A new book co-authored by my buddy Nick Schulz (editor of The American) and Arnold Kling is out today. Pick it up with Going Rogue. I'm getting my copy today.
It may not constitute history from a conservative point of view but I have tried for many years to inspire children to read Churchill's "History of the English Speaking Peoples" as a good overview of an aspect of western civilization.
Also, another e-mailer says that Stephen Ambrose belongs in our discussion. Agreed. I wouldn't call him a conservative in the movement sense of the term; he's more of an Ike Republican. I recall his support of Colin Powell for president. More important than these distinctions, he's a high-quality historian of America.
Sarah Palin? Yes, I have my doubts. Doubts, I mean, that she'd be able to resist the temptation to "go native" once installed in D.C. Her main appeal for me in the '08 campaign was as evidence that the GOP still had a few functioning brain cells. They gave us G. H. W. Bush and Dan Quayle; they gave us Bob Dole and Jack Kemp; they gave us G. W. Bush and Cheney; then, for anyone who had not yet put his GOP registration card into the waste disposal unit, they gave us John McCain.
Then, after that dismal parade of world-savers, cock-eyed optimists, WASP ethnomasochists, and Senate seat-warmers, here came Calamity Jane from out West, six-shooters a-poppin'. Who wouldn't be bowled over? I still am. Good luck to her; and if she goes native in D.C., well, at least she'll have to go native. From being something else.
Re: Where Troubles Melt Like Lemon Drops [Jack Fowler]
Mark, the stimulating of non-existent Congressional Districts isn’t limited to New Hampshire and its infamous 00th — there’s also the North Dakota 99th, and plenty more where that came from. There’s a great piece by Bill McMorris over at Watchdog.org that reports $6.4 billion in stimulus funds going to 440 phantom districts:
Just how big is the stimulus package? Well for one, it has doubled the size of the House of Representatives, according to recovery.gov, which says that funds were distributed to 440 congressional districts that do not exist.
According to data retrieved from recovery.gov, nearly $6.4 billion was used to “create or save” just under 30,000 jobs in these phantom congressional districts–almost $225,000 per job. The web site operates on an $84 million budget and is tasked with monitoring the distribution of the $787 billion stimulus package passed by Congress–which, for the record, counts 435 members–in early 2009.
The site’s monitors, however, are not too savvy about America’s political or geographic landscape. More than $2 million was given to the 99th District of North Dakota, a state which has only one congressional district. In order to qualify for 99 districts, North Dakota would have to have a population of about 60 million people, almost 24 million more people than California.
My column on all this will be up tomorrow on NRO. But there's at least one point I make in it that I think isn't getting enough attention. It is ludicrous for the president to claim this was solely Holder's decision. First, I don't think it's true that Obama handed it off to Holder without any input on the matter.
But even if it were true, it's still Obama's decision. When the commander-in-chief gives law enforcement the final authority over what to do with enemy combatants, he can't then claim that he's not responsible for the decision. This isn't just a "buck stops here" point, though that's part of it. The moment he made this the Justice Department's call rather than the Defense Department's he made it clear where he comes down on the question. It's good politics to claim that he's just letting the rule of law and the justice system work through the issues, but that's all it is, politics. And, as president, it's if he thought Holder was wrong, he would have both the power and the responsibility to overrule him. He doesn't want to overrule Holder because the two of them see eye-to-eye on these questions.
I almost didn't donate this year. Two kids applying to med school, a third a freshman in college, retirement not that far away. Then I thought: It's worth it; give anyway.
Sometimes I Just Want to Turn Off the Light and Close My Eyes [Rick Brookhiser]
I am on the road, which is when I watch television. Last night I caught George Lopez, a comic who is new to me. He was amusing: refried Jay Leno. But he opened his monologue with Sarah Palin and Going Rogue. He called her a piece of s***, and told gross sexual jokes about her daughter.
Last January, several Republican legal stars wrote a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee supporting Eric Holder's nomination to be attorney general. Now, in light of Holder's decision to grant 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed full American constitutional rights and try him in federal court in New York, some of those veteran lawyers are having second thoughts.
The January letter called Holder an "extraordinary lawyer" of "unfailing integrity" who is "superbly qualified" to lead the Justice Department and whose appointment as the first African-American attorney general "should be hailed as a milestone." "From his experience Eric fully understands and appreciates the constant threat posed by al Qaeda and Islamic extremists," the GOP lawyers wrote. "[He] is the right man at the right time to protect our citizens in the critical years ahead."
The Khalid Sheikh Mohammed decision, in which Holder abandoned the carefully-constructed military tribunal system in favor of a risky prosecution in civilian court, troubles some of the Republicans who once supported Holder. "If the decision was his, and he made the decision and told the president, then I have some real qualms about my support for him," says Makan Delrahim, a former Justice Department official and former staff director of the Judiciary Committee. "I personally have a tough time knowing the rationale for this. We spent so much time making the military tribunals conform to constitutional standards to deal with exactly this type of situation."
Holder says the decision was indeed his.
Andy won't say it, but I will: Andy McCarthy was right. Andy McCarthy warned us. Andy McCarthy isn't blind.
I disagree with the guy on many things, and I've written some very pointed things about him in the past. But when my book came out I went on his radio show, expecting that we'd butt heads. Instead, he had some fun reading some of the stuff I've written about him and then we had a very civil, very mannerly conversation. I still disagree with him on many things, but I enjoy being on his radio show which I do from time to time. He's always very courtly, charming, and respectful. I don't know what he's going to do next, but I wish him well.
In the battle of the foreign nations portion of our 2009 Fall Fundraising Drive, Sweden is in the lead; we just received a $100 donation from a reader there.
At noon today, I'll participate in the Heritage Foundation's weekly Bloggers Briefing. Also on the schedule: Sen. Jim DeMint and Mike Franc. My subject is this. It's possible to phone in and listen online.
Is there another publication, never mind a conservative one, that has enlightened more people to the dangers of the zombie menace (or the pressing need to lance tumefied volcanoes with airborne lasers)?
National Review Online: We worry about socialized medicine — and zombies.
In the summer of 1990, I was fortunate enough to attend a weekend program for college students at the home of Russell Kirk in Michigan. In our group's first formal gathering, Kirk held up a book and told us that we all should read it. I had not heard of it before. It was The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America, by George H. Nash. Back in Ann Arbor, I borrowed a copy from the library and devoured it. A number of books contributed to my intellectual formation, but Nash's may have been the most important of all.
Today's podcast is with Nash. We discuss whether liberals were premature in their eager declarations of conservatism's death a year ago, why conservatism may be in a better position today than it was a generation ago, and why conservatives need to know their intellectual forefathers. Nash also offers a spirited interpretation of Herbert Hoover's conservatism.
Some National Review readers have already contributed to our Fall 2009 Fundraising Drive. We’re grateful.
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Major Hasan put up more red flags than the Politburo, but there's always room for one more:
Major Nidal Malik Hasan's military superiors repeatedly ignored or rebuffed his efforts to open criminal prosecutions of soldiers he claimed had confessed to "war crimes" during psychiatric counseling, according to investigative reports circulated among federal law enforcement officials.
On Nov. 4, the day after his last attempt to raise the issue, he took extra target practice at Stan's shooting range in nearby Florence, Texas and then closed a safe deposit box he had at a Bank of America branch in Killeen, according to the reports... Diane Wagner, Bank of America's senior vice president of media relations, said that her company does not "comment or discuss customer relationships".
Which evidently is more than you can say for Dr. Hasan.
Captain Surman told investigators that Hasan had formally contacted military prosecutors to report patients he was evaluating, according to people briefed on the exchange. She said Hasan signed his e-mails with "Praise Be to Allah." Legal analysts say psychiatrists are strictly bound by the rules of patient confidentiality except in cases where they might become aware of crimes about to be committed.
Imagine you're back from a tour in Iraq or Afghanistan. The Army assigns you a shrink who tries to convert you to Islam, and looks on his "counseling" sessions as war-crimes interrogations.
The U.S. military appears awfully close to having colluded in Major Hasan's abuse of his patients. But that's okay, it's not like they're Gitmo detainees or anything . . .
This year I saw my health insurance premium double from $500 to $1,000. My work has already announced that there will be no raises (for the second year), and our summer work has been seriously curtailed (severely cutting into my annual income). It isn't just those who have lost their jobs that have seen the impact of this disastrous economy. I'm donating to NR because NR is an essential voice for the intellectual argument for liberty and the market — the surest guarantor of a reversal of these troubling economic trends. My donation is hence an investment in the victory of free market ideas . . . and I hope to see a return on my investment that far exceeds the small sum I'm contributing today!
Speaking of Bill Bennett and conservative history: He has a two-volume history of the U.S. and it's actually being used in schools (and being adopted in others). It's an accessible series, with a supplement for teachers online. There's more here.
It's good American history, with good reviews on the Right and Left, and it's even in classrooms.
The Kazakh National Youth Symphony is now touring America. This Friday, it will perform at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.
I'm apparently one of the few Americans who didn't think Borat was an especially funny film. Anyway, I bet the KNYS will enjoy greater-than-normal success because the movie was such a hit.
I realized how much I rely on you when the server was down during one of the presidential debates. You never know how much something means until it's not there. You keep me sane.
We're used to indictments about America from the New York Times, but this morning's story on President Obama in China has a few extra dimensions to it, as well as a dose of reality that should wake us up as we begin down a path for this country not seen since the waning days of Jimmy Carter's presidency. This morning, the NYT looks at Obama in China and our influence, or, I should say, President Obama's influence.
Start with yesterday's meeting with 500 students in Shanghai:
Most of those who attended the event at the Museum of Science and Technology turned out to be members of the Communist Youth League, an official organization that grooms obedient students for future leadership posts.
Some Chinese bloggers whom the White House had tried to invite were barred from attending. Even then, the Chinese government took no chances, declining to broadcast the event live to a national audience — or even mention it on the main evening newscast of state-run China Central Television.
Now get this:
The degree of control exercised over the most public event of Mr. Obama’s three-day stay in China suggests that Chinese leaders are less willing to make concessions to American demands for the arrangements of a presidential visit than they once were.
The White House spent weeks wrangling with Chinese authorities over who would be allowed to attend the Shanghai town hall meeting, including how much access the media would have and whether it would be broadcast live throughout the country. In the end Mr. Obama had little chance to promote a message to the broader Chinese public.
The event in some respects signaled a retreat from the reception given at least two earlier American presidents, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, both of whom asked for, and were granted, the opportunity to address the Chinese people and answer their questions in a live national broadcast.
A retreat, read: less influence than, Bill Clinton or George W. Bush — both of whom got more from the Chinese in advance. So much for a new foreign policy where there is more respect for the United States.
He was asked one question by the Shanghai crowd, should Chinese citizens be allowed to Twitter freely. He gave what the NYT describes as an "oblique" and "cautious answer," saying that critics in the United States make him better.
But, the NYT concludes: "Beijing vetoed the White House’s attempt to invite a group of popular bloggers, an audience component that administration officials hoped would make the session more authentic."
So, to sum up: Less influence than Bush and Clinton, "a retreat," "Beijing vetoed White House attempt." So far I'd say, China 1, U.S. 0. How's that for resetting relations and better diplomacy?
Might as well go down the line: Are we doing better with one single nation since President Obama came to office campaigning on and promising a better kind of respectful diplomacy with other nations? Nobody is happier in Latin America since President Obama came to power, except Hugo Chavez and the Castro brothers who have praised him. Iran has done nothing to show any leniency and, instead, has been given the green light to crush dissent and has not been dissuaded in its nuclear ambitions (the IAEA said yesterday Iran is as close as ever to developing a nuclear bomb, btw). Eastern Europe is "rethinking" its position relative to the U.S. according to Lech Walesa. Israel is no more the happier with the United States and feels no more the safer just now. And now we have China, kicking us around. I guess if you show softness, you will be treated as soft.
This kind of international public representation is what brought Jimmy Carter's presidency to a halt, Americans do not like to be kicked around — and even if our leadership doesn't believe in a strong United States, our allies depend on it. Here's a question: In Iraq, we are about to redeploy troops, in Afghanistan, it's an even proposition that we may redeploy troops. Last week we took the worst terrorists out of our military system and granted them civil judicial respect: When we do leave Iraq, and if we do leave Afghanistan, do you think bin Laden or Ayman al-Zawahiri will view us as a weak or as a strong horse? Will they be curtailed in their future plans for us or emboldened? And what, right now, do you think the Iranians think about U.S. power and the willingness to deploy it in order to stop them? — Seth Leibsohn is a fellow of the Claremont Institute.
Once I opened Going Rogue, I was struck by how different it is than it sounds on MSNBC (and elsewhere). It was easy to get the impression over and going into the weekend that the book was a whole lot of score-settling. Having done a speed read of it, I'd say it's a reintroduction more than score-settling.
Sure, Nicolle Wallace and Steve Schmidt aren’t giving it as Christmas gifts, but it’s not gratuitously nasty. In fact, it’s not even nasty (dang, there's some sarcasm, but with a folksy Palin touch). Palin gives Schmidt some credit, even, along the way (for being well-informed on Iraq, for one; which she’s open about not being an expert on, with real self-awareness on display).
Because of the disloyalty of some on the McCain campaign, Governor Palin understandably felt the need to get on record about some things that happened during the campaign. What she has to say about some of these things are not the whole of the book. The book is “Who is Sarah Palin? By Sarah Palin.” Much of what you’ll find won’t surprise you. But it’s her reintroduction, on her terms. And in terms of any future she wants to have in public life of whatever kind, I think the whole reintroduction is a good move.
Yesterday, Jonah published an e-mail from a man who wants to read books by conservative historians. Who are the good ones? the man asked. Jonah provided a helpful list of suggestions. I don't mean simply to add to it.
Another way of looking at the problem is not to consider the author but rather the form. Popular works of narrative history are often conservative, at least in the small-c sense of the word. Many academics despise them: They hate their popularity among the hoi polloi, they hate their refusal to invoke critical race theory and other ivory-tower obsessions, they hate their jargon-free readability, etc. Jealousy is at work in this assessment, but so is ideology. These books aim for large audiences of Americans who want to learn more about their country's past and its traditions (often because their own classroom education left too many gaps in their knowledge). In other words, this is a market of readers who broadly admire the United States. They are not uncritical, but neither are they hostile. They express their patriotism through their book-buying choices. Smart and successful historians don't insult them.
One book that's selling well right now (according to a quick look at the NYT best-seller list) is D-Day: The Battle for Normandy, by Anthony Beevor. I haven't read it. I know almost nothing about Beevor. But I suspect that this book is a well-written and fundamentally reliable guide to one of the great events of the 20th century. Left-wing historians just don't write books on this topic, at least not books that sell enough copies to make the best-seller list. Liberals (as opposed to leftists) can break through, but their mission is not subversive: Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin is written by a liberal who admires Lincoln. This is the very essence of small-c conservatism.
There are exceptions that prove the rule: Howard Zinn, an America-bashing historian whose books have sold well, in large part because they're heavily assigned in college courses. Also, narrative histories on certain recent subjects, such as the 1960s or the New Deal, should be handled with care.
And now, just for fun, a few additional names of historians not menitoned by Jonah who are at least right of center (or at least seem to be): Jacques Barzun, Michael Knox Beran, Adrian Goldsworthy, Allen Guelzo, Arthur Herman, Paul Kengor, Walter McDougal, Amity Shlaes, and Jay Winik.
Oh, and since we're on the general topic, Burt Folsom's excellent book New Deal or Raw Deal? is out in paperback today.
Roger Kimball Nails the Lou Dobbs Departure [Andy McCarthy]
Though an all-purpose populist irritant, Lou Dobbs touched the third-rail inveighing against illegal immigration, earning the ire of Media Matters and the New York Times, and disturbing leftist CNN's centrist pretensions. The less in all this? Writing in Forbes, Roger explains:
Here's a conjunction worth savoring: Media Matters and [as it proclaims] "The power of media to elevate the political discourse." Feeling a bit sea-sick? Paul Krugman will increase the malaise. "Until now," he writes in his New York Times blog, "it really has seemed as if there was nothing, nothing at all, that someone on the right could say and do that would make them unacceptable in polite company. Now it at least seems that there is a line somewhere." For those of you who wonder what has happened to the public's sense of irony, I note further that Krugman calls his blog "The Conscience of a Liberal." … I'd like to pause to consider Krugman's invocation of "polite company." When it first reported on Dobbs' departure from CNN Nov. 11, The New York Timesdescribed Dobbs as "an outlier at CNN, which has sought to position itself as a middle ground of sorts in the fractious cable news arena."
Elevating political discourse. Drawing a line in the sand. Polite company. A middle ground. Get it? If you're Media Matters, CNN or The New York Times, you are in the happy position of proposing that what you espouse is elevating, middle-of-the-road, non-fractious opinion that is acceptable to "polite company," i.e., you and your friends.
But according to what dispensation are entities like The New York Times and Media Matters, individuals like Burns and Krugman, endowed with that coveted imprimatur? Who says that they get to determine what is acceptable and unacceptable to polite company? That they get to stake out what counts as "the middle ground"? To decide what "elevates" and what is merely ideological pandering? ... [Like Dobbs,] Krugman and his confreres also have strong opinions. But they arrogate to themselves alone the privilege of deciding whose opinions count as part of the "middle ground" that is acceptable to "polite company." The opinions of people like Dobbs, or the millions who watch Fox News instead of CNN, do not pass muster. Why?
The English critic William Hazlitt once spoke disparagingly of "common place critics" who pretend to put themselves "in the middle, between the extremes of right and wrong." Something similar could be said of the rancid, illiberal liberalism of commentators like Krugman and Burns. They look upon their own opinions less as opinions than as universally applicable observations that reflect the state of nature. Their opinions are just what any enlightened, virtuous member of "polite" society believes. Only those who disagree with them have "fractious," line-crossing opinions unacceptable to such polite company as represented by Krugman, The New York Times and Media Matters. Here's what's really at stake in the controversy of Dobbs and CNN. It's not only Dobbs who's been rusticated: It's also the robust liberalism that thrived on disagreement, argument and polemic.
Reading those jobs numbers, I can't be the only resident of New Hampshire's Second Congressional District who dreams of relocating to the "00 Congressional District", land of 2,873.9 newly created jobs. What a great name! Because in the Obama budget you can always use a couple extra zeroes.
I like to think of it as somewhere up around the Fourth Connecticut Lake or the Indian Stream by the old bootlegging routes in from Quebec. I drive around in the forlorn hope that one day on a rutted Class VI road deep in the woods, just over the washed out culvert, I'll round the bend and see the sign saying "Now Entering The 00 Congressional District. This $47,000 sign brought to you by the America Recovery & Reinvestment Act," and the Emerald City of Oo will rise before me, its streets paved with Stimulus green and lined with dancing fountains of sparkling H1N1 vaccine and Obamatronic statues that bow as you pass by as if you're the Japanese Emperor and they sing "Be Our Guest" in a faintly metallic voice. And I'll be greeted by 2,873.9 gnarled old stump-toothed loggers with an average of 2.7 fingers between them, now federally retrained as green-jobs czars, NEA performance artists, end-of-life counseling coordinators, and Joe Biden speechwriters . . .
Here are two gentle wake-up calls for those foolish enough to believe that the EU Constitution Lisbon Treaty would be the end — for a while — of the EU's drive to ever-closer union.
Italy is to push for the creation of a European Army after the "new Europe" takes shape at this week's crucial EU summit following the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty. Franco Frattini, the Italian Foreign Minister, said that the Lisbon Treaty had established "that if some countries want to enter into reinforced co-operation between themselves they can do so". This was already the case with the euro and the Schengen accords on frontier-free travel, and could now be applied to "common European defence".
Frattini added this:
If we do not find a common foreign policy, there is the risk that Europe will become irrelevant. We will be bypassed by the G2 of America and China, which is to say the Pacific axis, and the Atlantic axis will be forgotten. We need political will and commitment, otherwise the people of Europe will be disillusioned and disappointed. People expect a great deal of us.
What the people of Europe expected, of course, was a say in their future — and that was never something that the EU's oligarchs were prepared to give them.
I teach at an inner-city school, where I am daily confronted with the scourges of liberalism, both literal and figurative. Images of liberal icons (I have not yet found a conservative figure) are painted on the school's hallways: numerous images of Barack Obama, Ted Kennedy, John Lewis, Louis Farrakhan, and a number of Black Panthers. . . Relaxing with NRO at night helps to keep me sane.
Keep up the outstanding work in these Orwellian times! And thanks for illustrating how conservatism can be fun, smart, and totally engaging.
I watched the Oprah interview on-and-off and thought Palin was good. She was comfortable and likable. I was always a little skeptical of the "let Sarah be Sarah" school of thought during the campaign, because she desperately needed to be briefed on everything. Given what she needed to learn, you couldn't just let her loose. But this was a different Sarah. She knows her story, obviously, and talked about it in a way that I'm guessing people will relate to (plus: no tendentious questions or hostile editing). The weakest point was her explanation of leaving the governorship. And Oprah is right that you read the book (I've read a lot of it) and still come away unclear on that one. Anyway, a good start for her tour.
Hey, I could only give a paltry $10.00, but I love NRO just as much as the big contributors! NRO is my home page, which keeps me more informed than 90% of Americans (that's a completely arbitrary number, but I'll bet it's close...).
In other GM news, that's how much U.S. taxpayers will end up spending on the auto bailouts, according to a new study authored by professor Thomas D. Hopkins in conjunction with the National Taxpayers Union:
To better appreciate the scale of the bailout, it is instructive to divide the taxpayer's contribution of $79 billion by the number of vehicles [GM and Chrysler] sell. If the two sell 7.36 million vehicles during 2009 and 2010, the subsidy represents $10,700 per vehicle. That (plus interest forgone) would be the direct taxpayer burden (a) were no further subsidy granted and (b) the firms do not survive beyond 2010.
Might as well buy a car from GM or Chrysler: You already paid for a third of it.
I always include your website in my daily reading. I'm not a traditionalist but believe the role of a conservative is to maintain the status quo until something better comes along and socialism is definitely not it. Thank you.
GM on Outsourcing Production to Overseas, Non-Union Shops: You Want Us to Pay You Back, Right? [Stephen Spruiell]
Last week I wrote a piece on five promises to taxpayers that General Motors has broken since taking bailout money. Well, another week, another broken promise:
Here is a question: You, as a taxpayer, now own a stake in General Motors. 50 billion dollars of taxpayer money was invested in the company. Now, if the company decides it is in the best interest of their bottom line to invest some of that money overseas, would you be upset?
That’s a question being asked of GM today. GM is using some of the money floated to them by the US government to bolster its operations overseas. The upset is that part of the justification for investing tax dollars in GM was to create (or save) jobs here in America.
You could argue — and you would be right — that the mistake was to promise to build subcompacts in the U.S. rather than in China in the first place, but, as former car czar Steve Rattner put it (quoting his father), "He who eats my bread sings my song," and right now, Congress wants GM to sing Brooks and Dunn's "Only in America."
Not to introduce a competing fundraising campaign, but in response to my earlier post, reader Michael from Atlanta writes:
Doesn't someone have the money to start an ad campaign "SINGLE PAYER the one sure way to stop ABORTION. Once control of the government shifts we'll be able to stop all abortions by a simple regulation. No Congress, no state legislatures, just a stroke of the pen!!!!" Sort of like The Onion, but maybe alarming to the big-government crowd.
Thanks for always helping keep me armed with the facts needed to thwart the slings and arrows thrown my direction from my liberal co-workers and relatives.
Washington, DC, November 16, 2009 — The Phillips Foundation is now accepting applications for the 2010 Robert Novak Journalism Fellowship Program. Print and online journalists with less than 10 years of professional experience are eligible. The Foundation created this program to provide fellowships for projects by journalists who share its mission to advance constitutional principles, a democratic society and a vibrant free enterprise system.
The Phillips Foundation awards $75,000 and $50,000 full-time fellowships and $25,000 part-time fellowships to undertake and complete a one-year project of the applicant's choosing focusing on journalism supportive of American culture and a free society. In addition, the Foundation offers separate yearlong fellowships on the environment, on the benefits of free-market competition, and on law enforcement. There are also Alumni Fund Fellowships funded by donations from current and former Phillips Fellows. Alumni Fund Fellowship winners write one magazine-length article on their topic.
My wife and I read NRO daily and subscribe to the magazine. We really appreciate the well reasoned fact-based reasoning presented by NRO to further conservative values. Keep fighting the good fight!
In pursuit of an Eagle Scout badge, Kevin Anderson, 17, has toiled for more than 200 hours hours over several weeks to clear a walking path in an east Allentown park.
Little did the do-gooder know that his altruistic act would put him in the cross hairs of the city's largest municipal union.
Nick Balzano, president of the local Service Employees International Union, told Allentown City Council Tuesday that the union is considering filing a grievance against the city for allowing Anderson to clear a 1,000-foot walking and biking path at Kimmets Lock Park.
"We'll be looking into the Cub Scout or Boy Scout who did the trails," Balzano told the council.
Balzano said Saturday he isn't targeting Boy Scouts. But given the city's decision in July to lay off 39 SEIU members, Balzano said "there's to be no volunteers." No one except union members may pick up a hoe or shovel, plant a flower or clear a walking path.
In related news, the Teamsters are filing an injunction against Santa Claus.
There is nothing I enjoy more than reading Andy McCarthy and Hans von Spakovsky at NRO expose the hypocrisy of the Obama administration's Justice Department. Keep up the great work.
