Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall

NeoNeocon posts her thoughts on President Obama who isn't going to the celebration:

Obama has no time for Berlin Wall festivities

Is it any surprise that, although Obama the candidate made a big (and confused and misleading) speech in Berlin about the fall of Communism, he can’t be bothered to attend the ceremony marking the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall?

Moral Reasoning

Moral Reasoning 22: Justice is a class being taught by Michael Sandel at Harvard. Michael Gerson has an op-ed on it in the Washington Post.

I found the article very interesting, it lays down no this is right, this is wrong messages about the class. It discusses the effects and consequences of different reasonings and judgements.

An interesting article, go read it.

Sometimes there is Good News

From the LA Times blogs there is this article by Tony Perry:
Marines will not seek to reinstate charges against top officer in Haditha killings

The Marine Corps has decided not to seek to reinstate criminal charges against a former battalion commander at Camp Pendleton for a 2005 incident in which his troops killed 24 civilians in Haditha, Iraq.

Instead, the Marine Corps will convene a Board of Inquiry to hear testimony and recommend whether Lt. Col. Jeffrey Chessani should be demoted to major for purposes of retirement.

Even if such a recommendation is made and then accepted by
the Secretary of the Navy, Chessani's retirement pay would still be based on being a lieutenant colonel.

The Marine Corps had sought to try Chessani for dereliction of duty for not ordering a war-crimes investigation when his Marines killed the 24, including three women and seven children. Chessani, who was not present when the killings occurred, reported to his superiors that the deaths, while tragic, were the result of fighting between Marines and insurgents.

Go to read the whole thing, sometimes good happens.

"Death Panels" by any other Name

The Strata Sphere blog has a good article by AJ Strata:

Update: Sarah Palin comes out again today, noting as I did, this is not about end-of-life consultations, it is about the core essence of any cheap, government run healthcare system - end update.

The liberals are now all up in arms because someone (i.e., Governor Sarah Palin) was finally able to label the core problem with any and all government run health care options. That label is “death panels”, and it is very appropriate and accurate, and is only marginally attached to end-of-life consultations.

Today’s liberal know-it-alls march around with the pompous, busy-body attitude reflecting a modern day inquisition. They tell everyone how to think, how to live, how to talk to each other, what myths to follow (global warming comes to mind). And if we lowly peasants violate these holy liberals we are chastised, attacked and can be punished under the law for our digressions from orthodoxy.

Interestingly, right now the opponents of the liberals’ government run dreams of conquest don’t need to theorize or extrapolate about the possible outcomes, because the UK clearly shows us all where a government run health care ‘option’ will lead us. What they are going through now, in terms of ‘cost savings’, is what ANY government controlled health spending program for individuals will end up. And realize, this is not about consultations – it is about cost savings (aka ‘cheap healthcare’, ‘affordable health care’, ‘universal access’, etc) and how the liberal inquisitors will chose the worthy......

So, how does the government save/not spend money on health care? Let’s hear from President Obama’s lead architect and advisor, in his own words (which he is today trying to deny are his words) on how this can be accomplished:
Start with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel. He has already been appointed to two key positions: health-policy adviser at the Office of Management and Budget and a member of Federal Council on Comparative Effectiveness Research. Emanuel bluntly admits that the cuts will not be pain-free. “Vague promises of savings from cutting waste, enhancing prevention and wellness, installing electronic medical records and improving quality are merely ‘lipstick’ cost control, more for show and public relations than for true change,” he wrote last year (Health Affairs Feb. 27, 2008).

Read it all at the Strata Sphere (this is a long article and well worth reading) and go to the ABC news blog for all the quotes from Zeke Emanuel.

"What we seek is a political realignment"

A Very Important post from Powerline.
We recently posted William Voegeli's response to our series of posts by Hillsdale College history professor Paul A. Rahe. In his response, Voegeli challenged Professor Rahe "to help render the conservative movement more strategically acute." Professor Rahe writes:

We should begin by turning to American history for guidance. What we seek is a political realignment - predicated on a dramatic shift in public opinion - accompanied by a radical shift in public policy.

This has happened before, and it has nearly always involved a return to and reinterpretation of America's first principles. Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt all appealed to the equality principle embedded in the Declaration of Independence, and the movements that they led charged their
opponents with an abandonment of this principle, contending that liberty was threatened by monarchical, aristocratic, or oligarchical power. You really must read it all. We need the guidance.