Copyright 2009 The New York Sun Thu, 26 Nov 2009 07:44:40 -0500 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Editorials :: Stories from The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials istoll@nysun.com (Ira Stoll) webmaster@nysun.com en-us Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/thanksgiving-2006-11-22/43946/ Wed, 22 Nov 2006 00:00:00 EST When George Washington issued his first Thanksgiving proclamation — on October 3, 1789, here in New York City — he noted that Congress had requested that he recommend to the people "a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God." He set aside Thursday, November 26, 1789, "to be devoted by the people of these states to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/matt-drudge-for-treasury/86889/ Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:07:17 EST Newsman Matt Drudge is being blamed for the collapse of the dollar, says a headline on the Drudge Report. It links to a story on the website politico.com. The Washington based news site reports that Mr. Drudge has developed what Politico calls “a fascination” with the declining dollar. It quotes some sources as doubting that Mr. Drudge moves the market per se. It quotes others who think Drudge's dollar coverage is political. It quotes the director of the Pew Research Center, Tom Rosenstiel, as... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/robert-bernsteins-courage/86888/ Wed, 21 Oct 2009 09:26:20 EST The real service that the founding chairman of Human Rights Watch, Robert Bernstein, provided with his article in the New York Times deploring the turn that the organization he founded has taken against Israel came less with speaking out on that topic – his views had been widely known among those who follow these matters even before they were publicly expressed – than with smoking out the views of the organization’s leaders by eliciting from them a public response. That response came in the... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/an-unconstitutional-nobel/86886/ Sun, 18 Oct 2009 04:49:13 EST Apart from the question of whether President Obama deserves the Nobel Prize — a matter that we’ve suggested is the purview of the Norwegians — the newspapers are starting to crackle with the question of whether the Constitution permits Mr. Obama to accept it. The Nobel, after all, is worth more than $1 million, and Article I, Second 9 of the United States Constitution states in plain language that “No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States” and that “no Person holding any... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-which-blair-project/86885/ Thu, 15 Oct 2009 10:59:12 EST An email has just come in from one of our favorite newspapers, Il Foglio, seeking support for the candidacy of Tony Blair to be president of the European Council. It seems that under the Treaty of Lisbon, the presidency of the Council will changing from being a rotating musical chairs kind of thing to a position with a two-year term and slightly more power. Its power would not amount to a hill of beans in an era when there was a strong and assertive American president pressing our interests... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/welcome-tom-friedman/86884/ Sun, 11 Oct 2009 10:33:22 EST Thomas Friedman has a marvelous column in the October 11th number of the New York Times, urging President Obama to go to Oslo and accept the Nobel Prize “on behalf of all the most important peacekeepers in the world in the last century — the men and women of the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps.” We were particularly pleased with Mr. Friedman’s column, because it followed by only two days the New York Sun’s latest editorial urging that the peace prize really should go to G.I. Joe. Mr... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/palin-and-paul/86882/ Sat, 10 Oct 2009 13:05:44 EST Those of us who have been waiting for a politician to pick up on the monetary issue are perking up at Governor Palin’s demarche on the dollar. This came last week in a posting on her Facebook page, where she reacted to a report that Gulf oil producers were negotiating with Russia, China, Japan, and France to abandon the use of the dollar in pricing petroleum. She noted the report in the Wall Street Journal that Arab oil officials were denying the story, but reckoned that “even the possibility... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/opinion/a-nobel-for-obama/86880/ Fri, 9 Oct 2009 12:59:52 EST The decision of the Norwegians to award the Nobel Prize for Peace to President Obama is not going to be met with sneering in these quarters. For all that we disagree with the president in respect of policy, Mr. Obama has clearly inspired not only a huge number of Americans but also a huge number of Europeans. That act of inspiration — rather than the gaining of peace, or even participation in a peace process, such as won the prize for, say, Yasser Arafat — is achievement enough for the Nobel... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/vang-pao-escapes/86878/ Mon, 21 Sep 2009 07:37:56 EST The decision by America to drop criminal charges against General Vang Pao, whom it had accused of plotting to overthrow the communist regime in Laos, is being greeted with joy among the freedom-loving Hmong the world over — and these columns are with them. It is hard to recall a prosecution as misguided as that which was brought against the general whose army, in league with the Central Intelligence Agency, played a heroic role in the fight against the communists during the long war in... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-optimum-death-panel/86877/ Thu, 10 Sep 2009 01:26:15 EST As President Obama was getting ready to address the joint meeting of Congress, we were alerted by the Drudge Report to Richard Pindar’s dispatch in the London Daily Telegraph on a new report that argues that the “cheapest way to combat climate change” is — wait for it — contraception. The report turns out to have been done for a British environmental organization called Optimum Population Trust. The report, put together for the Trust by the London School of Economics, stated that “[f] rom the... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/morgenthaus-message/86876/ Wed, 9 Sep 2009 02:57:17 EST That was quite a warning the district attorney of New York County, Robert Morgenthau, delivered earlier this week at the Brookings Institution in Washington. A version of it appears this week on the op-ed page of the Wall Street Journal. It is not often that the district attorney, who normally does his talking in a court room or in a press conference related to a specific case, goes public in a matter of international politics and strategy. But the DA is warning of the growing entente between... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/conrad-black-before-the-9/86871/ Tue, 19 May 2009 01:00:24 EST God Bless the Supreme Court of the United States, which has just decided to hear the appeal of the press baron Conrad Black, who has for more than a year been imprisoned at a federal correctional facility at Coleman, Florida. It would be far premature to suggest that the court’s decision to hear Black’s appeal means that he will win the argument at the high court. But it certainly puts paid the idea that the courts should have, as they did, dismissed out of hand Black’s insistence that he was... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/golden-opportunity/86870/ Tue, 12 May 2009 12:33:46 EST The big question following Secretary Geithner’s admission that monetary policy was in error during much of the Bush administration is whether the Congress is going to step up to its responsibilities in respect of the national currency. Mr. Geithner’s comments were made last week in response to a question from Charlie Rose about what mistakes he would see looking back. One the secretary cited was that, as he put it, “monetary policy around the world was too loose too long.” That, he said... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/sound-familiar/86869/ Tue, 28 Apr 2009 01:33:55 EST “Cheney for President” is the headline today over the first column by the New York Times’s newest op-ed regular, Ross Douthat — a delightful debut suggesting that, as Mr. Douthat puts it, “both the Republican Party and the country would be better off today if Cheney, rather than John McCain, had been a candidate for president in 2008.” Well, the left laughed, along with a number of Republicans, when The New York Sun suggested exactly that — more than two years before the Times. “Cheney’s... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-bailout-bust/86857/ Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Those who blame yesterday's dive in the stock market on the House of Representatives' failure to approve the Paulson-Pelosi bailout plan can consider that the market was down sharply yesterday even before the House vote, defying predictions that the agreement on a deal that was announced over the weekend would yield a rally. Half of the Wall Street adage — sell on Rosh Hashana, buy on Yom Kippur — was proven a day early. Everyone is talking about how to revive the bailout plan, but at a certain... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-arc-of-the-sun/86865/ Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST What a run. A newspaper founded by a company that was scheduled to be created on September 11, 2001, announces its last issue on September 29, 2008, the day of the largest one-day point drop in the history of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. It's easy to forget the boom years in between that were bracketed by the terrorist attacks and the financial crisis. Beginning a new daily newspaper in New York was an optimistic project. And in many ways the optimism that animated this venture has been... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/plus-Ca-change/86786/ Mon, 29 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST What an astonishing turn the campaign has taken in respect of the Battle of Iraq. It started out as something of a plebiscite on the war itself only to evolve — one can say on the basis of Friday's debate — into an argument in which it can be tricky to discover where Senators Obama and McCain differ in any significant way on Iraq save a dispute about which side of the debate they were on five years ago, when Mr. Obama represents he was against the war, although not in a position of having to... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/wealth-transfer/86787/ Mon, 29 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST As members of Congress prepare to vote on the Bush administration's plan to take troubled assets off bank balance sheets and put them in custody of the United States Treasury, here are two points to remember. First, the congressmen at least get a vote on the plan, which is more than the shareholders of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or AIG got before the government seized 80% of their companies. And second, while the administration from the president on down is full of scare talk about a huge... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-credit-crisis/86697/ Fri, 26 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The McCain campaign reports that yesterday's White House summit with President Bush, senators McCain and Obama, and the congressional leadership aimed at reaching an agreement on Secretary Paulson's plan to buy troubled mortgage-backed securities from financial institutions "devolved into a contentious shouting match." Thank goodness for checks and balances; if the Paulson plan runs aground in Congress, it would be fine with us. Our friends at the New York Post set out this week to document the... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/gun-nuts/86701/ Fri, 26 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST These columns have been defending Second Amendment rights against the Bloomberg administration, but there comes a point where the gun-dealers cross the line to indefensible, and the Daily News had a story this week about one such line. It turns out that Lauer Custom Weaponry in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, is selling what it calls the "Bloomberg Collection" — decorative gun finishes in "Manhattan Red," "Bronx Rose," "Brooklyn Blue," "Queens Green," and "Staten Island Orange." The company's Web... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/bailout-baloney/86592/ Thu, 25 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Well, which is it? On one hand, Secretary Paulson claims that the mortgage-backed securities on bank balance sheets are so "toxic" that letting them stay there puts the entire economy at risk. On the other hand, Mr. Paulson himself, and President Bush last night, claim that the value of the assets will eventually rise higher than the current market price, so that taxpayers will eventually recover much of the $700 billion Messrs. Bush and Paulson propose to spend buying up these assets. This is... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-real-culprits/86593/ Thu, 25 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The American Jewish community has fallen into a paroxysm of recrimination in the aftermath of Senator Clinton's dropping out of the rally against Iran, and of the disinvitation to Governor Palin that followed. A long article in the newspaper Yated Ne'eman asserts that "the real culprits in this story" were "the die-hard Democrat partisans within the three sponsoring groups" — the United Jewish Communities, the UJA-Federation of New York, and the Jewish Council on Public Affairs — "who were... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/the-early-vote/86485/ Wed, 24 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST We haven't had a single presidential debate yet, neither presidential candidate has voted on the proposed $700 billion bailout plan for Wall Street, and Al Qaeda has yet to spring the October surprise that our Eli Lake reported it is plotting. Nevertheless, voters are already casting presidential absentee ballots in Virginia, Georgia, and Kentucky. Here in New York City, the Board of Election says ballots won't be ready until the second week of October. Good. We're all for making it possible... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/paulsons-prices/86486/ Wed, 24 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Congress is concerned about the prospect that taxpayers will be on the hook for $2,300 apiece as part of what Senator Obama fretted yesterday will be a plan by Secretary Paulson to provide "a welfare program for corporate CEOs." Those who have been following Paulson's pattern so far can bet there is not a chance. The treasury secretary has such unusual power as a purchaser to set prices that we wouldn't be surprised, after all is said and done, if the government's losses end up being much less... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/ahmadinejad-in-new-york/86487/ Wed, 24 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST In some respects President Ahmadinejad's visit is a public relations mission. He told CNN that he would meet with Senators McCain and Obama. In the General Assembly, he played to the passions of the American left by railing about the "occupation of Iraq." On Israel he used Europe's oldest anti-Semitic language to blame "a small but deceitful number of people called Zionists" for "dominating an important portion of the financial and monetary centers." He told Los Angeles Times that Israel is an... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/schumers-straddle/86393/ Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The Democratic presidential nominee, Senator Obama, was on the campaign trail yesterday taking aim at someone who has been retired from the Senate since November 30, 2002 — Philip Gramm of Texas. In remarks prepared for delivery yesterday in Green Bay, Wisconsin, Mr. Obama called Mr. Gramm, "the architect in the U.S. Senate of the de-regulatory steps that helped cause this mess." It sent us scrambling for Senator Schumer's remarks back in 1999 on the passage of the conference report of S. 900... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/monroe-and-putin/86394/ Tue, 23 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Just in time for the big foreign policy debate between Senators McCain and Obama, Russia's nuclear flagship, Peter the Great, set off yesterday for Venezuela what Moscow and Caracas promise will be joint naval exercises. Wouldn't it be nice were the debate to be moderated by President Monroe, whose doctrine was designed to keep the Europeans from meddling in our hemisphere? The Kremlin camarilla has hinted that its gunboat diplomacy is a response to President Bush's decision to send warships... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/aigs-correction/86295/ Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST We wouldn't attribute all of Friday's 40% gain in the price of American International Group's stock to our editorial issued Friday morning suggesting that there might yet be a way for the shareholders to get a better deal than the one from the government, which left them with a scant 20% of what they had before. But the fact is that no sooner had The New York Sun noticed that the federal government's taking of an 80% share in American International Group would be subject to a shareholder vote... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/opinion/governor-palins-promise/86327/ Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST What a magnificent statement Governor Palin has issued in response to President Ahmadinejad's expected appearance Tuesday at the United Nations. Her prepared remarks appear on our front page today. What a disgrace that the political constellation couldn't figure out a way for her to express her sentiments and those of Senator McCain before the thousands of demonstrators who will gather to protest the Iranian's threats against Jewry, America, and the Free World. At first Senator Clinton was... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/confidence-game/86231/ Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST President Bush yesterday put the government takeover of AIG and Fannie Mae in the category of actions that "improve investor confidence." Count us — and more than a few AIG and Fannie Mae shareholders — as skeptical. One measure will be whether AIG shareholders vote to approve the deal at an upcoming, yet to be scheduled meeting. At least they, unlike Fannie Mae shareholders, are being given the courtesy of a vote before about 80% of their company is taken by the federal government. Not that... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/politics-of-hope/86232/ Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Senator Obama is telling his supporters to find their Republican neighbors and "argue with them and get in their face," the Associated Press reports. Mr. Obama is also getting nasty in his campaign: a study released this week by the University of Wisconsin's Wisconsin Advertising Project found that nationwide, following the political conventions, "56 percent of the McCain campaign ads were negative, while 77 percent of Obama's ads were negative." So much for the politics of hope that aimed to... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/priced-out/86233/ Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Think gasoline prices or Manhattan apartment prices have soared in recent years? That escalation is nothing compared to the price of becoming a citizen of America, for which the naturalization and fingerprinting fee has climbed to $675 from the $95 it cost in 1998. That is a 610% escalation over 10 years. The Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights highlighted the problem in a report released earlier this month, "Priced Out," which we read about in Albor Ruiz's column in the Daily... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/obamas-shorts/86234/ Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The Obama campaign convened a conference call earlier this week to flesh out the Democratic nominee's message on the financial crisis. It had two participants, both men: Lawrence Summers, who served as Treasury Secretary at the end of the Clinton administration before taking over as president of Harvard, and William Donaldson, who, as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission during the Bush administration, presided over the loosening of capital requirements for broker-dealers such as... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/taxes-of-the-times-iii/86137/ Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The New York Times has a recipe for responding to the financial crisis: raising taxes on New York City homeowners. That's right, with New Yorkers struggling to make mortgage payments and many of them newly out of work, the Times in an editorial yesterday endorsed a $1.5 billion a year increase in property taxes. Quoth the Times: "The City Council in New York should not stand in the way of raising the property tax." For those of us who are counting, and we are, this marks at least the eighth... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/exit-strategy/86120/ Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST One of the questions the next president will have to answer is what to do with the financial institutions that have been "Paulsonized." We speak of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and of American International Group, in all of which the federal government has emerged as a major shareholder under the leadership of the secretary of the Treasury, Henry Paulson. How long will the government hold on to its stakes in these firms? How will the stakes be unwound? Will there be a transparent auction of... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/signal-of-shame/86121/ Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Senator Clinton would be wise to reconsider her decision to pull out of a protest rally against President Ahmadinejad. The rally has been called by the National Coalition to Stop Iran Now, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, and other Jewish groups, who are planning to gather on September 22 outside the United Nations. The Jewish groups are acting because they recognize that the nature of the Iranian's public diplomacy is at its core anti-Semitic in a way more... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/its-only-money/86122/ Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST As millions of Americans check their portfolios to find out how they have personally been affected by what many reckon is the worse financial crisis since the Depression, here is a thought that may brighten your day: It's only money. And money, while important, is less important than many other things. Like family. Or friendships. Or happiness. Or health. Or integrity. So as many begin today poorer than at the beginning of the week, it is a time to remember to count all blessings and to... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/bring-back-greenberg/86042/ Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST As America was racing toward the nationalization of what is left of American International Group, we couldn't help think of Eliot Spitzer. Among all his mistakes, it's hard to think of one more catastrophic than his decision to force Maurice "Hank" Greenberg out of the leadership of AIG. The picture since then has not been a pretty one. As Mr. Greenberg put it yesterday in a letter, "In a little over a year, I, and other shareholders, have watched the company that I helped build over 35 years... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/change-in-cuba/86043/ Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Freedom House, an American non-profit group, this week released the results of a study it conducted of change in Cuba, where Fidel Castro has stepped down in favor of his brother Raúl. Five field researchers from Freedom House conducted interviews with 180 Cubans. The results provide a valuable corrective to those who romanticize life in Communist Cuba. According to Freedom House: "Beef is so scarce that its respondents said it is commonly referred to as oro negro, or black gold." Also... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/hurricane-henry/86044/ Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Ironically, a free-market-loving Republican administration is presiding over the most ambitious intrusion of government into the market in almost anyone's memory. But to what end? Bailouts, subsidies, and government insurance won't help Wall Street because the Street's fundamental problem isn't lack of capital. It's lack of trust. — Clinton administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich, in a posting on his blog. By deciding essentially to wipe out shareholders in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/in-defense-of-markets/85936/ Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST As the crisis on Wall Street tempts the politicians, someone needs to put in a word for free markets. Senator Obama is rushing to blame the Bush administration and New Yorkers and calls for more regulation. "The challenges facing our financial system today are more evidence that too many folks in Washington and on Wall Street weren't minding the store," Mr. Obama said in a statement yesterday. He added: "Eight years of policies that have shredded consumer protections, loosened oversight and... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/al-alusi-and-israel/85940/ Tue, 16 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The events in Baghdad involving the trip to Israel by a member of Iraq's parliament, Mithal al-Alusi, are shaping up as quite a test. On Sunday, members of Iraq's parliament moved to strip Mr. Alusi's parliamentary immunity from prosecution in order to charge him with treason for visiting the Jewish state. Mr. Alusi has attended this same counter-terrorism conference for the past four years. The law under which he is to be prosecuted is a 1969 statute dating back to the initial Baathist purges... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/gioias-success/85802/ Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST In January 2003, with the war in Iraq just over the horizon, President Bush faced many more pressing challenges than choosing a new chairman for the National Endowment for the Arts. But when he picked Dana Gioia to lead the once embattled agency, the president made what now looks like one of the most successful appointments of his administration. Mr. Gioia's recent announcement that he will step down at the beginning of 2009 marks the right moment to reflect on the revolution he made at the NEA... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/iranian-forfeit/85803/ Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Iran's wheelchair basketball team forfeited a game against America over the weekend at the Paralympics in Beijing. Press reports say Iran denied the withdrawal was political, but it seems clear to just about everyone that Iran was trying to avoid the potential of a match against Israel; according to the schedule, the winner of the U.S.-Iran game would have gone on to face the winner of the Canada-Israel game. It's only the latest episode in which Iranian athletes have tried to avoid Israelis... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/a-lehman-lesson/85804/ Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST A dispatch in Friday's New York Times noted in passing that the chief executive of Lehman Brothers, Richard Fuld, has seen "much of his wealth disappear." The value of his stock and options in the company had fallen by late last week to about $40 million from the $956 million they were worth at their peak in early 2007. We would say that the evaporation of $916 million in personal wealth over the course of a year and a half was unprecedented, except that the chief executive of Bear Stearns... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/garcia-for-governor/85760/ Fri, 12 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The talk around Foley Square is that the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, Michael Garcia, is eyeing Manhattan law firms to join as the Bush administration draws to a close. Here's hoping it is a departure akin to the tour one of his predecessors as U.S. attorney, Rudolph Giuliani, took at White & Case and at Anderson, Kill & Olick before running for public office. Because Mr. Garcia looks as if he'd be a great governor. He's certainly done better than anyone... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/bushs-legacy-in-danger/85761/ Fri, 12 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST President Bush is in danger, if he isn't careful, of seeing his foreign policy reputation erode in his final term of office from one of plain talk and bold action to one of tough talk accompanied by hesitation. What else to make of the report in the Israeli daily Ha'aretz that Israel is having trouble getting the Bush administration to agree to its requests for a package of security aid and a shared understanding that would facilitate an Israeli strike against Iranian nuclear facilities? The... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/a-scholar-as-leader/85642/ Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Apparently we aren't the only ones who thought the appointment of a young tapestry curator, Thomas Campbell, as the ninth director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art was an inspired choice. According to the outgoing director, Philippe de Montebello, Mr. Campbell received a minute-long standing ovation from museum staff at a reception on Tuesday afternoon, after the trustees voted to confirm his appointment. Mr. Campbell drew laughs at yesterday's press conference when he said, of his lack of... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/september-11-2008/85632/ Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST At moments it might seem as if the memories fade as the time passes but then all of a sudden the date creeps up and there it is. On one level it now seems all so long ago: Before The New York Sun had even started publishing, back when Barack Obama was serving in the Illinois state senate and President Bush was in his first year of his first term in office. But then for all of those who were in this city that day or know someone who was killed in the attack, there are moments when it all comes... Editorial of The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/editorials/rangels-taxes/85654/ Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST In March of 1938, President Franklin Roosevelt sent a letter to his commissioner of internal revenue, Guy Helvering. "My dear Commissioner Helvering," the letter began, "I am enclosing my income tax return for the calendar year 1937, together with my check for $15,000. I am wholly unable to figure out the amount of the tax ..." In the letter, which is reproduced in Amity Shlaes's book "The Forgotten Man," the president asks the Internal Revenue Service to answer the "problem in higher math" on...