Alan Caruba

Let Obama Be Obama

Watching the Obama campaign is akin to watching a movie about a train wreck that you know is coming because you know that there’s been a mountain slide and the tracks just around the bend are covered with huge boulders.

The August Bloodletting Has Begun

Politicians are always talking about the “October surprise” as an element of a campaign, but most of the hard work of destroying a candidate’s credibility begins in August. That was the case of the Swift Boat revelations about Sen. John Kerry’s real service in Vietnam before he came home to declare his fellow soldiers to be rapists and murderers.

US Arctic Oil May be LOST to the UN

“The Arctic may hold 90 billion barrels of oil, more than all the known reserves of Nigeria, Kazakhstan, and Mexico combined, and enough to supply U.S. demand for 12 years.” One would have thought Joe Carroll’s Bloomberg News report would have evoked some interest by the public and other media outlets. Instead, news of the U.S. Geological Survey was greeted mostly by a giant collective yawn.

Obama is Channeling Jimmy Carter

In 1980, President Jimmy Carter set in motion the energy crisis that America is experiencing today. He was aided by a Democrat-controlled Congress that imposed a Domestic Crude Oil Windfall Profits tax on oil companies who he blamed for the crisis that had led to long lines at gas stations. It was, however, the OPEC nations, not the oil companies, that decided to force up the price of oil.

Take Your Choice. Pests or Pesticides?

I have never been able to understand why people have no problem taking drugs for medicinal purposes—frequently never reading the listing of side effects or the warning that taking too much might kill them, but seem to have fits every time some nitwit self-appointed think tank announces that a pesticide poses a threat to all life on Earth.

Apologizing for the Past

I read and re-read the news report that on Tuesday the U.S. House of Representatives had passed a resolution described as “the federal government’s first formal apology for the ‘fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality, and inhumanity’ of slavery and the legal segregation of African-Americans.”

Why McCain Will Win

The nice thing about politics in America is that everyone can have an opinion and even the experts are often as wrong as the rest of us.

Bin Laden Morphs into Che Guevera

It’s become so commonplace as to receive only a minor mention in the news. Predator drones under the command presumably of the CIA or the Air Force find and kill some ranking member of al Qaeda in far-off Waziristan.

Are Newspapers Dinosaurs?

My local Sunday newspaper was not delivered, requiring me to drive to my local newsstand to pick up a copy. They, too, had experienced a delay in receiving a batch of them for sale.

The Greens are Going Crazy

It’s hard to ignore the fact that the Greens are going crazy, not just in the United States, but around the world. They are increasingly frantic over the opposition being voiced against global warming, one of the greatest hoaxes in modern history.

Ceaseless Hot Air and Wasted Dollars

There is a point at which one’s contempt for the environmentalists and their allies is irredeemable. There is no longer the usual excuse that’s there’s room for argument or discussion regarding global warming. Having been labeled “deniers” for years, the sense that the end of this hoax is in sight brings no desire to forgive and forget

The Politics of Showmanship

For political theatre, there is no denying that the speech Sen. Barack Obama delivered in Berlin drew a huge, adoring crowd and was filled with the kind of talk intended to impress, not just Berliners, not just Europe, not just America, but the entire world that a new leader has appeared on the scene to work miracles

Do Not Send a Boy

It is an old adage. Do not send a boy to do a man’s job.

Apparently We Have Won the Iraq War

I had an odd thought the other day. Apparently we have won the Iraq war.

Not as Dumb as They Think

One thing that both journalists and politicians hold in common is their belief that the American public is really dumb. This is why politicians keep telling us that there’s only enough oil in Alaska for six month’s use, that puddles left over from a rain storm should be regarded as “navigable waters” and every species known to man and God is “endangered.”

Obama the Intellectual

Anyone who has ever studied history knows that intellectuals have been the cause of more misery in the modern world than any other group.

Who Needs NATO?

What I know about NATO, the North American Treaty Organization, you could put in a bug’s ear. Well, that’s not quite true. I do know the treaty was signed April 4, 1949. It was the result of Cold War fears that the Soviet Union represented a military threat to Europe.

Tilting at T. Boone Picken’s Windmills

You may have seen the television commercials with T. Boone Pickens, a multi-millionaire who made his money in oil and is now trying to double up selling wind. That is wind as in wind power—as in hundreds and hundreds of wind turbines to generate electricity.

Let’s Ban Al Gore

[Warning! This is satire. If there is any resemblance to reality in the text below, it is purely intentional.] Al Gore, former Vice President of the United States, Nobel Peace Prize winner, and winner of a Hollywood Oscar for his documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth”, was at it again, giving another of those “The End is Near” speeches in which he advises the rest of us to stop driving, get rid of our air conditioners, and do everything else to avoid global warming.

My Stimulus Bribe

I received my stimulus check yesterday. It was $600 and I put it into my checking account and immediately paid a bill that accounted for half of it. I have serious doubts that it did anything to stimulate an economy that is undergoing a crisis of confidence in its financial and government institutions.