Commentary by Michael Barone

Obama Must Defend NATO's Red Lines From Putin's Aggression by Michael Barone

Last week, masked men in camouflage garb with no insignia, dressed and equipped like Russian special forces, started taking over police stations and other government buildings in the Donets basin in Eastern Ukraine. They appeared to be working in tandem with local militias in defying the Ukrainian government.

This week, the Ukrainian government has responded by sending in military forces to counter these actions. There has been shooting and violence. But Ukraine's military doesn't seem capable of asserting control.

Dems Play Politics With Bogus 77-cent Differential in Male-Female Pay By Michael Barone

An economist serving on a second-term president's Council of Economic Advisers might expect to weigh in on fundamental issues, restructuring the tax system or making entitlement programs sustainable over the long term. Barack Obama once talked of addressing such issues, and Republican leaders such as House Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp are doing so.   

If You Think the Sky is Falling, Check out the Prophecies of the 1970s by Michael Barone

Forty years is roughly the length of a working lifetime -- and long enough for history to have taken some unexpected turns. And to have proved that long-term forecasts based on extrapolations of existing trends usually end up wide of the mark.

The list of failed prophecies from the 1970s is rather long. The conventional wisdom of the time was more than usually unreliable.

Ukrainians, and Americans, are the Children of History By Michael Barone

If you've been following events in Ukraine closely, you may have seen maps, available at electoralgeography.com, showing how the ethnic Russian areas voted heavily for one candidate and the ethnic Ukrainian areas for another. 

Millennials Choose the Path of Least Resistance By Michael Barone

When Alexis de Tocqueville visited America in 1830, he was struck by how many Americans were participating in voluntary associations. It was quite a contrast with his native France, where power was centralized in Paris and people did not trust each other enough to join in voluntary groups.

Tocqueville might have a different impression should he, utilizing time travel, visit the America of 2030. Or so I conclude on reading the recently released Pew Research Center report on the attitudes and behavior of America's Millennial generation.

Obama's Top-and-Bottom Coalition Shows Signs of Strain By Michael Barone

America's two major political parties are inevitably coalitions, forced by the winner-take-all Electoral College and the need of candidates in single-member congressional districts to amass 50 percent of the vote, or nearly that, to win election.

Obama's 'Flexibility' Leads to a Dangerous World By Michael Barone

"This is my last election," President Obama said in words caught on an open mic. "After my election, I have more flexibility."

Hillary Clinton Won't Have an Easy Ride to Presidency By Michael Barone

Will Hillary Clinton be elected America's next president? The polls suggest she will.

Having a Venerable Name Can Be a Key to Upward Mobility by Michael Barone

America used to be a land with great upward social mobility, but isn't anymore. America never was a land with great upward social mobility

Which do you believe? Keep in mind that your answer will have significant implications for public policy.

Michael Barone, senior political analyst at the Washington Examiner, (www.washingtonexaminer.com), where this article first appeared, is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Fox News Channel contributor and a co-author of The Almanac of American Politics. To find out more about Michael Barone, and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2014 THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

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Democratic Strategists in 2014 Are Like French Generals in 1940 By Michael Barone

It is reminiscent of the quandary faced by Gen. Maurice Gamelin on the evening of May 15, 1940. Suddenly he realized that German panzer troops had broken through the supposedly impassable Ardennes.   

For Good Highways, Use Tolls and Ditch the Gasoline Tax By Michael Barone

Last month, Barack Obama traveled to snowy St. Paul, Minn., the same place where in the sunnier days of June 2008 he predicted that his clinching of the Democratic presidential nomination would be remembered as "the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and the earth began to heal."

This time in St. Paul he addressed a lesser problem, one within the ambit of a president's powers: transportation.

Obama's Mistaken Belief That Others See the World as He Sees It By Michael Barone

Solipsism. It's a fancy word that means that the self is the only existing reality and that the external world, including other people, are representations of one's own self and can have no independent existence. A person who follows this philosophy may believe that others see the world as he does and will behave as he would.   

Don't Write Those Tea Party Obituaries Just Yet By Michael Barone

February marked the fifth anniversary of the reemergence of the label "Tea Party" in American politics. It was in February 2009 that Rick Santelli delivered his famous rant on CNBC, and a few days later, a group calling itself the Tea Party Patriots was organized.

Protesters in Ukraine and Venezuela Seek the Rule of Law By Michael Barone

What motivates people to demonstrate in central squares, day after day and week after week, against repressive regimes at the risk of life and limb? It's a question raised most recently by events in Ukraine and Venezuela.

In Hyperpartisan Era, Only Candidates Can Change Outcomes By Michael Barone

Former House Speaker Tip O'Neill famously said that all politics is local. And it mostly was, in his time: He was first elected to the Massachusetts legislature's lower house in 1936 and became its speaker in 1949, and was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1952 and became its speaker in 1977.

Those were years when there was constant churning and turmoil in partisan politics. Yankee Republicans yielded majority status to Catholic Democrats in O'Neill's Massachusetts.

UAW Loss in Chattanooga a Repudiation of 1930s Unionism By Michael Barone

It is 611 miles from the United Auto Workers headquarters in Detroit to Volkswagen's assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tenn. It's a long day's drive, about 10 hours almost entirely on Interstate 75, but it turned out to be too far for the UAW.

Or so one must judge from the results of the unionization election last week in Chattanooga. Volkswagen employees voted 712-626 against certifying the UAW as their bargaining agent.

The Failure of Obama's Aristocracy of Merit By Michael Barone

The roots of American liberalism are not compassion, but snobbery. That's the thesis of Fred Siegel's revealing new book, "The Revolt Against the Masses: How Liberalism Has Undermined the Middle Class."   

'Disparate Impact' Doctrine Often Hurts Those it's Intended to Help by Michael Barone

Disparate impact. That's a phrase you don't hear much in everyday conversation. But it's the shorthand description of a legal doctrine with important effects on everyday American life -- and more if Barack Obama and his political allies get their way.

Consider the Department of Justice and Department of Education policies on school discipline. In a "dear colleague" letter distributed last month, the departments noted that "students of certain racial or ethnic groups tend to be disciplined more than their peers."

Michael Barone, senior political analyst at the Washington Examiner, where this article first appeared (www.washingtonexaminer.com), is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Fox News Channel contributor and a co-author of The Almanac of American Politics. To find out more about Michael Barone, and read features by other Creators writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.

COPYRIGHT 2014 THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

DISTRIBUTED BY CREATORS.COM

Is Obama Seeking an Opening to Iran the way Richard Nixon did With China? By Michael Barone

Is Barack Obama trying to shift alliances in the Middle East away from traditional allies and toward Iran? Robert Kaplan, author and geopolitical analyst for the Stratford consulting firm, thinks so.

Americans Learn to Succeed by Learning From Failure By Michael Barone

America succeeds because Americans fail and forgive. That's the intriguing message -- or part of it -- of Megan McArdle's new book "The Up Side of Down: Why Failing Well Is the Key to Success."