Cal Thomas
Columns by Cal Thomas
Risky business Stateside
The Obama administration has chosen the wrong New York venue to try five co-conspirators in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States. Instead of a Manhattan courtroom less than a mile from the site of where the World Trade Center stood, the government should have chosen the Bronx Zoo, because a zoo is what will be created when this terrorist trial is held. Published November 17, 2009
E pluribus diversity?
Government and military officials have issued statements since last week's shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, that have nothing to do with the reality of what occurred, what is occurring and what our enemies would still like to have occur all over the United States. Listening to them leads to the conclusion that these people were handed talking points because they are all saying pretty much the same thing: that we shouldn't jump to conclusions, stereotype or give in to paranoia. Published November 12, 2009
Jihadists in the military
By now, the script should be disturbingly familiar. Whether in the Middle East or, increasingly, in America, a fanatical Muslim blows up or goes on a shooting spree, killing many. This is followed quickly by "condemnations" from "Muslim civil rights groups," such as the Council on American-Islamic Relations. We are then warned by the president and some newspaper editorials not to jump to conclusions or to stereotype. Yasser Arafat wrote this script, which he used with great success throughout his bloody career as a terrorist. Published November 10, 2009
Communism’s enablers and excusers
On Nov. 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall was pulled down to the consternation of leftists, who still had faith socialism could work with the right leaders, and to the delight of conservatives, who believed that socialism and communism guaranteed mutually shared poverty. Published November 5, 2009
Can the 10th Amendment save us?
Does the U.S. Constitution stand for anything in an era of government excess? Can that founding document, which is supposed to restrain the power and reach of a centralized federal government, slow down the juggernaut of czars, health insurance overhaul and anything else this administration and Congress wish to do that is not in the Constitution? Published November 3, 2009
Democrats worth hearing
Does anyone in Washington tell the truth? Why should Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid be believed when he promises that states can "opt out" of a public option on health care? Published October 29, 2009
Liberation from liberalism
Some conservatives are salivating prematurely over President Obama's declining poll numbers, According to a recent Gallup daily tracking poll, "the nine-point drop in the most recent quarter is the largest Gallup has ever measured for an elected president between the second and third quarters of his term, dating back to 1953." That may comfort some Obama opponents, but three years is a long time until the next presidential election, so conservatives and Republicans (not always the same) had better think of a long-range strategy if they want to save the country from the long-term consequences of what many call "socialism." Published October 27, 2009
‘Radio Free America’
During the Cold War, the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe were among the broadcast entities that effectively penetrated the Iron Curtain to deliver truth to the "captive nations" that were being fed a steady dose of propaganda by their communist rulers. Those dictators did everything they could to jam the signals so that their people would only hear what their unelected overseers wanted them to hear. Contemporary versions of jamming and other forms of censorship occur today in Venezuela, Cuba and many other places where dictators believe public ignorance is essential to their unchallenged rule. Published October 22, 2009
‘That’s just the way it is’
The Washington Post headline sounds as if a comedy writer, or someone fluent in George Orwell's "newspeak" wrote it: "Record-High Deficit May Dash Big Plans," it said. Published October 20, 2009
Don’t ask, tell or legitimize
I am sympathetic to the story told by Joseph Rocha, who claims in a Washington Post opinion column that he was discharged from the Navy because he is gay, though he says he never told anyone. Mr. Rocha says his male colleagues concluded he was gay when he wouldn't laugh at their dirty jokes about women or visit prostitutes with them. Published October 15, 2009
No peace, no prize
Like the Pulitzer Prize for journalism and the Oscar and Emmy for film and television, the Nobel Peace Prize is an inside job in which liberal, wishful-thinking humanists give awards to one another. Published October 13, 2009
Wherefore art thou a debtor?
Why won't we listen to what used to be called sage advice before the Internet made too many of us think we are reinventing the world and nothing we think or try has ever been thought or tried before? Published October 8, 2009
Creepy behaviors
In olden days, when "a glimpse of stocking was looked on as something shocking," a morals clause was written into an actor's film contract. The purpose was to restrain an actor from engaging in public behavior that might offend the audience and harm ticket sales. Published October 6, 2009
The story behind a story
What we are led to believe by an often lazy and Obama-supporting big media, enabled by a deliberately ignorant public that lacks, rather than longs, for the truth, is not as it first seems. Take just one example. Published October 1, 2009
A conflict of deception
If you were an enemy of America seeking its destruction, you would add to your pursuit of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons the undermining of this nation from within. You would do this largely through deception, putting on a peaceful face while subtly plotting ways to bring America down. Published September 29, 2009
Glenn Beck explained
Radio and TV commentator Glenn Beck was mentioned three times in separate opinion columns on the same day and in an article the next day in the New York Times, possibly a record for someone who does not hold elective office. Published September 24, 2009
Weakness as a shortcut to war
When I was a kid, there was a bully in our neighborhood. He never picked on kids his own size and certainly not on anyone larger. Rather, he punched, pushed and kicked kids smaller and weaker than himself, especially those who refused to respond to his threats. Stirred by his adversaries' impotent responses, the bully felt free to slug anyone he fancied. Published September 22, 2009
Playing the racism card
When Barack Obama was elected president of the United States, some suggested that race played a factor in his success. People "wanted" to elect a black man president because of our history of slavery and the denial of civil rights for so many years to blacks. It is never "racism" to vote for someone because he is black. It is only racism to oppose the policies of a black Democrat. Published September 17, 2009
Liar, Liar
Wouldn't it be nice, as the Beach Boys sang in another context, if there was such a thing as a liar meter? It would detect when a politician wasn't telling the truth and alert the public. In the absence of such an invention, we are left to challenge our political leadership based on an objective look at the facts. Published September 16, 2009
The reason for our discontent
Who wrote the following: "We must learn to welcome and not to fear the voices of dissent. We must dare to think about 'unthinkable things' because when things become unthinkable, thinking stops and action becomes mindless." Published September 10, 2009
