Bookworm Beat — hit the road edition

This is one of those days that sees my obligations as a mother and a homemaker trump everything, at least for the morning. I’m going to slam through as many links as I can before I have to hit the road.  Since I’m running out the door, let me apologize in advance for typos.  This one was “dictated, but not read.”

Our Imperial President

There’s no sign that Obama is backing down from his plan to abrogate constitutional power to himself by unilaterally “reforming” immigration law. Many have written about this, but I like Keith Koffler’s summary best:

Pfeiifer offered up the usual White House drivel about Obama needing to do something because Congress won’t bend to his will.

Because of Congress’ failure to fix the immigration system and to pass the supplemental appropriations will need to deal with the specific crisis on the border, the president has no choice but to act.

Really? No choice?

Where in the Constitution does it say that if Congress fails to act, the president must write his own laws?

Actually, just last November, as Stephanopoulos pointed out, Obama himself couldn’t find such a provision:

If, in fact, I could solve all these problems without passing laws in Congress, then I would do so. But we’re also a nation of laws. That’s part of our tradition.

I dunno, maybe he went rummaging through the Federalist Papers between tees Saturday.

Or maybe we’re no longer a nation of laws.

President Obama — Liar in Chief

Yeah, yeah, it’s old news by now, but I still like to hear Bawney Fwank admit that Obama lied to people about Obamacare.  Of course, Fwank must have known that at the time, so his accusation sounds less like a pure statement of truth, and more like a CYA for his future reputation.

A few words about the war between Israel and Hamas

I agree with Victor Davis Hanson:  I think Israel emerged fairly well from this latest round with Hamas.

David Horovitz isn’t so sure about Israel’s victory, but he’s certain about Hamas’s defeat.

Amazingly, Israel achieved this despite the worldwide media’s (and I include America in that phrase) grotesque efforts to shelter Hamas from scrutiny.

Interestingly, maybe because he had the scheisse scared out of him by a rocket launched right over his head, a reporter for France24 candidly admitted that Israel was right:  Hamas was launching rockets from heavily populated civilian areas, right near UN buildings.

The outcry about civilian deaths in Gaza made me think of Sherman’s march through Georgia.  He was brutal, incredibly brutal.  But he also finally ended the Civil War.  Sherman understood an unfortunate truth:  wars end, not when the army loses, but when the civilian population gives up.  Unless they’re hurting, the war goes on.  With perfect timing, just as I was thinking these thoughts, Victor Davis Hanson wrote about Sherman’s march.

Too bad the Left is going to shoot this messenger

Every single one of Charles Koch’s recommendations for turning the economy around makes perfect sense.  Unfortunately, he’s been so completely demonized on the Left that half the country will reflexively reject them simply because they come from someone who is, to them, a Satanic figure.

Did Pro Publica commit a smear job against Move America Forward?

Leftist friends on Facebook have been kvelling about Pro Publica’s article exposing Move America Forward, a conservative, troop-supporting entity, as a corrupt arm of the Tea Party.  Except maybe that’s not what happened at all.

Red Light Camera scam?

Up until a month ago, red-light cameras were a hypothetical evil as far as I was concerned.  Then, I got caught by one, despite the fact that my front wheels were in the intersection for a right turn when the light changed.  I didn’t bother to fight it, knowing that the court would never side with me over the camera, so I paid my fines and grumbled, a lot.  I wouldn’t be surprised to learn, though, that I was caught in a revenue scam, just as the people of Chicago are discovering about their own fair city.

Revisiting the decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki

The death of Theodore “Dutch” Van Kirk (who, unbeknownst to me, lived and died just a few miles north of me), marked a perfect occasion to for a review of Paul Ham’s Hiroshima Nagasaki: The Real Story of the Atomic Bombings and Their Aftermath, which looks at the atomic bomb and concludes that it was a bad thing. He’s right to be angry at Japanese leaders who refused to surrender even though they knew the war was lost. He’s wrong, in my estimation, to revile Americans for bringing the war to an abrupt end.

More to follow this afternoon….