I was deeply amused to read the breathless news coverage of Hammerin’ Hank Paulson’s “ambitious” and “sweeping” plans to restructure the federal financial regulatory structure. It says something about how far the goalposts of this country’s discourse have been moved towards rampant, unchecked, unbridled “law of the jungle” financial pillaging that modest reforms like these are considered a major move.

If these pathetic hot-flashing stenographers that call themselves “reporters” would actually take a closer look at the plan itself–hell, even just the fact sheet–they would see that not only is Paulson’s reform agenda miniscule at best, but that it’s a shell game, a distraction designed to accomplish the long-held mantra of the Bush administration–centralizing federal power and weakening consumer protections at the state level. Full story »

Really? I mean, really? Are you serious?

What you’re seeing is my reaction to reading an interview in which Hillary Clinton basically tells every Democrat that she’s in it till the last dog dies and is not going to quit until the Convention.

According to her,

“I know there are some people who want to shut this down and I think they are wrong,” Clinton said in an interview during a campaign stop here Saturday. “I have no intention of stopping until we finish what we started and until we see what happens in the next 10 contests and until we resolve Florida and Michigan. And if we don’t resolve it, we’ll resolve it at the convention — that’s what credentials committees are for. Full story »

Eric Haas and our friends over at the Rockridge Institute have a great Monday Weekly Workgroup feature that I encourage everybody to investigate. Today the subject is homeschooling, and that’s obviously one that’s going to matter to a lot of folks here. Several of us at S&R either are or were educators and it’s a topic our readers have demonstrated a good deal of concern for, as well.

Eric frames this week’s conversation nicely: Full story »

Walt Whitman once said, “I see great things in baseball. It’s our game, the American game. It will repair our losses and be a blessing to us.” You could look it up. – Annie Savoy

I’ll promise to go easier on drinking and to get to bed earlier, but not for you, fifty thousand dollars, or two-hundred and fifty thousand dollars will I give up women. They’re too much fun. – Babe Ruth

Today is Opening Day for America’s Pastime, and to mark the occasion S&R honors our newest Scrogue, George Herman Ruth. The Bambino. The Sultan of Swat.

The Babe. Full story »

Elections in Africa are always precarious affairs. If there is the least sense that, perhaps, the current dictator-for-life will somehow be deprived of power then the citizens will expect change.

If, despite this overwhelming demand for change, the election still goes the way of the incumbent then … well, you get events like Kenya. Previously seemingly stable countries erupt into genocide and horror.

Then we get Zimbabwe. A place that has been unstable and unpleasant almost since independence. Current president-for-life, Robert Mugabe, is responsible for massacres in Matabeleland and causing untold suffering to his people. He has rigged every election since independence. But he is gradually losing control as the economy falls apart (inflation is now 100,000% – everyone is a billionaire).

So, here we stand. The elections took place on the 29th of March. The results were due out this morning. They are not yet out. The opposition parties expect to win. So do the people. If Mugabe still wins, then the chances are that there will be outrage.

However, if Mugabe rigs it outrageously, and his well-paid army takes to the streets … well, things will go on much as they have for the past decade. Unpleasantly.

More news as it happens.

by Chris Mackowski

Mr. Adams’s Last Crusade: John Quincy Adams’s Extraordinary Post-Presidential Life in Congress
by Joseph Wheelan
PublicAffairs Publishing

Fewer families in America have had a greater influence on the country than the Adams family of Quincy, Massachusetts. After all, the family spawned two presidents, America’s most influential Founding Mother, a minister to England who helped saved the Union during the Civil War, and a turn-of-the-twentieth-century literary giant.

The family patriarch—America’s second president, John—has received a lot of attention in the past few years since the publication of David McCullough’s Pulitzer Prize winning biography. Full story »

Appearing weekly, Nota Bene attempts to provide an overview of the week’s news. Meanwhile, in its appendix, we cull trenchant comments to articles and posts, as well as those heard in person or emailed.

In “The Obama Doctrine” at American Prospect, Spencer Ackerman writes: “Obama is offering the most sweeping liberal foreign-policy critique we’ve heard from a serious presidential contender in decades. [He envisions] a doctrine that first ends the politics of fear . . . in favor of ‘dignity promotion,’ to fix the conditions of misery that breed anti-Americanism. ”We want to have [a foreign policy] debate with John McCain,’ a close Obama adviser says.” Full story »