Unca Darrell

MAY 16 / Barack Hussein Obama: Alinskyite rope-a-doper

THE ENTERPRISE formerly known as ACORN once ran the election-fraud division of the progressive project, the ultimate goal of which is to fundamentally transform America. In different iterations, it still does.

The crudest forms of election fraud -- such as signing up fictional voters, then casting their ballots by mail -- are sometimes found out. Whereupon the organization wrings its hands, declares that it never authorized such a despicable thing, and fires someone.

Next election, the same players do the same thing.

So it is . . . 

APRIL 15 / They didn't use the word "ratchet," but . . .

. . . that's what they were talking about, way back then.

The fact was that in this country, we had gone very much further toward socialism than most democratic countries in Europe -- in the extent of the public sector, with the nationalized industries, and the amount of control, and to some extent the attitudes. We had to turn back. In other words, the center is always the midway between two points, and the whole of the political debate had gone to the left. . .

APRIL 9 / Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?

HOUSTON CHRONICLE cartoonist Nick Anderson today celebrates the death of Margaret Thatcher with an image of her as a particularly ugly harridan, berating God at a desk in heaven. "What kind of socialist dystopia are you running here, kind sir?"

God, miserable, head in hands, hides under the desk: "I think I've died and gone to hell."

The message is . . . 

MARCH 23 / Europe does not lack good policies; it lacks . . .

. . . good politics. So says . . .

MARCH 2 / The power of heavy-handed rhetorical legerdemain

TO THOSE younger than 35, communism must seem like some ridiculous hoax. How could so many Western intellectuals have defended an ideology -- and defended it into the late 1980s -- that had never produced anything but . . .

FEBRUARY 28 / Progressives preach . . .

. . . more spending, more taxing, and more regulation. So does the uber-progressive Houston Chronicle.

In the last eight days, the paper -- in the voice of its editors, cartoonist, and public-affairs columnists -- has urged more spending at least six times, more regulation at least five times, and more taxes at least once. 

The paper frosted this three-layed cake with filigrees of criticism and mockery for those who would spend less, tax less, and regulate less: conservatives generally, the Tea Party in particular.

Details below.

FEBRUARY 25 / Jack Lew's sweet unemployment contract

[THE] STORY is how Wall Street has become a get-rich-turnstile for Democratic political operatives. The terms of Mr. Lew's original employment contract with Citi included a bonus guarantee if he left the bank for . . . 

FEBRUARY 23 / Civilization and barbarism

GREAT POLITICAL movies transcend that category and tell us something useful, often depressing, sometimes inspiring, about the human condition. The best of recent years was "The Lives of Others," the brilliant 2006 Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Film about an East German Stasi agent who spied on artists and intellectuals.

A powerful documentary now joins the list. It's . . .

FEBRUARY 22 / "Forrest Gump at Treasury"

Investor in Cayman Islands tax havens? Check. Recipient of a bonus and corporate jet rides underwritten by taxpayers at a bailed-out bank? Check. Executive at a university that accepted student-loan "kickbacks" . . .

FEBRUARY 14 / These people are unserious

PRESIDENT OBAMA and the Democrats are cheerfully bankrupting America, and here's what Chronicle editorial cartoonist Nick Anderson thinks is important and funny: