a healthy $322 million worth of distilled spirits last year, pouring $115 million in net profit into Richmond's coffers. Wresting this bottle from state lawmakers would represent a significant victory for Mr. McDonnell, but it comes at a cost to consumers. Published September 8, 2010

EDITORIAL: AMA vs. greedy lawyers

A proposed special-interest tax break for plaintiffs' lawyers would add billions of dollars in federal spending and jack up costs to consumers. It's nothing more than a direct subsidy from taxpayers to ambulance chasers. Published September 7, 2010

EDITORIAL: The Koran and other burning issues

Those who are upset over the plan by the Dove World Outreach Center to burn copies of the Koran on Sept. 11 now know how the opponents of the Ground Zero Mosque feel. Having the right to do something doesn't make it the right thing to do, whether it's destroying books or profaning the sacred space of Ground Zero with a mega-mosque. Published September 7, 2010

EDITORIAL: Obama can’t kick the stimulus habit

Move over recovery summer, it's time for fabulous fall as President Obama ups the stimulus spending ante by $50 billion. Mr. Obama announced his generosity at Monday's Laborfest pep rally in Milwaukee, Wisc. An audience of union members cheered the plan, knowing the majority of this public cash infusion would be transferred into their own pockets. That's just the thing to energize labor in advance of November elections that look increasingly bleak for Democrats. Published September 7, 2010

EDITORIAL: Scandal at Justice: Enabling vote fraud

The dead voters may be forced back into their graves. The biggest scandal emerging from the infamous New Black Panther voter- intimidation case didn't even involve the Black Panthers. Instead, it came when whistleblowing attorney J. Christian Adams told the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights that top Justice Department official Julie Fernandes had openly refused to enforce laws that require states to remove ineligible names - dead people, felons, people who have moved - from voter rolls. Published September 3, 2010

EDITORIAL: Obama’s backdoor gun ban

President Obama is afraid of the M1 Garand, the U.S. rifle that helped win World War II, defeating Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. Administration officials earlier this year moved to block the government of South Korea from selling vintage U.S.-made M1 Garands and M1 carbines to eager stateside collectors. Published September 3, 2010

EDITORIAL: Right for the wrong reason

Arlington County officials filed a lawsuit last year alleging that the state's plan to turn Interstate 95/395 high-occupancy-vehicle (HOV) lanes into a toll road was, among other things, a racist enterprise. While it's hard to endorse that logical leap, the legal wrangling has ground progress on the tolling scheme to a halt - and that's the best possible outcome for limited-government conservatives. Published September 3, 2010

EDITORIAL: Back to the future with the Gipper

Samuel Gompers, one of the first labor leaders in this country, said that Labor Day was a time to pledge ourselves to an even greater effort in the coming year. Samuel Gompers knew that the key to a prosperous future is to have faith in it, and that's why for him, Labor Day stood for a celebration of tomorrow's promise and possibilities. Published September 3, 2010

EDITORIAL: The right to the fruits of our labor

When you get a whole country - as did ours - thinking that Washington is a sort of heaven and behind its clouds dwell omniscience and omnipotence, you are educating that country into a dependent state of mind which augurs ill for the future. Our help does not come from Washington, but from ourselves; our help may, however, go to Washington as a sort of central distribution point where all our efforts are coordinated for the general good. We may help the Government; the Government cannot help us. Published September 3, 2010

EDITORIAL: NRA mans up to Harry Reid

This week's hostage standoff at the Discovery Channel headquarters in Maryland offers a scary reminder why it's important for Americans to be able to own and carry firearms. When the public is packing heat, it's more dangerous for deranged criminals to threaten innocent life because individuals can defend themselves. No organization does more to protect our right to keep and bear arms than the National Rifle Association, and when you go against the NRA, you get thumped. Just ask Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Published September 2, 2010

EDITORIAL: An inconvenient eco-terrorist

The hostage situation at the Discovery Channel headquarters in Silver Spring, Md., ended Wednesday with police taking the life of the apparent gunman, James L. Lee. This unhinged individual, inspired by the ideas of environmental extremists, believed that by terrorizing employees at the television network he would spark a change that would ultimately "save the planet." His problem was that he took far-left principles a bit too seriously. Published September 2, 2010

EDITORIAL: Dead in Ohio, but still voting

The liberal obsession with using election law to promote racial grievance-mongering rather than to protect against voter fraud continues apace. The worst case in point this week is the effort of Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a highly partisan Democrat who's forcing Cuyahoga County to waste half a million dollars on unnecessary bilingual ballots while she fails to remove 5,800 dead people from the Buckeye State's voter rolls. Published September 2, 2010

EDITORIAL: Walpin-gate judge has conflict

''I've got your back." That's what U.S. District Judge Richard Roberts said to his decades-long friend, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., in introducing the AG at an April 22 speech at Vassar College. At that time, Judge Roberts was ignoring several legal deadlines to the benefit of Mr. Holder's administration on numerous motions and countermotions in a key lawsuit for which Mr. Holder's underlings effectively were acting as defense attorneys. Published September 1, 2010

EDITORIAL: Mission accomplished in Iraq

President Obama was granted an opportunity to give a victory speech about Iraq on Tuesday, courtesy of George W. Bush. He mentioned President Bush in passing, essentially damning him with faint praise. If Mr. Bush had followed Mr. Obama's strategic recommendations in 2007, the war in Iraq would have been lost years ago. Published September 1, 2010

EDITORIAL: The left’s war on the gasoline-powered car

Professor Obama is looking to grade you on your car-buying preferences. Beginning with the 2012 model year, new vehicles will carry revised window stickers bearing ratings from "A+" to "D," with the highest marks reserved for choices the administration endorses and the lowest for those it frowns upon. This is just the latest example of the nanny state mentality that has taken hold inside the Beltway. Published September 1, 2010