WASHINGTON — Old habits die hard. The media are so enamored of the continuing (and largely contrived) story about the great Republican civil war that they fail to appreciate that the real internecine fight is being waged on the other side of the aisle. I grant that there’s a lot of shouting today among Republicans. […]
Charles Krauthammer
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: Climate pact with China swindles U.S.
WASHINGTON — Historic. Such is the ubiquitous description of the climate agreement recently announced in Beijing between Barack Obama and Xi Jinping in which China promised for the first time to cap carbon emissions. If this were a real breakthrough, I’d be an enthusiastic supporter. I have long advocated for a tangible global agreement to […]
advertisement
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: Obamacare was sold on a pack of lies
WASHINGTON — It’s not exactly the Ems Dispatch (the diplomatic cable Bismarck doctored to provoke the 1870 Franco-Prussian War). But what the just-resurfaced Gruber Confession lacks in world-historical consequence, it makes up for in world-class cynicism. This October 2013 video shows MIT professor Jonathan Gruber, a principal architect of Obamacare, admitting that, in order to […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: To GOP: Seize the day
WASHINGTON — Memo to the GOP. You had a great night on Tuesday. But remember: You didn’t win it. The Democrats lost it. This is not to say that you didn’t show discipline in making the election a referendum on six years of Barack Obama. You exercised adult supervision over the choice of candidates. You […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: Referendum about competence
WASHINGTON — Is this election really about nothing? Democrats might like to think so, but it’s not. First, like all U.S. elections, it’s about the economy. The effect of the weakest recovery in two generations is reflected in President Obama’s 13-point underwater ratings for his handling of the economy. Moreover, here is a president who […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: Obama lacks the will to win against ISIS
WASHINGTON — During the 1944 Warsaw uprising, Stalin ordered the advancing Red Army to stop at the outskirts of the city while the Nazis, for 63 days, annihilated the non-Communist Polish partisans. Only then did Stalin take Warsaw. No one can match Stalin for merciless cynicism, but President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey is offering […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: The real reason winning the Senate matters
WASHINGTON — You can win midterm elections without a positive agenda. You can’t win presidential elections that way. It is therefore vitally important for Republicans to win the Senate in 2014. Here’s why. In midterms, it’s all right to be the party of no. The 2010 election, for example, was a referendum on the liberal […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: The real Syria strategy: containment-plus
WASHINGTON — Late, hesitant and reluctant as he is, President Obama has begun effecting a workable strategy against the Islamic State. True, he’s been driven there by public opinion. Does anyone imagine that without the broadcast beheadings we’d be doing anything more than pinprick strikes within Iraq? If Obama can remain steady through future fluctuations […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: The jihadi logic
WASHINGTON — What was the Islamic State thinking? We know it is sophisticated in its use of modern media. But what was the logic of propagating to the world videos of its beheadings of two Americans (and subsequently a Briton) — sure to inflame public opinion? There are two possible explanations. One is that these […]
Posted inOp-Eds
Charles Krauthammer: Obama goes haltingly, lamely into the fray
WASHINGTON — In his Islamic State speech, President Obama said many of the right things. Most importantly, he finally got the mission right: degrade and destroy the enemy. This alone will probably get him a bump in the polls, which have dropped to historic lows. But his strategic problem remains: the disconnect between (proclaimed) ends […]