March 4th 2008 - Today's Columns:

Thomas Sowell : Rescuing the Rust Belt - Sowell provides an excellent autopsy of the rust belt. Decades of union wages and work rules and high taxes have created have led businesses to move away from Ohio, Michigan, West Virginia, etc. and opened up opportunities for new businesses to capture market share. But the people and the policies remain behind like the salted earth at Carthage. Nothing can ever grow there while that poison remains. Until a significant portion of Americans understand simple economic principles, these events will be repeated again and again. There is no free lunch.

Rich Lowry : The Superfluous Woman - As much as I enjoy bashing Hillary, I fail to see the point of Lowry's column. Next.

Rich Galen : A Name, An Ad - "her campaign might have made real strides with rank-and-file Democrats if her staff would have had her answer the phone at 3 AM dressed in a ratty old robe, no make up, her hair uncombed, a cigarette hanging from the corner of her mouth, and a bunny slipper dangling from one foot."

Robert Knight : Clueless in Obama Nation - This article is about religion. I've been hoodwinked!

Jonah Goldberg : The Prince of Polysyllabism - A tribute to WFB. "You cannot paint the Mona Lisa by assigning one dab each to a thousand painters"

Michael Barone : Throw Out the Old Electoral Maps in 2008 - Barone opines that the red/blue divide of the past will not be determinative of the future. The candidates are widely different this time around and the vote will split along different lines than the past two Presidential elections.

Robert D. Novak : Bailing Out Barack -

• Obama made a major mistake in the debate by not denouncing Farrakhan's support but was saved by Hillary's remark about rejecting the New York Independence Party's endorsement.
• Hillary's ugly complaint in the debate about being called on first was planned in order to play up Saturday Night Live's depiction of media favoritism of Obama.
• Rumors are circulating that McCain won the last minute endorsement from Gov. Christ of Florida by promising him a VP spot on the ticket.
• Newt turned friends into enemies by his support of Rep. Wayne Gilchrest in MD. [It seems to me Newt has been trimming his sails lately and largely on environmental issues in an apparent effort to make his potential Presidential candidacy more palatable to the wider electorate. I respect and admire Newt highly and I fail to understand his recent actions. As Ayn Rand warned: “Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think that you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.”]
• Denny Hastert's Illinois district is up for grabs. A Democratic victory there "would be heralded as a harbinger of a big Democratic year ahead."
  
  

Charles Krauthammer : The Freedom to Lobby - Krauthammer points out that the no matter how much politicians rail against "special interests", the right to lobby is Constitutionally guaranteed:

Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of
religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of
speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and
to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.