AnnotatedOpinions.com

The Case for Regulatory Reform: Reassuring Americans that our financial system will be better controlled is critical to our economic recovery. [Washington Post]

GOP should favor health overhaul [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]

Stop the speculators: One of the most basic concepts of economics is the law of supply and demand, which helps determine the price of goods, services, and commodities. Unless, of course, that commodity is crude oil. [Philadelphia Inquirer]

Politics of Short Memories: The first glimmerings of recovery prompt the first real resistance to Obama. [Washington Post]

Look again: Events bear out Homeland Security report’s warnings [Houston Chronicle]

Neither Real Nor Free: If the election in Iran were truly “real and free” as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad insisted, the results would be accepted by
the voters and the government would not have to resort to repression. [New York Times]

Iran’s fishy election results [USA Today]

Angry old men: With the aging of the boomers, we can expect more violent incidents from the elderly. [LA Times]

GOP blew up budget themselves [Atlanta Journal-Constitution]

Even Now, There’s Risk in ‘Driving While Black’: How deep-seated bias remains an obstacle to a “postracial” America. [New York Times]

Nuclear weapons debate takes new form [Boston Globe]

Is Obama caving in to coal? The administration deserves credit for some minimal restrictions on mountaintop mining, but the president’s hands-off approach to coal defeats his climate-change efforts. [LA
Times]

This is your brain on religion [USA Today]

Misguided Budget Cuts: There are better ways to slash the federal budget than to cut the conservation programs in the farm bill. [New York Times]

A singular solution for healthcare [Boston Globe]

Good in a Bad Election: The possibility of choice inspired protest in Iran’s previously passive society. [Washington Post]

Torture, the painful truth: It may be a blow to our self-image, but torture has been part of the American way for decades. [LA
Times]

What the People Wanted: Our polling suggests that Iran’s election results reflect real support for Ahmadinejad. [Washington
Post]

On Earth Day, think Thoreau [LA Times]

Trapped in Sri Lanka: Thousands of innocent civilians are dying in the name of the ‘war on terror.’ [Washington Post]

Torture and truth: President Barack Obama made a tough call—and the right one—last week by releasing secret Justice Department documents detailing interrogation methods for extracting information from terror suspects. [Chicago Tribune]

Obama’s Diplomatic Opening: The president’s multilateral approach arrives at a moment ripe with possibility. [Washington Post]

Swimming Without a Suit: America needs to invest money and energy into schools with a sense of urgency that the economic and moral stakes demand. [New York Times]

The real story behind the faux Jane Harman scandal: A troubled espionage case may be fueling the controversy surrounding the congresswoman. [LA Times]

Denting the Deficit: $100 million won’t do it. Here are five changes that could. [Washington Post]

Diplomacy isn’t what we see [USA Today]

Accountability in Schools: Stimulus money meant for disadvantaged schoolchildren won’t get to the students for whom it is intended unless the Department of Education holds schools to transparent accounting practices. [New York Times]

Strength’s New Face: Why Obama Scored Overseas [New York Post]

Reporters behind bars: The Obama administration must insist that nations seeking U.S. goodwill respect free speech and not hold journalists as political pawns. [LA Times]

A protest in need of a sane image. Protest groups of all persuasions have a right to organize peacefully without government intrusion. In return, leaders and organizers have a responsibility to police their own ranks for nut cases. [Chicago Tribune]

If California wants to be economically competitive, government spending must be brought under control. One solution is to establish an independent bipartisan commission to propose a package of budget cuts. To minimize the ability of special interests to secure favorable treatment, the Legislature and governor should be required to accept or reject the whole package, with no amendments allowed.[AO: But how do we minimize the ability of special interests to secure favorable treatment from the new panel? Further, if the problem is lobbyist, why circumscribe our political system by shifting decision making away from our elected representatives when you can go after the lobbyist and lobbying? ]

If the world economy is to recover, we need China, and China needs us. [New York Post]

The car maker / banker dissonance. [Washington Post]

The government should have stayed away from GM and prepared the region for a structured bankruptcy process. [New York Times]

The government’s new, forceful stance is more likely to produce a meaningful overhaul of the car industry. [New York Times]

Saying no to torture. [Chicago Tribune]

Texas chooses evolution. [New York Times]

The good and bad of Obama’s budget. [Houston Chronicle]

Notre Dame, the continuing saga. [Chicago Tribune]

President Obama’s question and answer secession scheduled for today gives the public a valuable chance to participate, while also demonstrating how the administration’s message on economic issues is playing at the grass roots. [LA Times]

Reinvigorating the War on Cancer. The five step process. [The Houston Chronicle]

Experts are not exactly . . . experts. [New York Times]

The Treasury should fight fire with fire! [Wall Street Journal]

Huge deficits put nation on unsustainable course. [USA Today]

Blaming Rihanna. [New York Daily News]

The real Obama. [The Washington Post]

President Obama has also proposed a 10-year budget that is faithful to the progressive vision he articulated during his campaign. . . .

The opposition begins, predictably, with taxes, so it is important to understand the major tax changes President Obama is proposing and their underlying rationale. President Bush’s tax cuts are scheduled to expire at the end of 2010. At that time, assuming the economy has entered a recovery, President Obama’s budget will restore the top two marginal income tax rates to their 1990s levels of 36% and 39.6% for individuals earning more than $200,000 and couples earning more than $250,000. . . .

Critics of a cap-and-trade system are correct when they claim it will raise the prices of goods and services whose production and use emit carbon. That’s exactly the point: Higher prices are necessary to encourage energy efficiency and the development of renewable energy, to discourage carbon emissions, and to reduce the societal costs of global warming. The Obama auction plan will also generate substantial government revenues, about 80% of which will be used for financing a refundable tax credit of up to $400 for individuals and up to $800 for families. The result will be tax cuts for 95% of working Americans. The remaining 20% of the auction revenue will be used to finance investments in energy efficiency, clean energy and smart-grid technologies. . . .

In the first place, they do not see themselves as a group of liberal crusaders. They see themselves as pragmatists who inherited a government and an economy that have been thrown out of whack. They’re not engaged in an ideological project to overturn the Reagan Revolution, a fight that was over long ago. They’re trying to restore balance: nurture an economy so that productivity gains are shared by the middle class and correct the irresponsible habits that developed during the Bush era.

Second, they argue, the Obama administration will not usher in an era of big government. . . .

Third, they say, Republicans should welcome the budget’s health care ideas. The Medicare reform represents a big cut in entitlement spending. It amounts to means-testing the system. It introduces more competition and cuts corporate welfare. These are all Republican ideas. . .

Fourth, the White House claims the budget will not produce a sea of red ink. Deficits are now at a gargantuan 12 percent of G.D.P., but the White House aims to bring this down to 3.5 percent in 2012. . .

What’s going on? “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste,” said chief of staff Rahm Emanuel. “This crisis provides the opportunity for us to do things that you could not do before.”

. . . Clever politics, but intellectually dishonest to the core. Health, education and energy — worthy and weighty as they may be — are not the cause of our financial collapse. And they are not the cure. The fraudulent claim that they are both cause and cure is the rhetorical device by which an ambitious president intends to enact the most radical agenda of social transformation seen in our lifetime. [AO: Obama is doing what he was elected to do. He campaigned on fixing healthcare, education, and energy policy and was elected for that purpose. Also, he is doing what he was elected to do in addition to addressing the economic problems.]

The illusion that Barack Obama will lead from the economic center has quickly come to an end. Instead of combining the best policies of past Democratic presidents — John Kennedy on taxes, Bill Clinton on welfare reform and a balanced budget, for instance — President Obama is returning to Jimmy Carter’s higher taxes and Mr. Clinton’s draconian defense drawdown.

Mr. Obama’s $3.6 trillion budget blueprint, by his own admission, redefines the role of government in our economy and society. The budget more than doubles the national debt held by the public, adding more to the debt than all previous presidents — from George Washington to George W. Bush — combined. It reduces defense spending to a level not sustained since the dangerous days before World War II, while increasing nondefense spending (relative to GDP) to the highest level in U.S. history. And it would raise taxes to historically high levels (again, relative to GDP). And all of this before addressing the impending explosion in Social Security and Medicare costs.

Not so long ago — before President Obama’s inauguration — “earmarks” referred to the special appropriations that bypass the normal budget process to cater to special interests and protect the incumbents who inserted them. The difference now is that the politicians have gotten much better at disguising their handiwork. Under the cover of emergency spending, the projects have also grown [AO: No. Earmarks direct approved funds to specific projects. That’s the OLD definition. What the WSJ seeks to do here is to expand the definition. I don’t disagree with the Wall Street Journal in its desire to expand the definition of earmarks (I think it is the right thing to do here). However, we must be cautious we don’t expand the definition too much. Also, the Wall Street Journal should admit that it’s using a different more expansive definition]