"President Barack
Uh-huh. Well, gosh, who can doubt that the federal government can fix GM?
It's done such a great job in winning the war on poverty, after all...
And by the way, note that even Clinton administration in-house liberal Robert Reich, who rarely meets a government program he doesn't like, is highly critical of the bailout...
HOW CAN CONSERVATIVES MAKE GOVERNMENT WORK, AND MAKE IT SMALLER, ETC ETC? DEPT:
Over at NRO, Rich Lowry have an interesting proposal, among many other good suggestions:
"Sometimes politics throws up issues that aren’t the least bit sexy and that conservatives have very little interest in. For example: traffic. Republicans have suffered in state after state from failing to attend to public concerns about traffic congestion. The most market-friendly solution to the problem — congestion pricing on private roads — tends to be popular once implemented, but road pricing is extremely unpopular to propose. Yet technology has made progress possible here. Replacing existing toll booths with flexible electronic-collection methods ought to be popular, since it speeds up traffic without raising costs overall. East Coast Republicans, in particular, ought to take note. If new systems work, they could quickly spread."
Read the whole thing...good stuff.
Michael Barone adds:
"...I think Republicans today should be less interested in moving toward the center and more interested in running against the center. Here I mean a different "center" — not a midpoint on an opinion spectrum, but rather the centralized government institutions being created and strengthened every day. This is a center that is taking over functions fulfilled in a decentralized way by private individuals, firms and markets. This center includes the Treasury, with its $700 billion of TARP funds voted last fall to purchase toxic assets from financial institutions and used instead to quasi-nationalize banks and preserve union benefits for employees and retirees of bankrupt auto companies."
BASEBALL DIARY: the Tigers yesterday shut out Baltimore, 3-0--behind a gem of a pitching performance by Edwin Jackson. And that came off of Saturday's solid start from Justin Verlander, won by the Tigers 6-3. So the Tigers salvaged a split in the series, thanks to some good pitching, and that is indeed so much of baseball. Three times in May Verlander and Jackson won back to back starts. That's one reason the Tigers are 7 games over .500 right now.
Meanwhile...the Rangers lost yesterday to Oakland, 5-4. Frankie Francisco, the team's closer, finally gave up a run, the first he's allowed all year, and that was the decider. But still...the Rangers won 3 of 4 over the weekend, including a 14-1 laugher Saturday night, and rallied from down 4-0 to tie the score in yesterday's game. They're still battling, playing well.
But the Cubs lost 8-2 to the Dodgers, as starter Sean Marshall was simply pounded, giving up 5 runs in the first. The Cubs did split their weekend series with the red-hot Dodgers, but they still need to play more consistently. Rich Harden's impending return from the DL may help.
FAVORITE TEAM UPDATE: the Detroit Red Wings are just two victories away from winning the Stanley Cup, again, as last night they again beat Pittsburgh 3-1 (they won Saturday night by the same score). They're doing it with great goaltending by Chris Osgood, the ability to turn the momentum back in their favor even when the Penguins dominate for a time (last night the Pens completely controlled the last half of period 1; but out came the Wings in the 2nd period and racked up two goals with good pressure); and again, will and poise, even though this is an older team than is Pittsburgh, even though the Wings are beat up with injuries. There's still a ways to go, though; now they go on the road to undoubtedly a very hostile Penguin home ice crowd...
