Skip ahead to page content

entitlements.jpg

Remembering the 9/11 victims

September 11, 2008 | By Nathaniel Ward

September 11, 2001 is a day of stories. Everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news that terrorists had murdered thousands of their countrymen in the Pentagon, the World Trade Center and a Pennsylvania cornfield.

The stories of all those involved in the Pentagon attack and its aftermath—the victims, the responders, their families and friends—converged at a new memorial dedicated Thursday.

» Read more about the ceremony and the memorial on MyHeritage.org

—David Talbot

Don't neglect homeland security

Seven years after the brutal terrorist attacks, Heritage Foundation experts continue to advance common-sense ideas to keep America safe at home and overseas.

"The anniversary of the 9/11 attacks should remind both campaigns that the issue of homeland security cannot be ignored," Heritage's Jena Baker McNeill argues.

In an article coauthored with and David Heyman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Heritage national security expert James Carafano expresses a similar worry.

» Continue reading to find out the real solutions for homeland security

Heritage's new weekly column

Last week, The Heritage Foundation launched a new initiative with the Washington Times to help take the conservative message to key decision-makers and the American people.

Heritage's "What's the Big Idea" column, which spotlights Heritage's take on current issues, is now featured on page A4 of the Washington Times every Thursday.

Heritage's Stuart Butler kicked off the initiative last Thursday with a column about policies that will encourage Americans to save. This week, Kim Holmes explains the need to establish a Global Freedom Coalition to deal with challenges to freedom that the United Nations cannot handle.

The column will also offer a platform for good ideas developed by state-based policy organizations across the country. To find summaries and links to a wide variety of research by state-based policy organizations, visit Heritage's InsiderOnline.org website.

—David Talbot

Freedom versus socialism in America

Speaking last month at an event sponsored by the Colorado Committee for Heritage, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) explains why Americans must return to the principles of freedom and constitutionalism.

An excerpt:

I'm afraid that America is sliding towards socialism.  Government is now the nation's largest property owner (controlling nearly 1/3 of the land mass), it effectively owns more than 1/3 of the profits of all businesses and more than 1/3 of the incomes of most working Americans.  Government controls the majority of education and healthcare services in America.  It owns the primary retirement income plan for most Americans (Social Security).  The federal government, through a burdensome regulatory system and undecipherable tax code, effectively controls a significant portion of the nation's economic development and business activity.  And now the government has gotten into the mortgage business!

America's style of socialism is more subtle and, on the surface, appears more benign than early twentieth century European socialism. America's federal government has not yet taken over or nationalized any industry, but it has increasingly expanded control through regulation, increased government ownership through confiscatory taxes, and in the case of healthcare, expanded control through fixed prices and mandatory service requirements.

Many on the Left now openly discuss socializing medicine and the energy industry, he warns. So what's the antidote? You'll need to read his full remarks for his answer.

Other Heritage work of note

  • Health Care. Congress may soon take up the renewal of a health care program intended to cover low-income children. When Congress last considered its renewal, the leading proposal would have served as a stepping-stone to socialized medicine by expanding the program's reach and scope. In a thorough new analysis, Heritage expert Dennis Smith argues that this time, "Congress should refocus the program on the population for which it was originally designed­—children in low-income working families above Medicaid eligibility—but not on children from higher-income families."
  • American Leadership. Ryan O'Donnell summarizes The Heritage Foundation's recommendations on how to respond to Russia's invasion of Georgia. "Through its actions in Georgia, Russia has made clear that it has little faith in—or respect for—the West's diplomatic, military, or economic resolve," he warns ominously. "Thus far, the West's response has done little to invalidate Moscow's geopolitical assessments."
  • Entitlements and Entrepreneurship. How did mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac end up controlled by the federal government? "The answer," Heritage's Conn Carroll explains, "is certainly not 'too much deregulation' of the marketplace. Freddie and Fannie are not, and never were, private companies. Instead they are quasi-public/private mutants — Fannie is a relic of the New Deal and Freddie was chartered by Congress in 1970 — that are owned by shareholders but, until this year, also enjoyed an implicit guarantee that the federal government would cover their losses."
  • American Leadership. Is North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il actually dead, as some news outlets have suggested? Possibly, Heritage foreign policy expert Peter Brookes writes in the New York Post, though "every few years, news of Kim's incapacitation — or death — makes the rounds, based on intelligence, rumor or even the reading of tea leaves." If Kim is actually dead, America and its allies should work quickly to answer a few key questions: Who is his successor? Who controls the country's nuclear weapons? What will China do?

In other news

  • Is the Iraq war winding down? Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has suggested as much. "I have cautioned that no matter what you think about the origins of the war in Iraq, we must get the endgame there right," he told member of Congress Wednesday. "I believe we have now entered that endgame."
  • The federal government is balking at a Colorado man's attempt to donate high-grade marble to replace a cracked portion of the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington Cemetery. Government bureaucrats resist the donation, the Denver Post reports, "because it is free and has not gone through a pricey bidding and specification process."
  • A Maryland judge has allowed Montgomery County, a Washington suburb, to enact a law barring discrimination against those with different "gender identities." The Washington Post reports that "the law prohibits discrimination based on gender identity in housing, employment, taxi service, cable service and public accommodations."
  • Thirteen current and former employees of the Department of the Interior have been accused of improper relationships with energy company employees. Perhaps if government agencies held less power, energy firms would be less tempted to seek influence through this sort of corruption.

Coming up at Heritage

To attend these or any other events at Heritage please RSVP at Heritage's website. Or you can view these events live online. All times are Eastern.

  • On Thursday, September 18 at 5:00 p.m., Heritage scholar Lee Edwards hosts a screening of The Soviet Story, a documentary that tells the story of the Soviet regime and how the Soviet Union – an Allied power at the time – helped Nazi Germany instigate the Holocaust as well as the slaughter of its own people on an industrial scale.

Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation. David Talbot contributed to this report.