Marco Rubio: The Obama of the right?

Whatever you think about Obama — and he is not very popular these days — the fact remains that he is one of the most talented politicians of our age. At his best, he gives a heck of a speech, he is undoubtedly intelligent and thoughtful, and while I disagree with most of his policies, [...]

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A doomed alliance?

A pretty fair article by Ed Kilgore on the widening rift between progressives and libertarians. One mini-saga of the past decade in American politics has been the flirtation—with talk of a deeper partnership—between progressives and libertarians. These two groups were driven together, in the main, by common hostility to huge chunks of the Bush administration’s [...]

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Obama wins Nobel prize for Peace?

My reaction was, and remains: WTF. If I were to expand on that, it would be roughly on the lines of this oped. The award of this year’s Nobel peace prize to President Obama will be met with widespread incredulity, consternation in many capitals and probably deep embarrassment by the President himself. Rarely has an [...]

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More Lynch footage from Reason

Reason has some exclusive footage from the aborted sentencing yesterday. Meanwhile, if you are a reader who is not entirely familiar with the timeline and details of the Charlie Lynch case, I strongly recommend this excellent Reason summary. To read my various posts on the case, click here.

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Obama’s medical marijuana lies

In response to questions from the court about how to proceed with the Lynch case given that government policy on this issue seems to have reversed, this is what the US Department of Justice wrote in a letter sent earlier today by Marshall Jarrett, Director. Not only does the DoJ has no intention of intervening in the [...]

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Assorted links

 While GM and Chrysler are in their last throes, Ford is trudging on. Obama may have fired GM’s CEO and told Chrysler exactly what to do but he has had no such luck controlling Ford. The company has refused offers of taxpayer life support and believes it can not only survive this recession but in [...]

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That’s one of the best quotes I have read lately

“Obama is causing a lot of Rand fans to completely flip their lids in part because Obama and his devotees are Bizarro World Randian romantics in the grip of an adolescent faith in the generative powers of the state.” – Will Wilkinson.

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DEA to end medical marijuana raids?

So says Eric Holder. As I wrote in this post, ending the raids was one of Obama’s campaign promises, so one would reasonably expect him to reverse Bush policy on this issue.  Politicians though, have lied on such matters before and political appointees even more so; thus I will wait to see actual change on [...]

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No fairness doctrine: Obama

This is terrific news. Around three months before the elections, I had listed the possible re-imposition of the fairness doctrine as one of the downsides of an Obama victory. Now that Obama has categorically ruled out that option, I think it is safe to strike it off from my list of fallouts.

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More on Obama and DEA raids

Jacob Sullum writes: Yesterday I wondered whether and when President Obama would follow through on his oft-repeated campaign promise to stop the DEA from undermining state medical marijuana laws by harassing patients and dispensaries. Today The Washington Times reports that Obama plans to suspend the DEA’s raids once he “nominates someone to take charge of DEA, which [...]

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Obama and DEA raids

Having praised Obama yesterday, I think it is all the more important to point out that so far, there are no signs he has reversed the policy of raiding medical marijuana units in states like California (where medical marijuana is legal). As Jacob Sullum puts it: “I’m not going to be using Justice Department resources [...]

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Some good signs from the Obama administration

• Tom Daschle — big government healthcare lord with plenty of tax issues  – is out. Obama admits he screwed up. Refreshing. • He might actually kill the terrible protectionist clause from the stimulus. I certainly did not expect this.  • He has selected an excellent nominee for the secretary of commerce post, it’s a Republican who once [...]

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Geithner and Summers — power equations

The New Republic has a fascinating article on the dynamics between Lawrence Summers and Tim Geithner, the two principal players of Obama’s economic team. An excerpt: It’s only natural that a man who was hailed as one of his generation’s great academic minds by age 30 and who’d become Treasury secretary by 45 would have [...]

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Raise a toast to Obama

I am a long time reader of Radley Balko’s outstanding blog, The Agitator, and I have seldom seen him this jubilant. From yesterday’s post: Credit where it’s due: Well done, Mr. Obama. I’m sure we’ll have our differences, but afer your first 40+ hours on the job, this libertarian couldn’t be happier. The tally: Obama [...]

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An old Obama speech on religion

[Post edited] I discovered this video today. It is a recording of a speech Obama made more than an year ago. The familiar themes of collectivist altruism (this is Obama after all!) have their place but the speech is mainly about religion in a political context. Having heard many good and not so good Obama [...]

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