ObamaCare Damaging Medical Device Manufacturers

At Michelle's, "Taxing medical progress to death."

Two years ago this month, as public debate over Obamacare raged, former President Bill Clinton rushed to the hospital because of a heart condition. He immediately underwent a procedure to place two stents in one of his coronary arteries. It was a timely reminder about the dangers of stifling private-sector medical innovation. No one listened.

Stents don’t grow on trees. They were not created, developed, marketed or sold by government bureaucrats and lawmakers. One of the nation’s top stent manufacturers, Boston Scientific, warned at the time that Obamacare’s punitive medical device tax would lead to worker losses and research cuts. The 2.3 percent excise tax, the company said, “would be very damaging to Boston Scientific, and the medical device industry as a whole. In a nutshell, it would raise costs and lead to significant job losses. It does not address the quality of care but the political scorecard of savings.”

Two years later, Bill Clinton’s doing just peachy. But many medical device manufacturers are suffering, and many more are preparing for the worst as the White House gears up to collect on an estimated $20 billion from the lifesaving industry. In typical Obama-transparent fashion, the Internal Revenue Service quietly released a complex thicket of medical device tax implementation rules in a Friday document dump earlier this month. Barring congressional intervention, the medical device tax will go into full effect in 2013.

Continue reading.

And flashback to 2010, at IBD, "20 Ways ObamaCare Will Take Away Our Freedoms."

Poland Leads Wave of Communist-Era Reckoning in Europe

This is fascinating.

At New York Times, "Europe Reckons With Its Legacy of Communism":

WARSAW — For all that Poland has accomplished since the fall of the Iron Curtain, it has long resisted fully coming to terms with its Communist past — the oppression, the spying, even the massacres. Society preferred to forget, to move on.

So it may come as a surprise that Poland and many of its neighbors in Central and Eastern Europe have decided the time is right to deal with the unfinished business. Suddenly there is a wave of accounting in the form of government actions and cultural explorations, some seeking closure, others payback.

A court in Poland last month found that the Communist leaders behind the imposition of martial law in December 1981 were part of a “criminal group.” Bulgaria’s president is trying to purge ambassadors who served as security agents. The Macedonian government is busy hunting for collaborators, and Hungary’s new Constitution allows legal action against former Communists.

On Sunday in Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel nominated as the next president a former pastor and East German activist, Joachim Gauck, who turned the files of the Ministry for State Security — better known as the Stasi — into a permanent archive.

“In order to defend ourselves in the future against other totalitarian regimes, we have to understand how they worked in the past, like a vaccine,” said Lukasz Kaminski, the president of Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance. Across Central and Eastern Europe, a consensus of silence appears to have ended, one that never muted all criticism and discussion but did muffle voices crying out for a long-awaited reckoning.

Continue reading.

Sarah Palin Releases Video to Celebrate Presidents' Day

Via Governor Palin on Twitter:

Powerful Presidents' Day Video from Knights of Columbus

Via Theo Spark:

Scenes From the CPAC Soap Opera, and Notes for Conference Attendees in Future Years

Here's yet another topic I'd been hoping to blog about during the last week but didn't find the time.

From what I've been reading among CPAC attendees, this year's event was decidedly more raucous than years past, either that, or some of the more veteran bloggers on the scene are feeling pushed out and over the hill, forced to issue cultural fatwas against the hip crowd of younger participants, many of whom were apparently looking for a good time beyond the conference panels on politics and new media. This morning's lengthy essay by Robert Stacy McCain is perhaps a symptom of that, although few people are quite so skillful in expressing the angst: "Notes on an Unfinished Letter of Apology (Or, Does Ed Morrissey Torture Cats?)." (Via Memeorandum.)

That's a term paper-length discussion, but linked there are some of the earlier commentaries that I'd hoped to write about previously. Of special importance is Robert's own piece from last weekend, responding to the reportedly scandalous social mores and reality-series behavior on display among the young hotties prowling around the place. See: "Who Wants to See Tina Korbe’s Thighs?"

That's Tina Korbe at the video above, along with Ed Morrissey she is interviewing Rick Santorum. I've never met Ms. Korbe, but I've tweeted a few things to her and have yet to get a tweet back in response. Sometime last year she became the third full-time blogger at Hot Air. I don't read over there that much anymore, so I can't give a real detailed review of her commentary and analysis. She's good and has an excellent sense for the breaking topics, and if I recall she's got a cultural conservative orientation that's right up my alley. But like I said, I don't read Hot Air all that much. Basically, back when Hot Air was a Michelle Malkin joint, Ed Morrissey was brought on board as a marquee blogger, and I used to read over there regularly. But in 2008, when I had backed John McCain before just about anyone else in the conservative 'sphere, I recall "Captain Ed" tip-toeing around about supporting a candidate in the primaries, before coming out basically like a weasel for Mitt Romney. At that time in 2008, Romney had gotten the choice National Review endorsement and he seemed, for some reason, like a grassroots alternative to McCain, who was hammered as RINO (quite deservedly, but I didn't acknowledge that 'till later). I didn't care so much at the time about evincing a go-along-get-along approach to my fellow conservative bloggers across the 'sphere. I thus proceeded to savage Ed's endorsement and ridiculed others who'd jumped on the Romney bandwagon. I have no idea if Ed actually read my stuff or not, although I have a hunch that Allahpundit may have seen some of it and later, when I was aggressively promoting my blog posts by email, I received a personal note from him informing me that he didn't want anything to do with me. To this day, I don't think Allah's ever linked me at Hot Air (although Jazz Shaw linked me just the other day). He's a something of a self-appointed gatekeeper of the upper-establishment blogosphere, and in my opinion he's an overrated analyst, prone to verbose conspiracies and milquetoast ideological commitments. When Michelle announced the sale of Hot Air to Salem Communications I had even less reason to visit the site, as it seemed that any remnants of conservative activist sensibilities went out the window with the sale.

In any case, when I visited CPAC in 2011 I made it a point not to say hello to Ed Morrissey. The Hot Air people set up the big booth not far from the main lobby of the hotel, and the swag giveaways there make for a circus atmosphere as you're maneuvering through the conference to get to your panel presentations. Ed looks like a nice guy, and he's reasonable and doesn't bother with flame wars and all that. But I felt no need to pile on and substantiate with a personal introduction whatever other praise and ululations Ed was no doubt getting from the college-age blog wannabes slumming around the conference filling their tote bags with Hot Air yo-yos. The hierarchy in the conservative 'sphere is obviously unfair, but life is unfair and you go with the advantages that you have. Ed's good, but he's not that good. He probably ought not blog about politics in California's Central Valley, for example, as I indicated in a post some time back offering the Captain a corrective on Golden State water politics: "California's Central Valley Economy in Perspective."

But enough about Hot Air. Captain Ed and the others are certainly a good entry to this larger topic that's been vexing Robert Stacy McCain and some of the others who ventured opinions on the Jersey Shore-ification of CPAC. One bit of news from this year's conference that comes as absolutely no shock to me is that the CPAC bloggers' lounge is now segregated. I traded emails with The Lonely Conservative before the conference, and she mentioned she'd just put in her application for her blogger's credentials. I then recounted my story with her, whereby I had been denied credentials in 2011, but that when I got to the convention I spoke directly with Tabitha Hale to issue my outrage at the exclusion. "Do you know who I am?" I asked Tabitha without the slightest bit of hubris. I told her that I'd long paid my dues in the conservative 'sphere. (I dare anyone to walk five miles with me to put out citizen journalism like my exclusive and widely-cited 2010 report, "Immigrants and Socialists March Against SB 1070 in Phoenix.") And I explained to Tabitha that I was going to be reporting from CPAC for John Hawkins' Right Wing News and David Horowtiz's News Real Blog. So with that Tabitha threw up her hands, waved over to Kristina Ribali, and relented with some exasperation, saying: "Oh, let him have his credentials." I'm not accustomed to begging for attention, much less special treatment, so I can guarantee you that the moment didn't sit well with me. And while I fully expect to attend CPAC in the future, I will assuredly be taking a different approach next time, and in fact I doubt I'll even bother with scoring credentials unless something changes in the interim. As The Lonely Conservative reports, even acquiring credentials now is no guarantee of access to the bloggers' lounge. See: "Random Ramblings: CPAC Loose Ends,..":

There’s a lot from CPAC that I haven’t had time to get to. As usual, I had a wonderful time. The first day I was hoping maybe I could get into the bloggers lounge, but had no such luck. I had my heavy laptop with me, which I ended up carrying around all day. I shouldn’t have worn heels, by the time Susan Robbins and I got to BlogBash I was exhausted and my dogs were barking up a storm.

Lonely Con was "hoping to get into the bloggers' lounge"? What's up with that? She was credentialed. It turns out that CPAC's now using a two-tiered credentialing system for bloggers, which is another way of saying that non-establishment and non-inside schmooze-bloggers need not apply. Jerry Wilson has more on that at Goldfish and Clowns (where he picks up on some comments offered by Joy McCann):

I got quite the unintended chuckle from Joy McCann’s comments about the lack of room for bloggers:

As I understand it, this was the first year that we had two tiers of blogging, and in a way that’s really unfortunate. Perhaps next year there should be a sort of “media overflow lounge” where we can meet with some of the boutique bloggers and the up-and-comers. (I’m very small-time, myself, but I’m connected enough that barely I made it in [and, no, not by showing skin or flirting].)


Ed Morrissey and I talked a bit at BlogBash about how odd it is that New Media at CPAC has grown as big as it has, and although I know that this makes some people wistful, all-in-all it’s likely a good thing: information is good, and avenues for its dissemination are to be desired in the conservative movement (and in a democratic republic at large).


But I’m not crazy about it forcing a tiered system on us, wherein there are two classes of bloggers. With 500 bloggers, however, and fire codes preventing us all cramming ourselves into that one room, I’m not sure what can be done . . . unless we get a different room that doesn’t feature access to the main ballroom. It could be that that is the next step.

Ed Morrissey, concerned about a tiered caste bloggers society? Actually, as I read Joy’s post it says nothing about Morrissey being concerned about the situation. But of course. What else can one expect from Mr. I’m Only Here To Pick Up My Award (And Don’t You Dare Ask Me To Answer My Email)?

While I know Joy means well — she expands on the idea here — I’m not crazy about the idea of a media overflow lounge where those of us on the bottom rung can be stuffed into with the hope that maybe, just maybe one of the bloggers from on high will wander by to possibly acknowledge our presence with a royal wave before being escorted back to the bloggers lounge we dare not besmirch with our loathsome lowly putrid persons. Blogging is supposed to be about citizen journalists, no one above anyone else and all with something worth considering.

This leads to the question as to whether professional bloggers, which I define as bloggers paid by a corporation to write, are bloggers at all. I don’t believe they are. Case in point would be Hot Air, which is now owned by Salem Communications. Its writers write on behalf of Salem. Their primary function is creating content that entices readers to the site, thus enabling Salem to sell advertising on it at a maximum profit. That’s not blogging. That’s paid column writing that should be judged – and treated – accordingly. Go hang out with the regular media, for that is precisely what you are — conservative (sometimes) Maureen Dowds.

As to BlogBash… still waiting for an invitation. Maybe it became lost in the email. I’m sure it will arrive right after my invitation to BlogCon in Charlotte this May. (File that under “Never.”) Speaking of which, I confess to a perverse hope that CPAC will announce a regional event in California to be held the same weekend as BlogCon.

There's still much more at Jerry's post, but I want to stay with the two-tiered outrage for a minute. I didn't attend this year, of course, so I don't even know who decided on credentialing and segregating at the bloggers' lounge. Obviously there are too many bloggers who'd like access to the lounge, and I'll admit, it's a pretty sweet set up. While the WiFi sucks, you'll enjoy breakfast served and an eagle's nest access to the main convention hall, and you'll meet all of your favorite bloggers --- and not to mention some of the political rock stars of the convention, who often swing up to the lounge for a meet-and-greet with the selected few bloggers lucky enough to gain entrée. Jeez Donald Rumsfeld, I might have missed you had I not gotten down and groveled like a hungry beggar so as not to miss out on privileged access to the CPAC sky-box of the blogosphere:

Anyways, I think I'll send readers back over to Robert's post, which is still longer than this one and that ought to be enough anti-establishment ranting for one day.

CPAC is a once-in-a-lifetime experience for any conservative. I doubt I'll have any less a good time if I'm un-credentialed next time. Indeed, events like this are as fun as you make them, and I'll be planning my own bashes among like-minded friends for the next go-'round. Jason at The Western Experience did without credentials this year and he reported having a great time --- and he suggested we get together to plan for future conferences. So, up-and-coming bloggers take note: The conservative blogosphere is your oyster. Have at it and pursue your happiness, which is your God-given right. Don't let the false blogging gods of CPAC segregate you out of having a good time. You don't need them. Write with a passion, get involved and network among those with similar goals, and understand that all of these hierarchies don't mean a lot in the end --- frankly, the Ed Morrisseys of this world are media celebrities more than they are bloggers. Keeping things in perspective will help you avoid burnout and disgust. Just keep pluggin' and see where things take you. Onwards and upward you blogging proletarians!

Intensity Question for Romney

From Thomas Beaumont, at RCP, "Intensity Question for Romney Stirs Doubt for Fall":

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — If Mitt Romney wins the Republican nomination for president, he'll face the urgent task of inspiring the party's conservative core and rallying them to beat President Barack Obama.

Judging by his performances in the primaries and caucuses so far, and the challenge he faces next week, he's got his work cut out for him.

Even Republicans who think he'll be the nominee worry about whether he can generate the intensity required to beat the Democratic incumbent.

These party leaders and activists, from the states voting Feb. 28 and the most contested ones ahead in the fall, say Romney has made strides toward addressing this problem. But, they say, he needs to do more to convince the Republican base that he's running to fundamentally reverse the nation's course, not simply manage what they see as the federal government's mess.

"I think Romney will be the nominee, but there is still tremendous work to be done," said Sally Bradshaw, a Florida Republican and adviser to former Gov. Jeb Bush. "He has got to find a way to unify the party and increase the intensity of support for him among voters who have supported Newt Gingrich, or Rick Santorum or Ron Paul or someone else. And that is going to be the key to how he does in the fall."

Romney leads in the delegate count for the nomination, and by a wide margin in polls ahead of the Feb. 28 primaries in Arizona and Michigan. But the challenge from former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum in Michigan, where Romney was born and raised, underscores doubts about Romney's ability to ignite fervor in the GOP base.

Continue reading.

And check Walter Shapiro, at The New Republic, "Why Mitt Romney's Presidential Prospects May Not Be Salvageable."

PREVIOUSLY: "Romney Gains Ground in Crucial Michigan GOP Primary."

Romney Gains Ground in Crucial Michigan GOP Primary

Mitt Romney really can't lose Michigan. He grew up there, a favorite son, and a loss would demonstrate just how badly his claim to inevitability has collapsed.

At Public Policy Polling, "Michigan GOP race tightens" (via Memeorandum).

Also at The Hill, "Slouching toward nomination, Romney needs win in Michigan" (via Memeorandum).

Iran Halts Oil Exports to Britain and France

This move is a major escalation of international tension, and despite Iran's minuscule shipments, the historical precedents of such embargoes indicate the initial steps to war.

At New York Times:

PARIS — Iran’s government on Sunday ordered a halt to oil exports to Britain and France, in what may be only an initial response to the European Union’s decision to cut off Iranian oil imports and freeze central bank assets beginning in July.

Britain and France depend little on Iranian oil, however, so their targeting may be a mostly symbolic act, a function of the strong positions the two nations have taken in trying to halt Iranian nuclear enrichment and to bring pressure to bear on Syria, one of Iran’s closest allies.

Iran may also be reluctant, when its economy has been damaged by existing sanctions, to deprive itself of revenues from its larger European customers. At the same time, it may be seeking to divide the 27-nation European Union between those who depend on Iranian oil and those who do not.

Sunday’s order, according to the Mehr News Agency in Tehran, came from the Iranian oil minister, Rostam Qassemi, who had warned this month that Iran would cut off oil exports to “hostile” European nations. On Sunday, the Oil Ministry spokesman, Ali Reza Nikzad-Rahbar, confirmed that shipments to Britain and France had been cut off, and said on the ministry Web site, “We have our own customers and have no problem to sell and export our crude oil to new customers.”

At the same time, according to the Mehr agency, an official at the Oil Ministry said Iran was seeking longer-term contracts of two to five years with other European nations.

There was no immediate reaction from French officials, and the British Foreign Office in London declined to comment. A British government official, demanding anonymity to describe internal discussions, said that “we’re not getting exercised about it,” noting that Iran provides “less than 1 percent of our imported crude oil.”

More at that top link.

British Soap Star Helen Flanagan Looks Fantastic in Blue Bikini in Dubai

Well, as the commenters suggest at the Sun UK, maybe she'll become a Bond girl.

See: "Helen Flanagan is a hol lot hotta in Dubai," and also at London's Daily Mail, "That's a far cry from the cobbles! Helen Flanagan shows off her fantastic beach body in blue string bikini in Dubai."

Rick Santorum Could Beat Obama

Santorum has a lot of buzz not just on the GOP side, as folks are also taking a serious look at his chances in the general election. As always, the argument for Romney has been his electability, but that claim went out the window some time ago, and now Santorum's surge has become the biggest threat so far to Romney's long-assumed inevitability. The Hill reports, "Gallup poll shows Santorum with 8-point lead over Romney."

Note especially that Gallup's presidential tracking poll now has Santorum tied with Obama at 48 to 48 in a general election match-up.

And see Mark McKinnon, at Telegraph UK, "Santorum in his sweater vest could prove formidable Republican opponent to Barack Obama, the king of cool":

Rick Santorum may be unfashionable and obstinate, but in the end he could prove the strongest Republican contender.

Sleeveless pullovers were never cool. But neither was the small-town kid who was nicknamed "Rooster" by his classmates for the cowlick in his hair and the obstinacy in his nature.

So how, some 40 years later, can Rick Santorum - who has made the unfashionable knitwear that Americans call his sweater vest a trademark of his campaign - hope to challenge the dapper Mitt Romney for the Republican nomination before taking on the king of cool, Barack Obama?

In a string of recent contests, Santorum has beaten his rival Romney into second place, leaving Newt Gingrich, briefly seen as the likeliest alternative contender, way behind. And now he is even ahead in Michigan, the state where Romney was raised and the next primary will be held....

Raised in public housing in an industrial steel town, Santorum proudly touts his blue-collar beginnings..

Serving as a US Senator from 1995 to 2007, Santorum was a member of the "Gang of Seven" that exposed improper congressional spending. He also successfully guided welfare reform legislation, served on the Armed Services Committee, and championed legislation banning late-term abortions.

He then lost his seat in an 18-point landslide when Democrats swept control of Congress.

This defeat would seem to make Santorum a weak candidate. That's why conventional wisdom among American media and political pundits is that Romney, long-considered inevitable even though he is having a difficult time wrapping up the nomination, would be the most electable general election candidate against President Obama. Rick Santorum would get crushed.

The same pundits judge that Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, is generally more moderate, particularly on social issues, and so would have greater appeal to voters in the middle. Santorum, they reckon, would scare off independents.

Convenient thinking, but there may be much more at play that will turn conventional wisdom upside down....

In an economic address last week in Detroit, once the symbol of America's industrial dominance but now of its decline, Santorum spoke of cutting government spending, simplifying the tax code, and eliminating all taxes on manufacturing to spur middle-income job growth.

This will appeal to blue-collar workers – and their bosses. He has also said he supports unions in the private sector.
Democrats will try to use Santorum's family-focused, socially conservative stands to crucify him. But pocketbook issues will decide this election.

With Santorum as the Republican nominee, sweater vest and all, instead of Romney, President Obama would lose his foil, and his advantage as the sole candidate concerned about working Americans.

But see also David Paul Kuhn, at RealClearPolitics, "Is Santorum Too Socially Conservative to Defeat Obama?"

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers Slams Obama Administration's 'Roadmap to Greece'

She's awesome:

McMorris-Rodgers also gave this weekend's GOP address, and Lonely Con has that, "Republicans on Obama Budget: Roadmap to Greece (They Should Stop Helping Him)."

The Building Backlash Against Rick Santorum

I'm going to say it once more: Not one of the remaining candidates is my first pick, but I'm impressed with Rick Santorum, and I'd like to see him continue in the race and make the case for his candidacy. That's how it works.

That said, things certainly look grim for the GOP, by the looks of some of the responses to Santorum's surge and the increasingly desperate appeals to support Mitt Romney.

Jennifer Rubin, the resident Romney shill at the Washington Post, attempts to knock down Santorum this morning, "Is the not-Romney an improvement for conservatives?" I think attacking Santorum as an "extremist" is over-the-top and personally offensive, but that's Rubin for you:

I had lunch with a conservative scholar and writer on Friday. Remarking on the rise of Rick Santorum, he exclaimed sarcastically, “Oh, swell, the Republicans have found a guy who’s a big spender AND an extremist on social issues!”

On one level it was a funny remark, symptomatic of the notion among many conservative curmudgeons that if there is a way to screw up an election the GOP will find it. On the other, it was an interesting statement that suggests that the Republicans, after winning a House majority in 2010 by stressing limited government and focusing much less on social issues, may undo their success by choosing a candidate with positions unpopular with a substantial majority of Americans — big government and excessive meddling in personal lives (having nothing to do with abortion, on which the GOP is virtually united and public opinion in general is at least evenly divided.)

The two issues that I raised this past week — Santorum’s unconservative economic thinking and his extremism on social issues — have not gone unnoticed by others.

There's more at the link.

Again, that notion of "extremism on social issues" really rankles. Tell me, what's so extreme to say that traditional marriage is the foundation of a decent, ordered society? And what's so extreme to say that abortion is an abomination, and we should do everything we can to discourage it. It's funny too, since no doubt much of Rubin's attack on Santorum as "extreme" is directed at his Catholicism. But Rubin is Jewish, and one of the hardest of the neoconservative hardliners on the defense of Israel, something I admire in fact. The point is the hypocrisy here is astounding, and frankly a real turnoff.

In any case, Dan Riehl has more on this, taking on John Hinderaker for his whiny pleadings in favor of Mitt. See: "Powerline's Pansy Politics."

BONUS: Some additional thoughts from William Jacobson, "I feel Santorum supporters’ pain."

EXTRA: At Reuters, "Santorum says Obama agenda not 'based on Bible'." (Via Memeorandum.)

Santorum's walking that back a bit now at the video above.

ESPN Apologizes for 'Chink in the Armor' Headline

This is from the you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it files.

At HuffPo, "ESPN Racist Jeremy Lin Headline: Network Apologizes For Insensitive Headline For Knicks Loss."

And from the network: "Statement on New York Knicks Jeremy Lin Headline."

I've been meaning to post on this guy. He's a genuine phenomenon. See, for example, New York Times, "Chinatown Can Cheer, but Can’t Watch, Rise of an Adopted Star."

Sunday Cartoons

At Flopping Aces, "Sunday Funnies."

And see Reaganite Republican, "Reaganite's Sunday Funnies," and Theo Spark, "Cartoon Roundup."

Better-Late-Than-Never Rule 5 Sunday

I'm behind on my Rule 5.

And Dana at First Street Journal was reminding me with his post, "Rule 5 Blogging: IDF Edition."

See also Bob Belvedere, "Smokin' Valentina Lodovini."

Also, El Opinador Compulsivo has Shania Twain. And more from Reaganite, "Paraguay Becoming the New Venezuela...? 'Miss Paraguay 2011' is Alba Riquelme ~."

Plus at Randy's Roundtable, "Thursday Nite Tart: Esti Ginzburg." And Jake Finnegan has "Behati Prinsloo."

And at Maggie's Notebook, "Rule 5 Saturday Night: Candice Swanepoel and a Couple of Bonus Babes." Plus more of the Victoria's Secret hottie at Eye of Polyphemus, "Candice Swanepoel."

And late getting to this, but American Perspective posts some hot shots of Madonna.

And almost NSFW Rule 5 at Pirate's Cove, "If All You See…is snow that is caused by hot temperatures, you might just be a Warmist."

Also, don't miss Teresamerica, "Amanda Seyfried in Gone."

Photo via Theo Spark.

BONUS: Tropical Tiki Rule 5!

EXTRA: Just go read Troglopundit. Just do it!

Added: Gator Doug, "DaleyGator DaleyBabe Leianna Kai."

Sarah Palin Talks About Brokered Convention

Another great interview with Governor Palin.

The discussion of the brokered convention comes at almost 14:00 minutes. Palin is game for a run at the White House, and she says she'll do whatever it takes to help preserve freedom in America.

Allahpundit offers a somewhat fevered take on this at Hot Air, "Palin on a brokered convention: “I would do whatever I could to help”." But see also Sean Trende, at RealClearPolitics, "A Brokered Convention Could Be Dangerous for GOP."

Inglewood School District Works to Avoid Bankruptcy with Flashy Magnet School Instead of Fiscal Reforms

The state should go ahead at take over the district. It'll probably save taxpayers money in the long run and neighboring communities can be spared the social engineering that the Inglewood School Board hopes will allow the district to avoid a bailout by Sacramento.

See the Los Angeles Times, "In Inglewood, a sparkling new campus and looming bankruptcy":

When Johnny Young looks at La Tijera School, he sees more than the gleaming new facade of steel and stucco, the technology lab outfitted with 36 desktop computers, the fitness center with spinning cycles, treadmills and weights.

The Inglewood school board president sees salvation for his beleaguered district, the most financially precarious in California.

Socked by state funding cuts and declining enrollment, the Inglewood Unified School District is expected to go broke by May. Inglewood is one of seven school districts in the state that projects red ink through next year and is closest to the brink of bankruptcy, according to state fiscal management officials who work with troubled schools.

Without quick action, the Los Angeles County education office recently wrote, there is a "strong potential" that the state will have to bail out Inglewood with an emergency loan. That would trigger the California Department of Education to fire the superintendent, sideline the school board and take over district management until the loan is repaid, which could take 20 years.

But Young is confident that such drastic measures won't happen, and projects like the new La Tijera School are one reason why. He predicted that the $24-million state-of-the-art campus that opened in January, paid for with a construction bond, will attract hundreds of new students. And new magnet programs and publicity drives at other schools should bring in even more, he said. More students means more state funding — about $5,200 per pupil.

"We are very optimistic we will come out of this and avoid a state takeover," Young said.

But a long road of hurdles lies ahead.

Estela Ponce reflects on one of the district's biggest challenges. Like hundreds of other parents, Ponce moved her three children from Inglewood schools to charter campuses.

She said her two older children were not being prepared for college; her daughter, now a senior, was getting A's at Inglewood High School but scoring below basic on state standardized tests. When asked why, she said, her daughter blamed poor teachers.

Ponce's third child was attending Centinela Elementary, a district school that surpassed the goal of 800 on state standardized tests last year. But she put him in a charter last fall after his highly regarded second-grade teacher was moved to another grade. Ponce said too many teachers at Centinela couldn't control their students and set low academic standards

"They don't provide the education my child deserves," she said.

These are the families that need excellent public education systems, and the schools are failing. But read the rest of that article. The district is bad hands. Even the teachers' union supports a state takeover.

See my essay from yesterday, "Why Progressivism Should Scare the **** Out of You."

Arizona's Sheriff Paul Babeu is Gay

Well, I'm not sure about what happened either way, but having Sheriff Babeu come out is pretty interesting.

At New York Times, "Arizona Sheriff Is Accused of Threatening Ex-Boyfriend."

And also at Washington Post, "Arizona sheriff facing allegations of misconduct forced to publically announce he is gay."

A Lesson Plan for the Occupy Wall Street Curriculum

Actually, I have no problem with colleges offering classes on the Occupy movement. What's pissy is how the progressives have championed a violent, hateful movement that so far has had zero political impact, in contrast to the tea party, which clearly had a dramatic impact on the 2010 election and is still significant, despite media claims to the contrary. The push for an Occupy curriculum is just one more depressing example of how badly radicalism has infected higher education.

That said, Glenn Reynolds says go with the flow, at Wall Street Journal, "A Syllabus for the 'Occupy' Movement":

Schools from New York's Columbia to Chicago's Roosevelt University are offering courses on the "Occupy" movement. This has inspired some derision from the right, but I think that derision is misplaced. There is much that a course on the Occupy movement might profitably cover. Here are some possible lessons....

2) Bourgeois vs. Non-Bourgeois Revolutions: A Comparison and Contrast. The Occupy movement left its major sites—McPherson Square in D.C., Zuccotti Park in Manhattan, Dewey Square in Boston—filthy and disheveled. By contrast, the tea party protests famously left the Washington Mall and other locations cleaner than they found them, with members proudly performing cleanup duties....

4) Scapegoating and anti-Semitism in mass economic-protest movements. The Occupy movement began as an assault on "the 1%," a shadowy elite of bankers and financiers charged with running the world for their own benefit. Within a few months, the Anti-Defamation League was noting that anti-Semitic statements and sympathies seemed surprisingly widespread within the Occupy encampments. Compare with other such movements that led to similar results. Are such developments inevitable? If so, what strands in Western (and perhaps non-Western) culture account for this?

5) The Fragility of Public Health. Young and healthy upper-middle-class Americans, when huddled into encampments without modern sanitary facilities, developed a number of diseases, ranging from scabies to lice to tuberculosis, with surprising rapidity. In addition, populations of rats and other vermin exploded. What lessons can be learned about the fragility of public health, and the complacency bred by modern sanitation? Are we similarly complacent in other areas?

RTWT.

Rick Santorum Defends His Positions on Social Issues

Here's the interview with Greta Van Susteren (via Memeorandum):

And Dan Riehl has more, "Dear Spineless Cowards: STFU About Santorum's Religion-Based Comments."