Friday Linkfest

There's a treasure trove of good reading today at National Review Online.

Charles Krauthammer on Syria and Iran:

Human rights — decency — is reason enough to do everything we can to bring down Assad. But strategic opportunity compounds the urgency. With its archipelago of clients anchored by Syria, Iran is today the greatest regional threat — to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states terrified of Iranian nuclear hegemony; to traditional regimes menaced by Iranian jihadist subversion; to Israel, which the Islamic republic has pledged to annihilate; to America and the West, whom the mullahs have vowed to drive from the region.

Anthony Paletta on why Leftists hate vigilante films:

The principal objection, in each case, seems not aesthetic, but moral; the offense is to create one-dimensional criminals that one need not regret seeing handled with summary force, with nary a glance at their broken homes, or hungry children, or kindness to animals.

Rich Lowry warns that sugar is the next tobacco:

If this all seems good for yuks, just wait ten years. Before it’s over, the offending food and beverage companies — the “sugar merchants,” as a journalist sympathetic to Lustig’s case puts it — could well be as beaten-down as the tobacco companies. One of Lustig’s co-authors refers to sugar as “the substance.” The article cites “the dependence-producing properties of sugar in humans.” The predicate is there for making Little Debbie, despite her wholesome red curls and cheery slogan (“Unwrap a Smile”), into the moral equivalent of a drug pusher.

Jay Nordlinger, from his "Impromptus" column:

A month ago, I had a couple of indignant notes in Impromptus (here). Indignant Note 1: “I was talking to someone the other day who told me, with exquisite condescension, that ‘political elites’ disagreed with me. And here I thought I was one! Who does the certification?” Indignant Note 2: “This same fellow said he could not go along with something I said because — get this — ‘I’m a writer and I care about words.’ And here I thought I cared a little about words, and did a little writing! Maybe I should return to the pro shop, selling sleeves of Titleists . . .”

Michelle Malkin doesn't think much of Virginia congressman Jim Moran:

Responding on cable news to GOP congressman Allen West’s blunt criticisms of President Obama this week, Moran derided the retired U.S. Army colonel, who is black, as “not representative of the African-American community.” Moran then launched into the kind of tired race-traitor tirade I’ve heard from progressives of pallor for more than 20 years.