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Monthly Archives: January 2010

A silver lining?

Monday, January 25, 2010

Considering the Supreme court’s decision equating corporate spending to free speech, and considering the court’s holding that a corporation is a legal person in the eyes of the law, bearing in mind Justice Roberts corporate bias and his desire to strike down laws regulating corporations, including those regulating corporate mergers, remembering that people have other […]

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Two doomed candidates

Sunday, January 24, 2010

My wife has urged me to link to this column by the estimable Dave Collins, one of the better columnists over at the Day. The Day carried much water for Rob Simmons, but Collins was not one of the water bearers, and he does a good job making the case in this column that Simmons […]

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More on the court

Saturday, January 23, 2010

A reasonably good editorial in this morning’s Day, decrying the recent Supreme Court decision that handed the government over to the corporations. One quibble and one more serious caveat. While it’s true that the decision also gave the unions the right to spend unlimited amounts on campaigns, that fact is not worth mentioning in the […]

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Friday Night Music, take one Zoloft and see me in the morning

Friday, January 22, 2010

This has been one of the more depressing weeks on record, what with the people of Massachusetts having an episode of decompensation, the Democrats having several, and the Supreme Court giving democracy the coup de grâce, though, truth to tell, the week has not been entirely yuck free on a personal level. Still, it seems […]

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The End of What’s Left of Democracy

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Today, the Supreme Court ruled that Congress cannot restrict the amount corporations spend on political advertising. They will still be forbidden to give money to favored candidates, but they will be able to spend as much as they want opposing or supporting candidates of their choice. If you think Democrats live in fear of the […]

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A prognostication

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

The Democrats are busy drawing the wrong lessons from yesterday’s Massachusett’s debacle. But we may take some cheer in the fact that quite likely the Republicans are missing the cloud in the silver lining. The fruits of victory, in politics at least, often contain the seeds of future defeats. Scott Brown is the new Republican […]

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A question answered

Wednesday, January 20, 2010

What lesson will the Democrats learn from the disaster in Massachusetts? Whatever lesson the Republicans and the brain dead punditry tell them they should learn. After all, the Republicans must have their best interests at heart. What lesson did the Republicans learn from their disaster in New York’s 23rd (remember that?)? Precisely the opposite of […]

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Obama’s Tax

Monday, January 18, 2010

The Big Banks are weighing a constitutional challenge to the tax that Obama is proposing to impose, to recover the government’s bailout costs. According to experts consulted by the New York Times the legal theory behind the challenge is “dubious”: [The Bank’s] primary argument, however, might be that a tax so narrowly focused would penalize […]

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Massachusetts Madness

Sunday, January 17, 2010

Martha Coakley looks set to lose the Senate election in Massachusetts, a staggering achievement, if ever there was one. This is what comes of taking an electorate for granted, not to mention accusing Curt Shiling of being a Yankees fan. There are some lessons here for our own Dick Blumenthal. If he runs true to […]

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To Keene and back

Sunday, January 17, 2010

My wife and I just returned from New Hampshire, and herewith a few pictures. We stopped in Northampton at the Green Street Cafe, which is, believe it or not, located on Green Street in that fair city. The owners are currently engaged in a David and Goliath battle with Smith College, from whom the apparently […]

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