Free Republic

Senior Democrats on the panel — Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) — used a hearing on the Interior Department’s role to trace the disaster back to former Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy policy task force. Waxman said that task force — which was assembled early in the Bush administration — set the stage for policies that pushed drilling at the expense of tough safety oversight of rigs and review of environmental risks. “The cop on the beat was off-duty for nearly a decade and this gave rise to a dangerous culture of permissiveness,” Waxman said. “In...

Where has Helen Thomas been for the last, two pressers?

My fellow members of the American Legion, I have made some serious mistakes and miscalculations in our struggle against Islamic extremism over the past five years. Some of these were made out of anger and impatience in the months after we were so viciously attacked on Sept. 11, 2001. Others were made out of my heartfelt belief that our American values—freedom, democracy, market economics—are the surest path away from the fury and despair that have plagued the nations at the heart of the Islamic world. I still believe deeply in those values. I am still convinced that we are facing...