A high-speed connection is no more an essential civil right than 3G cell phone service or a Netflix account. Increasing competition and restoring academic excellence in abysmal public schools is far more of an imperative to minority children than handing them iPads.

Washington continues to encourage ever more ill-considered lending in a misguided attempt to stave off needed market corrections. The currently proposed combination of a nationwide infrastructure spending orgy plus tax-cut bribes does nothing to remedy that.

At the dawn of his administration, President Obama opined: 'A democracy requires accountability, and accountability requires transparency.' Magical rays of white-hot sunlight emanated from his media-manufactured halo. And then bureaucratically engineered darkness settled over the land.

I stand with the Santa Barbara News-Press. How about you?

Most small-business owners will tell you they don't want Obama 'boosting' them. They just want him to get out of the way.

The deal looks bad and smells worse.

Let me sum up in two words how the unhinged Left copes with the threat of global jihad: "Kill Bush!"