Opinion: In today’s pages: Presidential power, downtown makeovers, healthcare, and Hillary
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The editorial board says President Bush is right to scrutinize earmarks, but he might be using it as a way to extend executive power:
More scrutiny of earmarks is an undeniably good thing. Lawmakers’ pet projects account for a slender slice of the federal budget -- about one-half of 1% -- yet they feed much of the cynicism that the public feels about Congress and its penchant for spending. Bush’s stance, however, betrays more concern about executive branch power than about taxpayer dollars poured into questionable projects.
The board examines the crisis in Lebanon spurred by two bombings this month. The board also asks City Hall to be pragmatic with its plans to remake downtown’s Broadway.
Columnist Tim Rutten takes a look at another would-be downtown makeover -- this one a developer’s dystopian, ‘Blade Runner’-inspired vision. USC’s Harry P. Pachon and Columbia University’s Rodolfo O. de la Garza say Hillary Clinton can count on Latinos. Author Michael D’Antonio argues that Explorer may not have beaten Sputnik to space, but it did represent a greater scientific breakthrough. And state Sen. Mark Ridley-Thomas thinks the now-defeated ABX1 1 was California’s best chance at healthcare reform.
Readers react to historian Sean Wilentz’s argument that there’s no comparing Barack Obama to Abraham Lincoln or John Kennedy. See why Los Angeles’ Donald Cosentino says, ‘A scholar ought not to disguise such partisan rants as historical analyses.’