Kansas City Star: E. Thomas McClanahan

Wait, how did two years stretch into 28?

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 17:00 CDT

I learned the truth of Voltaire's dictum, that the "necessity of saying something, the perplexity of having nothing to say, and a desire of being witty, are three circumstances which alone are capable of making even the greatest writer ridiculous."

A moratorium for Obamacare

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 10:46 CDT

Obamacare has never been popular and as time passes it has become even less so. The best course now is a moratorium: Implementation of Obamacare should be delayed.

An industrial-era monstrosity slouches toward birth

Sun, 07 Apr 2013 07:54 CDT

With Obamacare's main provisions only a few months from full implementation, the law is now moving through the economy like a statutory disruptor beam. It's hard to see how this thing will ever be workable, or affordable.

Often-used number understates women's progress

Sat, 16 Mar 2013 17:00 CDT

The National Committee for Pay Equity, citing a Census Bureau number, says earnings for women are "statistically unchanged," with women receiving only 77 percent of men's earnings. What many people don't know is that this is a cherry-picked number and the idea that it's an accurate measure of discrimination is grossly misleading.

Obama's coverage may take on a harder edge

Sat, 09 Mar 2013 17:00 CST

The media may be biased -- as press critic Howard Kurtz noted at CNN, "there is little question that they have a social and cultural outlook that leans to the left" -- but reporters love a winner and detest a loser.

Obama's speech as seen 'on the margin'

Sat, 16 Feb 2013 17:00 CST

At any given moment, there are millions of people and businesses "on the margin," as economists say. In plain terms, they're barely getting by. Here's how the president's address last week might have been viewed by one of them.

A suitable remedy for an unsuitable ruling

Sat, 09 Feb 2013 17:00 CST

The Kansas Constitution says the state must make "suitable provision for finance" of public schools. Whatever committee came up with that may have seen the word as unthreatening. But what does it mean? What's suitable for one person may be unsuitable for another.

Why the GOP should back immigration reform

Sat, 02 Feb 2013 17:00 CST

Republican support for immigration reform won't guarantee more Hispanic votes, but outright resistance would harden attitudes among such voters for years. But Republicans shouldn't back reform solely for political reasons. They should support it because it's solidly in the national interest.

Ignore those people in the back and party on!

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 17:00 CST

President Obama's inaugural speech struck the notes expected on such occasions. He evoked our founding documents. He used words like "timeless" and "enduring," and as with most Obama speeches, it was a fine performance. Yet after four years you know this president doesn't always mean what he says.

Whatever happens, it's all 'climate change'

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 17:00 CST

If the temperature isn't rising globally then "climate change" is pretty much anything bad that happens. The Earth may well start warming again and human activity may be the cause, but there are signs that many people have lost patience with the greens' insistent predictions of doom.

Inside the White House parallel universe

Sat, 12 Jan 2013 17:00 CST

President Barack Obama fights every attempt to cut non-defense spending and on entitlement reform. He's offered nothing substantial. If this doesn't change, we'll look back on the Obama years as a time not only of economic stagnation but a period when our worst problems were simply allowed to fester.

How an anti-redlining law fed the housing bubble

Sat, 29 Dec 2012 17:00 CST

One of the major points of contentions in the aftermath of the housing debacle was whether the Community Reinvestment Act -- an anti-redlining law -- contributed to the disaster. Defenders of the law insisted it did not, but it's harder for backers to support that conclusion now, after the release of a working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

How should we deal with agonized loners?

Sat, 22 Dec 2012 17:00 CST

Part of any solution to tragedies such as the one in Newtown, Conn., involves politics and policy, especially a reassessment of how we care for the mentally ill. But more broadly, it also has to do with social capital, and I don't know how you fix that solely with politics.

Despite today's gloom, U.S. strengths remain

Sat, 15 Dec 2012 17:55 CST

If we're fretting about something we can see and debate, such as the looming "fiscal cliff," that could be a good sign. So maybe it's time to attempt an optimistic column. The immediate future may look awful, but when you look past that you find reminders of America's enduring strengths.

Obama ducked when his moment arrived

Sat, 08 Dec 2012 17:00 CST

Republicans are talking about caving on higher rates and fighting for serious entitlement reform, or caving now and fighting over spending in the next debt-ceiling crisis, due early next year. It's worth considering that the fiscal picture might be a lot healthier today had Barack Obama recognized his moment -- his historic opportunity -- when he saw it.

The Obama years could become our 'lost decade'

Sat, 01 Dec 2012 16:00 CST

If Barack Obama gets his way and carves the loopholes out of the tax code and raise the rates, we could face four more years of economic anemia -- which means we may someday look back on the Obama years as the Japanese look back on their "lost decade."

The United States, future energy superpower

Sat, 17 Nov 2012 16:00 CST

Let's recognize that there aren't any environmentally cost-free ways to produce energy. And while the shale revolution entails risk, the risks must be balanced against its considerable benefits. If the trend holds, a lot more Americans will have jobs, the nation will become an energy superpower and the Middle East will drop several notches on Washington's priority list.

For Republicans, a time of soul-searching

Sat, 10 Nov 2012 16:00 CST

Last week, I kept thinking of those images you see after tornadoes hit towns -- homes reduced to kindling, survivors picking through wreckage. That's pretty much how it felt Wednesday morning. I believed the predictions that Mitt Romney would win big. The autopsies will go on for some time, but what looms large for me is the issue of trust.

Obama had his chance; it's time to hire a new man

Sat, 03 Nov 2012 18:17 CDT

The nation's problems are so deep that even with the best of luck, a Mitt Romney administration isn't likely to offer profound change and transformation. But that's not what's needed. What's needed is to turn the ship, so that the problems we face stop festering or getting worse and start improving.

A campaign of happy photos and hollow promises

Sat, 27 Oct 2012 16:00 CDT

The striking thing about this campaign is that the guy who looks and behaves like the challenger is the incumbent -- President Barack Obama.

Obama turns on party, morphs into moderate grand bargainer

Sat, 27 Oct 2012 23:03 CDT

Could I accept the re-election of President Barack Obama? When this idea was suggested, what popped into my head was a scene from "Doctor Zhivago" -- the one with the protagonist slogging through a snowstorm toward a bleak horizon.

Mitt Romney's approach on China smacks of overkill

Sat, 20 Oct 2012 16:00 CDT

The tougher-than-thou poses on China have become routine in presidential campaigns, but these threats, if carried out, could hit American consumers with higher prices and spark damaging tit-for-tat responses from Beijing.

Sorry, but Obamacare is still a fiscal train wreck

Sat, 13 Oct 2012 16:00 CDT

Soon after the Supreme Court upheld the bulk of Obamacare, the Congressional Budget Office came out with a new estimate for its cost. No surprise: As before, CBO said it would reduce, not raise, the federal deficit. Too bad it's a fairy tale. With the election only weeks away, the point must be emphasized: This law is a fiscal calamity.

Romney still faces a tough sales job on Medicare

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 16:00 CDT

The credibility boost that Mitt Romney gave himself in the first presidential debate will help him sell his Medicare plan, a critical part of his platform. But he has a long way to go. Romney has to convince voters that he's proposing a reasonable modernization of a program that otherwise will crash of its own weight.

America's food Nazis are on the march

Sat, 29 Sep 2012 17:00 CDT

When first lady Michelle Obama began her anti-obesity campaign, I thought, Yeah, seems like a good idea. Get the kids outside and by all means, limit their intake of sugar water, er, soda. But worrisome signs were there from the beginning.