Sunday, January 13, 2008

Karl's Weekend Reading

Our long holiday from posting Weekend Reading suggestions is over. Here are some picks from the past weeks:

John Bolton suggests the US pull out of the February 13, 2006 nuclear agreement with North Korea after their "umpteenth violation". We concur, but for another reason. President Bush is the only one that will drive change in the N. Korea regime. If he doesn't reset the standard to full compliance, something always lacking in this agreement, we are confident his predecessor will not either. Reagan was uncomfortable knowing masses lived behind a wall, and he led with this core frustration while declining offers other presidents would have jumped at. That focus and discipline is absent today.

The criticisms of B. Hussein Obama are rolling in, and quite a few minutes too late. Kimberly Strassel dedicates two columns to this: December 28, 2007 - Change Agent? (link), and January 11, 2008 - Barack or Hillary (link). No critical comments here. We agree with her on every point, and HOPE she is right.

Charles Krauthammer reacts to Obama in his January 11 Townhall.com article, Finding the Unscripted Turning Point:

It is fitting that New Hampshire should have turned on a tear or an aside. The Democratic primary campaign has been breathtakingly empty. What passes for substance is an absurd contest of hopeful change (Obama) vs. experienced change (Clinton) vs. angry change (John Edwards playing Hugo Chavez in English).
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The freest of all passes to Obama is the general neglect of the obvious central contradiction of his candidacy -- the bipartisan uniter who would bring us together by transcending ideology is at every turn on every policy an unwavering, down-the-line, unreconstructed, uninteresting, liberal Democrat.