Free Republic

Out here, in Los Angeles, we have recently been treated to a colossal hissy fit that had liberals gunning for other liberals. One would think that any right-thinking conservative would happily sit back and watch the blood run in the gutters. But even in a battle royal that pits lefties against their own kind, a fair-minded person can't help taking sides. On one side, you have the knee-jerk liberal editors at the L.A. Times wearing the white trunks or, in this case, at least the white hats. On the other side, you have the idly rich women of the Westside...

I have rarely been this royally ticked off. However, nothing prepared me for the statements of Fox News analyst and law professor Susan Estrich calling for a feminist campaign against the Los Angeles Times. Ms. Estrich's grievance is that the newspaper has failed to publish enough articles by women (like her own syndicated column) on its editorial page. Described in the press as "belligerent" and "semiliterate," Ms. Estrich's tirades became increasing unhinged after it became clear that Mr. Kinsley would not yield to her ultimatums. Indeed, Ms. Estrich went to all caps in offering Mr. Kinsley "ONE MORE CHANCE BEFORE...

On Thursday, The Examiner printed an e-mail by University of Southern California professor Susan Estrich accusing the Los Angeles Times of sexual discrimination against women writers. We also ran a rebuttal by Michael Kinsley, opinion and editorial editor at the Times. Since then, they have been e-mailing each other back and forth - CCing David Mastio, The Examiner's editorial page editor, in the process. We are running them virtually unedited.Run my letter - or else From: Susan Estrich To: Kinsley, Michael Subject: RE: my letter to the editor I am sending over my letter this morning. It is very, very...

The election campaign made it official. These are the Disunited States. There is "Red" America: conservative, Republican, religious. And there is "Blue" America: liberal, Democratic, secular. Everybody's message from the election results is that Red America won, and Blue America must change or die. It's a terrible exaggeration, of course. People have different mixes of values, and states have different mixes of people. Just for example, more than 50 million, or 44 percent, of the 115 million citizens who voted for either George W. Bush or John Kerry on Tuesday live in states that went for the other guy. These...

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The country's main reaction to the need for more troops in Iraq is that we should get other countries to help us out. In other words, draft foreigners. But events in Iraq have revived rumors and predictions that the real draft is coming back, and they have provided one of the periodic opportunities for advocates of a draft to make their case. That case has two parts. One is fairness: When you're asking young people to disrupt their lives and risk dying for their country, that burden ought to be spread across society, not concentrated among those desperate enough to...

The Los Angeles Times is at it again. In a commentary on the economy/deficit (7/2/04), editorial guy Michael Kinsley referred to President Bush as a "drunk at the wheel." Ugh. Do people actually wonder why the Times' readership is declining?

Free Trade Butters "I'm for free trade but" usually means you're not for free trade at all. By Michael Kinsley One of the tiresome conceits of political debate is that when opponents agree on something, it is more likely to be true. Another is that an assertion is more credible if it comes from someone who used to assert the opposite. The joint byline on the New York Times op-ed page Jan. 6—"By Charles Schumer and Paul Craig Roberts"—certainly was a shocker. Schumer is a liberal Democratic senator from New York; Roberts is one of the wildest of the bug-eyed...

It's a familiar human predicament. Dear old Aunt Maude -- dear, rich old Aunt Maude -- has staged a remarkable recovery. The doctors say she could live another 30 years. You are delighted, of course. And yet you can't help thinking about the money. The Democratic presidential candidates woke up Sunday morning to learn that U.S. forces had captured Saddam Hussein. O joy! O joy! O [expletive]!

Why Bush Angers Liberals We have our reasons, and that is why we're so pragmatic about 2004 By MICHAEL KINSLEY Conservatives are alarmed about the tone of our political debate. Interviewed last week in TIME, Fox TV talk-show host Bill O'Reilly trumped the standard definition of chutzpah — a man who kills his parents, then pleads for mercy as an orphan — by complaining that the country is "as polarized as it's ever been in the history of the Republic." In TIME two weeks ago, essayist Charles Krauthammer expressed astonishment at the level of antagonism toward President Bush among liberals....

Monday, Oct. 06, 2003Why Bush Angers Liberals We have our reasons, and that is why we're so pragmatic about 2004 ByMICHAEL KINSLEY Conservatives are alarmed about the tone of our political debate. Interviewed last week in TIME, Fox TV talk-show host Bill O'Reilly trumped the standard definition of chutzpah — a man who kills his parents, then pleads for mercy as an orphan — by complaining that the country is "as polarized as it's ever been in the history of the Republic." In TIME two weeks ago, essayist Charles Krauthammer expressed astonishment at the level of antagonism toward President...

It's going to get ugly. And then it's going to get boring. So, we have two options here. We can add gay marriage to the short list of controversies—abortion, affirmative action, the death penalty—that are so frozen and ritualistic that debates about them are more like Kabuki performances than intellectual exercises. Or we can think outside the box. There is a solution that ought to satisfy both camps and may not be a bad idea even apart from the gay-marriage controversy. That solution is to end the institution of marriage. Or rather (he hastens to clarify, Dear) the solution is...

The fall of communism 14 years ago was not the end of history, despite Francis Fukuyama's famous prediction. It was, though, pretty much the end of the argument, in most of the world, about the best way to organize society. The answer (despite quibbles over the details and a surprisingly resilient minority preference for theocracy) is democratic capitalism. But this intellectual victory for the dynamic duo didn't resolve the tension between them. Democracy presumes and enshrines equality. Capitalism not only presumes but requires and produces inequality. How can you have a society based on equality and inequality at the same...

Rehnquist's Surprise By Michael Kinsley Friday, May 30, 2003; Page A23 The Supreme Court surprised everybody by ruling Tuesday that even state governments have to obey the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993. Liberals and women's groups are hailing the opinion and love-bombing its author, Chief Justice William Rehnquist... Rehnquist disappointed them, holding that discrimination against women is such a serious social problem that federal power can trump states' rights... The chief justice writes in a wonderfully matter-of-fact way about "mutually reinforcing stereotypes" about "women's domestic roles" and "a lack of domestic responsibilities for men." About how these "create...

Sympathy for the NY Times A newspaper that seldom plagiarizes, yet is often plagiarized Has the venerable New York Times gotten more than its fair share of bad press over the Jayson Blair fiasco? By Michael Kinsley SLATE.COM May 21 — Although rarely reluctant to join in a schadenfreude festival, I nevertheless feel sorry for The New York Times. Duped by one of its own reporters, hemorrhaging rumors and leaks like the institutions it is used to covering, its extravagant public self-flagellation merely inviting flagellation by everyone else, the paper is at a low ebb. Much of the criticism and...

May 15 — President Bush, of course, is not a junior reporter for The New York Times. So maybe it doesn’t matter if he makes up stories and puts them in the newspaper. After Ronald Reagan, it’s almost a presidential tradition. BUSH WAS IN New Mexico on Monday with a new answer to critics who complain that his tax cut proposal favors the rich. In two words: small business. “Most new jobs in America are created by small businesses.” Therefore tax cuts “must focus on the entrepreneur.” And thence to more familiar bromides: It’s not “the government’s money,” it’s “your...

For education and discussion only. Not for commercial use. President Bush, who was oh-so sneery about the idea of "nation-building" during the 2000 campaign, is now nation-building with a vengeance. He plans to spend something like $60 billion over the next three years rebuilding Iraq. The agenda includes everything from repairing the oil fields to rewriting the elementary school textbooks. Like the Clinton administration he ridiculed, he now realizes that you cannot pour soldiers and bombs into a country, declare it liberated and come home. But this is nation-building, Republican-style, with huge contracts awarded in secret to politically connected companies....

President Bush, who was oh-so-sneery about the idea of “nation-building” during the 2000 campaign, is now nation-building with a vengeance. He plans to spend $60 billion or more over the next three years rebuilding Iraq. The agenda includes everything from repairing the oil fields to rewriting the elementary-school textbooks. Like the Clinton administration he ridiculed, he now realizes that you cannot pour soldiers and bombs into a country, declare it liberated, and come home. BUT THIS IS nation-building Republican-style, with huge contracts awarded in secret to politically connected companies. They now say that the “emergency” oil-field contract to Halliburton, formerly...

So we've won, or just about. There is no quagmire. Saddam Hussein is dead, or as good as, along with his sons. It was all fairly painless - at least for most Westerners sitting at home watching it on television. Those who opposed the war look like fools. They are thoroughly discredited. The debate over Gulf War II is as over as the war itself soon will be, and the antis were defeated as thoroughly as Saddam. Right? No, not at all. To start with an obvious point that may get buried in the confetti of the victory parade, the...