A Variety of Subjects!

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Gelb asks you to gulp and then swallow!(See 1 below.)

Other commentary on Obama and Kerry's Iran Deal! (See 1a, 1b below.)
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My dear friend, John Agresto, has just published a new book. I am in the process of getting a copy and I know it will be an excellent read as was his last telling the story of his endeavor to rebuild the institutions of higher learning in Iraq: "Mugged By Reality."

John taught my oldest daughter at Kenyon College and asked me to be his sole designate for a Board of Advisor's position when he became president of St John's College , Santa Fe Campus.I served in that capacity for eight years.

John has a brilliant mind, is an excellent speaker and I asked him to speak when I started my JEA Speaker Series but we could never come up with a date that mutually worked. I am going to try again and see if he will come to Savannah for a book signing. (See 2 below.)

• Paperback: 236 pages
• Publisher: Asahina & Wallace (June 27, 2015)
• Price $16.00

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1940412161/ref=as_li_qf_sp_asin_il_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1940412161&linkCode=as2&tag=asawal04-20&linkId=6VJ2N5QQRTBIIGBZ

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Kim Strassel writes about an interesting man who has a program that works .

I have said for eons, Blacks have enslaved themselves to Democrats and have gotten little in return beyond handouts which destroyed their family unit, fractured their connection with their churches and demeaned their spirit. They have been played for fools.

Republicans foolishly concluded they could not regain their vote by campaigning for it .

Our own Meg Heap has proven a conservative can win the trust and respect of the black community because she has delivered on her commitment to serve all the citizens of Chatham County and to be fair in the process.

Rick Perry, most likely, will not get the Republican  nomination but he gets the Black connection! (See 3 and 3a below.)
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An embarrassment of riches? (See 4 below.)
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I have always said we have the best Congress money can buy: "Lobbyists now officially"own" Congress 
"Corporations now spend about $2.6 billion a year on reported lobbying expenditures – more than the $2 billion we spend to fund the House ($1.16 billion) and Senate ($820 million)..." 

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Mona Charen moans! (See 5 below.)

===A response to Ms. Dobrzynski's excellent review of Maine's Eight and her comment about my dear departed friend,  Lamar Dodd:

"My wife and I just returned from a 41 day coast to coast drive and we visited museums in Mobile, New Orleans,many in Texas from The Stark in Orange Texas to the Pacific War/Nimitz Museum in Fredericksburg, Texas, the wonderful museums in Fort Worth, San Antonio, Kerrville, Blanton in Austin,Don Judd in Marfa and, the amazing  Amerind in Dragoon Arizona,  as well as the magnificent museums in Oklahoma City and Tulsa among others and thus was fascinated by Judith Dobrzynski's review of Maine's Eight.

Her comment about my dear friend, Lamar Dodd, and his lack of a niche and thus fame, is mostly fair. That said, Lamar was a great administrator and I suggest his "Heart Series and NASA Space Paintings are unique and magnificent for their symbolism and richness of color .Lamar was a genius in his use of materials and a master of form..

I daresay, had Lamar devoted his life to painting full time, remained in New York and committed to being part of "the scene" he would have gained the fame Ms. Dobzynski claims he never achieved but he chose to be a big fish in a smaller pond and we Georgians will forever be richer for his decision." (See 6 below.)
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Dick
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1)  The Real Reason Obama Did the Iran Deal
By Leslie H. Gelb

Both Iran and the United States essentially got what they wanted from the 159-page nuclear deal agreed upon Tuesday in Vienna.

The Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s gains were more tangible than President Barack Obama’s. The Supreme Leader got significant sanctions relief for his ailing economy, the launch pad for Iran to become a more formidable Mideast power. Mr. Obama stretched Iran’s nuclear breakout time from a few months to over a year with strengthened inspection rights. But according to top administration officials, Mr. Obama has always been after something much bigger than capping Iran’s nuclear program, and he got it—the strategic opportunity to begin converting Iran from foe to “friend.”

Iranian negotiators understood well what’s been driving the U.S. president, and they have used the prospect of becoming “a friend” as their best bargaining card. For over a year now in small private conversations and strolls, they have been painting rosy pictures of Iranian-American cooperation.

The Iranian list of possibilities goes to most of Washington’s principal worries about the broad Middle East. They would step up their fighting alongside Iraqi troops to combat the so-called Islamic State (ISIS or ISIL) in central Iraq. And they would do much more in Syria to go after the headquarters and main forces that ISIS has there. They spoke of finding “solutions” to the civil war in Yemen between Sunnis and Iran-backed Shiites. They raised hopes of forging better relations with America’s “partners” in the Gulf. They pressed the idea of  renewing the cooperation they once had with the U.S. fighting the Taliban at the beginning of the Afghan war.

However, they said little or nothing about Lebanon, so as not to jeopardize the strong position there of their Hezbollah allies, or about their backing of Hamas in Gaza. And U.S. diplomats couldn’t get anything positive from them about Israel, the country that feels greatly threatened by Iran and fervently opposes any nuclear agreement with Tehran. But neither did Iranian diplomats close these doors.

To a large segment of foreign policy specialists and diplomats, such strategic openings are the very stuff of diplomacy, the real basis for reducing conflict and danger between nations, for putting the use of nuclear weapons into the background. But it seems for most politicians and legislators in Congress, these perspectives are too iffy and in the case of Iran, naïve.

So, as Republican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Sunday, the deal will be a “hard sell” in Congress. And these opponents won’t be moved by the fact that the vast majority of Iranians seek close relations with the U.S.—just as they closed their eyes to popular wishes in Mr. Obama’s opening to Cuba. Besides, critics just don’t buy the idea that Iran’s ruling clergy and the Revolutionary Guard will surrender internal power to anyone, let alone the pro-Western majority, or modify anti-American and anti-Israeli policies.

With Iran’s more than 30 years of backing its own terrorists and threatening American friends in the Mideast, congressional opponents will be looking for any reasons, any excuses, to oppose the Vienna deal.

If the past is prologue, few legislators will actually read the long and complex document. Instead they will rely on like-minded staffers and experts to reinforce their own prejudices. (And fortunately for them, the press won’t ask them hard questions to reveal their ignorance.)

Here will be the main lines of opposition:

First, the White House originally promised it would totally eliminate Iran’s nuclear program. Essentially true. But it was a dumb promise. There was no chance Iran would agree to this—none—then or now. And notice that virtually all those who wanted Iran to give up all nukes never made remotely similar demands when it came to North Korea’s nuclear program and mostly just bit their tongues as Pakistan crossed the nuclear threshold on its way to building almost 150 nuclear weapons today. It has to be asked, who is more likely to use nukes—North Korea, Pakistan, or Iran? Most experts pick Pakistan first, then North Korea.

Second, critics will argue that Iran continues its support of terrorists and efforts to overthrow Israel and the Gulf states. Also true. Of course, Iran continues to damage American interests, but these talks are about slowing its climb toward nuclear weapons, not instantly settling steamy Mideast problems.

Third, the critics say the U.S. could have had its way with the mullahs had Mr. Obama only strangled the Iranian economy with more sanctions. There are only a couple of problems with this argument. One is that no nation, including those far weaker economically than Iran, has ever capitulated after economic sanctions. Notice Russia, Cuba, and North Korea. And two, while Iran’s economy is hurting, almost all experts agree that it is nowhere near crumbling. Recent studies by conservative outlets such as the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and The Economist demonstrate just that.

Iran has the 17th-largest economy in the world. Its growth has slowed in the face of sanctions, but it still manages, and it has also held up well enough in the face of declining oil and gas prices, the proceeds of which account for 60 percent or so of Iran’s economy.

As for the heart of the nuclear agreement— for certain it is not perfect, but it does represent clear steps forward in holding Tehran to account on its nuclear efforts. All provisions regarding developing uranium or plutonium hold Iran way below where it is at present and where it’s been headed.

These restrictions aren’t everything, but they are far better than what exists without an agreement today—or what Iran could do tomorrow.

Inspection rights aren’t perfect either, but they go far beyond present commitments under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. No inspection rights in any arms control treaty have ever been air tight. No country, neither Iran nor the U.S., would permit open-ended inspections.

The worrisome provisions pertain to the lifting of sanctions. Counter to Tehran’s wishes, they won’t be lifted all at once or all soon. A big chunk will be removed soon after the agreement is formally approved, but then, the bulk of the sanctions by the U.S. and others will come off over the course of years. Some might not be lifted by the U.S. Congress for many, many years.

A legitimate worry is that Iran will cheat or otherwise not live up to the agreement’s obligations, and that the sanctioning parties will let them get away with it. Indeed, China and Russia could look the other way and probably will. It’s also probable that the other signatories—Britain, France, Germany, and the European Union—won’t be tough in their responses to violations.

These concerns give real weight to the argument that this agreement in its execution could allow Tehran to have its nuclear capacity and a much stronger economy as well.

The only protection here would be for Washington to go to its negotiating partners now and try to tie down how they will deal with possible violations collectively. If Paris, London, Moscow, Beijing, and Berlin can’t agree with Washington on common strong actions at this point, they should realize they are jeopardizing congressional passage of the deal that has taken all of them three years to negotiate. This collective commitment by the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany is the best counter argument to the criticism that Obama’s hope for a strategic opening to Tehran is a pipe dream.

This is the only way to show they won’t allow the great opportunity they have created to be subverted in a way that makes Iran stronger while it creates ever-greater problems.

1a)

Obama's Iran Deal Has the Makings of a Catastrophe

By Daniel Pipes

Barack Obama has repeatedly signaled during the past six and a half years that that his No. 1 priority in foreign affairs is not China, not Russia, not Mexico, but Iran. He wants to bring Iran in from the cold, to transform the Islamic Republic into just another normal member of the so-called international community, ending decades of its aggression and hostility.

In itself, this is a worthy goal; it's always good policy to reduce the number of enemies. (It brings to mind Nixon going to China.) The problem lies, of course, in the execution.

Barack Obama announcing the Iran deal on July 14.

The conduct of the Iran nuclear negotiations has been wretched, with the Obama administration inconsistent, capitulating, exaggerating, and even deceitful. It forcefully demanded certain terms, then soon after conceded these same terms. Secretary of State John Kerry implausibly announced that we have “absolutely knowledge” of what the Iranians have done until now in their nuclear program and therefore have no need for inspections to form a baseline. How can any adult, much less a high official, make such a statement?

The administration misled Americans about its own concessions: After the November 2013 Joint Plan of Action, it came out with a factsheet which Tehran said was inaccurate. Guess who was right? The Iranians. In brief, the U.S. government has shown itself deeply untrustworthy.

The agreement signed today ends the economic sanctions regime, permits the Iranians to hide much of their nuclear activities, lacks enforcement in case of Iranian deceit, and expires in slightly more than a decade. Two problems particularly stand out: The Iranian path to nuclear weapons has been eased and legitimated; Tehran will receive a “signing bonus” of some US$150 billion that greatly increases its abilities to aggress in the Middle East and beyond.

The United States alone, not to speak of the P5+1 countries as a whole, have vastly greater economic and military power than the Islamic Republic of Iran, making this one-sided concession ultimately a bafflement.

The smart guys (two Iranians) wear tie-less white shirts and look the happiest.

Of the administration's accumulated foreign-policy mistakes in the last six years, none have been catastrophic for the United States: Not the Chinese building islands, the Russians taking Crimea, or the collapse into civil wars of Libya, Yemen, Syria, and Iraq. But the Iran deal has the makings of a catastrophe.

Attention now shifts to the U.S. Congress to review today's accord, arguably the worst treaty not just in American history or modern history, but ever. Congress must reject this deal. Republican senators and representatives have shown themselves firm on this topic; will the Democrats rise to the occasion and provide the votes for a veto override? They need to feel the pressure.

Mr. Pipes is president of the Middle East Forum.

1b) Obama and Iran: A Created New Superpower

Center for Security Policy, Christopher Holton

This Iran nuclear deal was always in the works. It was pre-ordained with Obama’s election. We must view it in the context of Obama’s entire background. For instance, his 20-year membership in the vile anti-semite, Reverend Jeremiah Wright’s church. Or his attendance at a pro-Palestinian farewell party for Palestinian activist and academic darling Rashid Khalidi that turned into a veritable orgy of Israel hatred. Our corrupt media has covered that up; the Los Angeles Times has video of the event but has suppressed it. The bottom line is that Obama believes that because Israel has nuclear weapons Iran is entitled to them as well. He was never committed to preventing a nuclear-armed Iran and this deal ensures that Iran will become a nuclear power and sanctions will end, rewarding the Ayatollahs for decades of unlawful behavior.

Future generations will ask: “How did they ever let it happen?”

The other aspect of this is that Iran’s ire isn’t just directed at Israel. Israel is the “Little Satan.” America is the “Great Satan.” This will change the world in which America operates.

Allowing Iran to go nuclear is infinitely worse than allowing North Korea to go nuclear.

North Korea is an impoverished, isolated, Stalinist regime.

Iran is none of those things. Iran is wealthy and will grow wealthier thanks to this deal. Iran is expansionist and aggressive, with a Shariah-based constitutional mandate to export the Islamic revolution around the globe. They have sponsored Jihadist terrorism for decades as far away as Argentina and Bulgaria, as well as throughout the Middle East and Southwest Asia. They will now have a nuclear umbrella under which to conduct those activities

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2)JOHN AGRESTO's academic career has spanned teaching a the University of Toronto, Kenyon College, Duke University, Wabash College, and the New School University. 

In the late 1970s he was both a scholar and administrator at the National Humanities Center in North Carolina, and in the 1980s he served in both senior administrative and policy positions the National Endowment for the Humanities.

In 1989, he became President of St. John's College in Santa Fe, a position he served in for 11 years.
In 2003, Agresto went to Iraq, where he was the Senior Advisor for Higher Education and Scientific Research for the Coalition Provisional Authority. He returned regularly to Iraq over the years, becoming, in 2007, Acting Chancellor, Provost, and Academic Dean at the American University of Iraq in Sulaimani, positions he held until 2010. 

He was also, at various times, the Lilly Senior Research Fellow at Wabash College, Scholar-in-Residence at Hampden-Sidney College, and Fellow at the Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University.

Widely published in the areas of politics, law, and education, Agresto is the author or editor of four books, including Mugged by Reality: The Liberation of Iraq and the Failure of Good Intentions; The Supreme Court and Constitutional Democracy; The Humanist as Citizen: Essays on the Uses of the Humanities; as well as Tomatoes, Basil, and Olive Oil -- An Italian American Cookbook.

Though retired, Agresto remains President of John Agresto & Associates, an educational consulting company, and is also a member and former chair of the New Mexico State Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

Comments on John's new book:

"A brilliant analysis of the current political crises we face at home and abroad and how we might extricate ourselves by returning to our Founding principles. All who value freedom and believe in the American Experiment should read this book." - Linda Chavez, Fox News analyst and Chairman, Center for Equal Opportunity.

 What has happened to the American ideals of liberty and equality? Has America's image become tarnished at home and abroad? Does democracy itself merely trigger repression instead of fulfilling the promise of freedom? Can individual rights coexist with national security? 

In Rediscovering America, John Agresto urges a return to the founding principles of our republic in order to revive the great American experiment. Rejecting the simple slogans of both the left and the right, Agresto confronts the challenges that inequality and injustice pose to our ideals of democracy and freedom. From the burgeoning of new "rights" to the growth of entitlements, from clamor in the public square to ideological struggles in the halls of academia, Rediscovering America is a trenchant critique of our contemporary political culture. 

The art of American statecraft, Agresto argues, is both to free and to restrain, to turn individual liberty into a social good. Our task is to understand, respect, and transmit what the Founding Fathers hoped to accomplish, why they did what they did, and how they hoped to achieve it. Drawing on history, political theory, and current affairs, Rediscovering America is a searching examination of our country's crisis in self-understanding - and a ringing call to restore America's promise to its citizens and to the world. 

 "John Agresto cuts through the fog of present day debates to re-mind Americans that the way forward in the 21st century must be through a renewed commitment to the nation's founding ideals and institutions. 

This is a book that will inspire and inform every thoughtful American." - James Piereson, President, William E. Simon Foundation "An elegantly written and cogently argued account of how the recovery of America's first principles, rightly understood in the way the Founders themselves understood them, would go a long way toward alleviating the serious problems we face today.... 

This book should be required reading for all university students and concerned citizens." - Edward J. Erler, Senior Fellow, The Claremont Institute "If you want to understand why we should be patriots, and how to make America lovely and lovable once again, start with this pithy, accessible, instructive book." - Matthew Franck, Director, William E. and Carol G. Simon Center on Religion and the Constitution 

"Agresto guides the reader to understand that America stands, first and foremost, for the principle of equality, a principle he then admirably defends from contemporary critics on both the right and the left." - Ralph A. Rossum, Salvatori Professor of American Constitutionalism, Claremont McKenna College

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3)

Bring Back the Jack Kemp GOP

Republican presidential candidates should embrace the anti-poverty initiatives championed by Kemp and Bob Woodson.

ENLARGE

Rep. Paul Ryan and Bob Woodson at Monday’s anti-poverty summit. PHOTO: OPPORTUNITY NEWS MEDIA/ ASHLEY CRAIG/CLARE BURNS

By

KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL

Some 30 years ago, an influential congressman named Jack Kemp gave a call to Bob Woodson, and in doing so became a Republican model for empowerment politics and minority outreach. A high-profile group of conservatives is staging a revival, looking to finally engage the modern left on the politics of the poor. Republican presidential candidates, pay attention.

As Hillary Clinton was rolling out her economic plan Monday—bashing Republicans as callous to the plight of struggling Americans—influential conservatives were taking to their own stage to respond. They know Democrats will make inequality a driving theme of the 2016 race, accusing the GOP of wanting to slash government funding for the needy, of driving policies that hurt the poor.

What they billed as an “anti-poverty summit” in Washington on Monday was a road map. Up on stage, three decades later, was none other than Mr. Woodson, a titan in conservatism on poverty issues. A veteran of the civil-rights fight, Mr. Woodson became disenchanted with the left’s devotion to failed government poverty programs. He started the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise, which transforms low-income areas from the inside out.

The philosophy is that low-income individuals and neighborhood organizations must play the central role in fixing their communities, and that these efforts benefit from free-market concepts like competition, entrepreneurship, efficiency and metrics. His first federal partner was Kemp, who embraced and evangelized the Woodson approach starting in the 1980s, using it to pass smart reforms, to champion innovations like “enterprise zones,” and to give his party a model for inspirational, anti-poverty politics. (A model his party quickly forgot.)

Joining Mr. Woodson on stage was (who else?) House Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan, a Kemp protégé who a few years ago became awed by CNE’s remarkable track record. The Wisconsin Republican worked the method into a new policy agenda, including his proposal last year to combine and transform federal poverty programs into “opportunity grants” that go to the states, and allow local administrators to get money to groups that actually work.

The message has meanwhile found a broader voice in a new conservative news site, Opportunity Lives, run by John Hart, a former staffer to retired Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn. Its mission is to cover and hail conservative solutions, and it has already produced a high-quality, seven-part documentary called “Comeback” that features inspiring real-life stories out of the Woodson model. More than a half-million people have watched it.

Monday’s event featured all these players, as well as a celebrities such as NFL Hall of Famer Deion Sanders, opinion-makers like National Affairs editor Yuval Levin, and scholars like the Manhattan Institute’s Fred Siegel. It follows a mid-June event at which House Speaker John Boehner offered a private screening of “Comeback,” attended by more than a dozen influential Republican leaders and members. Politicians nationally have requested briefings, and the concept is working its way into political discourse across the country.

The attraction is first and foremost great policy. Federal poverty programs fail because they are one-size-fits-all bureaucracies that keep recipients in dependency. As Mr. Woodson told me in an interview this week, this is because the left has created a poverty-industrial complex, in which most federal dollars go to “those providing the services—the social workers, the drug counselors. That entire structure is hostile to helping the poor, because these folks have their own financial interest.” The Woodson approach works because it is local, tailored, volunteer-oriented and gets money to the needy.

The Woodson approach will also resonate with most Americans, who live and serve in local communities, and understand the power of that over government handouts. It’s also a rebuttal to Democrats like Mrs. Clinton who claim Republicans don’t care. For the Jeb Bushes and Marco Rubios, orienting their campaigns around opportunity, this deserves central billing.

It’s even an inroad to minority voters, though Mr. Woodson warns that Republicans need to go beyond rhetoric. “I keep telling Republicans: Stop assuming the only way to appeal to blacks is through the race door. The untapped opportunity is the broken policies in these urban centers that are strangling the poor. Roll up your sleeves, go into your districts, meet the legitimate leaders, minister to their needs. Recruit the businesses that fund your campaigns to help. Democrats inherited these votes; Republicans have to earn them.”

Mr. Woodson points to politicians like Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who drove reform making it easier for post-prison offenders to get their occupational licenses—and thus a job—and who won 25% of the black vote when re-elected in 2014.

The Kemp drive was influential in the GOP 1990s embrace of welfare reform, and the pity is the party retreated from that space. The 2016 race is a chance to re-embrace it, and give Mrs. Clinton a run for her own rhetoric.

3a)

Race, Party and Opportunity

Rick Perry’s race speech threw down the gauntlet on party loyalty and economic results.

ENLARGE

Rick Perry at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., July 2.  PHOTO: ZUMA PRESS

By

DANIEL HENNINGER

July 15, 2015 6:48 p.m. ET

281 COMMENTS

Something in American politics seems to be moving in mysteriously positive ways. Especially in the nation’s tense racial politics.

Last month a racist fanatic shot nine people in a black church in Charleston, S.C. Instead of the city going up in flames, as in Ferguson or Baltimore, the surviving family members counseled forgiveness.

Then, on July 2, Rick Perry, the former Texas governor and now Republican presidential candidate, gave a speech on race in America at the National Press Club in Washington. That Donald Trump’s demagoguery on Mexicans sucks the oxygen out of the media universe while Rick Perry’s strong speech on race fades from the news is a commentary on, well, the news.

With his first words, Gov. Perry recounted the 1916 torture and lynching in Waco, Texas, of a 17-year-old black youth named Jesse Washington. His description of what a mob did to Jesse Washington before finally killing him is stunning and graphic. Mr. Perry called it “an episode in our history that we cannot ignore.”

This was not the stuff of a normal political speech. Nor was much else in the talk, such as criticizing Barry Goldwater’s opposition to the 1964 Civil Rights Act (he did so for constitutional reasons). Normally members of the church of High Conservatism don’t say that, at least not in public.

Mr. Perry said Southern states had used states’ rights as justification for segregation. And he said there was a role for government in addressing the effects of segregation because government had sanctioned it in the past.

Media coverage described the Perry speech as confessional, a long-overdue admission that the Republican Party has ignored the black vote. But since the subject has been raised, one may ask: Since when has the Democratic Party not taken the black vote for granted?

That the black vote in the U.S.’s northern cities will be Democratic is as automatic as anything gets in politics. Liberals say they deserve this vote because Democratic politics has done so much for black Americans—Medicaid, food stamps, energy payments and the like.

Arguably it is true that because of these anti-poverty programs, the black Americans who have lived for generations in virtually the same housing projects and attended the same public schools—in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Harlem, the Bronx, Watts, the South Side of Chicago, North City in St. Louis, Camden, North Philadelphia, Cleveland’s east side and in what’s left of Detroit—remain reliably Democratic voters.

Now Rick Perry has thrown down the gauntlet to Democrats over this landlocked slice of the electorate: “Democrats have long had the opportunity to govern the African-American communities. It is time for black families to hold them accountable for the results. I’m here to tell you it is Republicans, not Democrats, who are truly offering black Americans the hope for a better life for themselves and their children.”

Whatever else government attempts to do for the poor, Mr. Perry emphasized the centrality of having and holding a job. It may be taken as a sign of progress that Hillary Clinton in her speech on the economy Monday seemed to agree. She said the number of “young people of color” not in school or out of work is “staggering,” noting that a quarter of young black men can’t get a job.

What most residents of the country’s all-black neighborhoods know is that their economic and social prospects flatlined long before the financial meltdown of 2008. While Mr. Obama has given some speeches about this, the question remains: What, exactly, has been going on in these moribund urban neighborhoods? How can so many people have stayed poor and unemployed in the same years the Democratic Party earned their votes by spending so much money on anti-poverty programs?

“In too many parts of this country,” Mr. Perry said, “black students are trapped in failing schools.” This too is a good subject for the two parties to debate. If with the furling of the Confederate flag we finally closed the book on the greatest American moral tragedy of the 19th century, let’s now move on to inner-city public schools, the greatest moral tragedy of the last century.

It’s not really true that black Americans never leave the inner cities out of loyalty to Democratic politics. One of the most remarkable social movements of our time is known as the New Great Migration, a reversal of the historic 20th century migration of blacks from the South to northern cities to find work.

For years now, black Americans seeking better economic prospects have been leaving the North’s cities and migrating back to the South, notably Florida, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina and yes, Texas, as Mr. Perry claimed in his speech. It’s called voting with your feet.

Rick Perry and his un-Trumped GOP colleagues should keep talking about race, party and policies that produce economic opportunity. Maybe 2016 is the year in which those ideas will get a fair hearing.

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4)

The 2016 Contest Begins to Take Shape

Hillary tries pointillism, while the GOP contends with an embarrassment of riches.

ENLARGE

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker at a Harley-Davidson dealership in Las Vegas, July 14. PHOTO: DAVID BECKER/REUTERS

By

PEGGY NOONAN

The weekend will be dominated by back-and-forth on the Iran deal. The administration will argue that some agreement was necessary and this was the best that could be got. They will continue their almost childlike insistence that it proves President Obama is either Ronald Reagan (he negotiates with foes) or Richard Nixon (he reaches out to adversaries).

There will be plenty of serious criticism of the deal, accompanied by a generalized sense that the U.S. probably got taken—because Mr. Obama always wants it too much. As with the opening to Cuba, Mr. Obama put his face on it too early, put his name on it too hard, talked about it too much in public, let his aides give background interviews saying this is a crucial effort, a historic gambit, part of the president’s visionary legacy. The adversary sees this, the need and the want—they watch the news too!—and proceeds accordingly.

Hillary Clinton has given her tentative support. The day before the deal was announced she gave a big economic speech, at the New School in New York.Mr. Obama is an odd one in that when there are rivals close by, in Congress for instance, with whom he could negotiate deals, he disses them in public, attacks their motives, yanks them around with executive orders, crushes them when possible. But when negotiating with actual tyrants he signals deference, hunger. I leave it to others to explain what it means when a man is bullying toward essentially good people and supplicating toward bad ones. But the sense is he always wants it too much and is consequently a poor negotiator, and this will have some impact on U.S. and world reaction.

I wanted to think along with it, but Mrs. Clinton doesn’t give you much to think to. She offers policy clumps wrapped in general sentiments. There was policy jargon—“consumer economy,” “quality, affordable child care,” “paid family leave,” “our fiscal outlook is sustainable.” In the tired rhetoric department there were “currents of change” and getting “our country moving.” There were a few fleeting shots at Republican candidates, which provided the speech with a kind of leavening cynicism.

She seemed at times to knock Mr. Obama, or at least distance herself from him. Wall Streeters who tanked the economy in the late 2000s got off with “limited consequences—or none at all.” Who’s been in charge since 2008? She made two references to rising health-care costs. I thought we took care of that.

There was a thought worthy of unpacking, which had to do with the “short-termism” that dominates CEOs’ thinking; they are enslaved to a “quarterly capitalism” that leaves them focused on the share price and the next earnings report at the expense of longer-term investment. This is true: They’re all squeezing too tight and missing the big picture because in the general rush of demands they can’t afford to see it. I’m not sure what a president can do about it, but it’s not bad to talk about such things.

Along the way she smuggled in a campaign theme: “I want to have principled and pragmatic and progressive policies.” I suspect we’ll be hearing more of the three P’s.

There was a nice thought nicely expressed: At its best, “public service is planting trees under whose shade you’ll never sit.” That was pretty.

It was a pointillist policy-dot speech meant to add up to a portrait of meaning. The meaning was clear: More progressivism, please. Also: There’s little substantial difference between Bernie Sanders and me other than that Goldman Sachs likes me, which only proves my range. The left doesn’t have to bolt away.

A concern for her campaign has to be Mrs. Clinton’s robotic delivery, as if she’s never there in the moment but distanced from herself. As if she’s thinking: I don’t fully believe this, but more important, do I seem to believe it? She seems to be overcoached by people who keep telling her to be natural. But why would someone in public life for more than 30 years need to be instructed in naturalness? I don’t understand her discomfort and wonder what it suggests or portends. You can argue she’s a strong leader; she may be the next president, she may be the acknowledged head of her party, but she is a poor campaigner—a poor giver of interviews and speeches, which is now most of what campaigning is. At the end of the day this will mean something.

Meanwhile, Scott Walker announced in Waukesha, Wis. There is still something fresh and awake about him. He’s not all dinged up and slump-shouldered, even though he’s been a target for so long. His subliminal message—actually, it’s liminal—has two parts: I wasn’t born into it, I’m normal like you—but I’ve achieved a great deal, maintained my seriousness, and been a brave governor.

He made his announcement in the increasingly popular casual manner, in shirt sleeves with an open collar and casual slacks. They’re all trying to express intimacy by removing barriers—podiums, teleprompters. But that’s superficial. You can make a connection in a suit behind a podium if you sound as if you’re thinking and speaking honestly and with depth. All this physical symbolism has gotten carried away. John Kasich is next. I’m hoping he won’t announce in a T-shirt and underpants.

What is most interesting about Mr. Walker is that he has remained in the top tier, often in the top three, while being less in the public eye recently than other candidates. His years as embattled Wisconsin governor have given him a hold on the Republican imagination. As he spoke I thought: He’s from the Republican wing of the Republican Party—blunt, direct, unadorned, Midwestern. His message was workmanlike: “I know how to fight and win.” He is a reform conservative, believes in federalism, is hard-line on foreign policy: Mr. Obama says climate change is the greatest threat to future generations, but “the greatest threat to future generations is radical Islamic terrorism.” Vladimir Putin, like Lenin, probes his adversaries with bayonets: “If you encounter mush, push; if you encounter steel, stop.” Mr. Walker will run hard on his Wisconsin record: “We lowered taxes by $2 billion. In fact we lowered taxes on individuals, employers and property. In fact, property taxes are lower today than they were four years ago. . . . How many governors can say that?”

All this will make him highly competitive for the nomination. Is it suited to the mood of the nation in the general election?

Mr. Walker, Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Carly Fiorina, Ted Cruz, soon John Kasich: They are going to be flooding the hustings very soon, and they’re going to hit Republicans on the ground as an embarrassment of riches—interesting, accomplished figures, all with a case to make. They’ll have the money to last because they pretty much all have rich backers. It is going to be hard for Republicans to make up their minds. This primary is going to go longer and end later than anyone knows.

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5)  Obama: Witting or Witless?

By Mona Charen

I was elected to end wars, not start them. -- Barack Obama The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it. -- George Orwell

A question has hung in the air since Barack Obama first moved into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and began his "fundamental transformation" of this country: Did he intend harm, or was he merely so blinded by ideology that he could not see the damage his policies were creating? The Iran deal provides an answer.

At his press conference, our duplicitous leader chose to call black white and claim that the deal does the opposite of what it does -- allow Iran to get nuclear weapons, albeit after a decent interval. We are deep into Orwellian territory now. "War is peace. Ignorance is strength." Iranian President Hassan Rouhani is crowing that Iran achieved all of its objectives and the U.S. none.

The bombproof facility in the mountain at Fordow -- which, until recently, the U.S. had demanded be shuttered and locked -- will now have an "international presence" so that attempts to thwart its progress even by sabotage will be effectively blocked. This is permission masquerading as prevention. It's of a piece with the administration's pressure on Israel to refrain from military action, which was rewarded with Obama aides calling Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a "chicken" and crowing that his chance had passed.

Permission masquerading as prevention sums up the whole deal. The U.S. had demanded anywhere/anytime inspections and negotiated to lift sanctions only after evidence of Iranian compliance. Now, the inspections regime is a joke: Iran gets 24 days' notice and sits on the committee that decides whether inspections are necessary. The sanctions are lifted immediately, handing the world's chief sponsor of terror a $100 billion windfall. Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes, who was captured on videotape in April saying anytime/anywhere inspections would be required, now denies the U.S. ever made that a condition.

While the administration claimed it couldn't negotiate for the release of four Americans held unlawfully in Iranian prisons because that was outside the scope of nuclear negotiations, they did agree to lift the embargo on conventional arms and intercontinental ballistic missiles, which were also outside the compass of nuclear concerns. Why? Because "Iran demanded it." Well, OK then.

Obama's press conference was a spectacle of bad faith. A virtuoso of lip service (see his sympathy for Israel) and endless conjurer of straw men, he took few questions but silkily implied he had answered all objections. "There is no scenario in which a U.S. president is not in a stronger position 12, 13, 15 years from now if, in fact, Iran decided at that point they still wanted to get a nuclear weapon."

What? In 12 to 15 years, Iran will be an immensely wealthier, better-armed and more powerful country than it is today. It will be, to quote Obama, "a very successful regional power" and then some. It will have acquired advanced anti-aircraft weapons and ballistic missiles and, doubtless, a much-improved air force.

The dishonest core of the president's pretense is this: that the choice was between war and diplomacy. Every schoolchild knows that diplomacy without the credible threat of force is a nullity. Obama knows how to frighten and intimidate when he wants to. See his conduct toward Republicans or Netanyahu or the Supreme Court.

There was always a very different path available. He could have increased the sanctions instead of pleading with Congress not to impose them. He could have attacked Syria when it crossed his "red line" rather than folding and thereby conveying his fecklessness to Tehran. He could have refrained from calling everyone in the U.S. who favored a hard line against Iran a "warmonger" -- again conveying that Iran had nothing to fear from him. He could have supported the protesters in the streets in 2009 rather than signaling his support for the regime. He could have left the negotiating table many times, but especially after the IAEA reported earlier this month that Iran was in violation of earlier nuclear treaties and had increased its stockpiles of enriched uranium by 20 percent. And yes, if all of the above failed, he could have deployed strategic bombing to destroy Iran's nuclear program.

But from his first inaugural address onward, Obama both secretly and openly wooed the Iranian regime. In the process, he repeatedly lied to Congress, our allies and the American people, settling, to my satisfaction at least, that he is inflicting this potential catastrophe wittingl

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6) Hunting Beauty on Maine’s Art Museum Trail

A journey spanning eight museums, over 400 miles, and some 73,000 works of art.

By JUDITH H. DOBRZYNSKI

Around Maine

Think of Maine: lobster, blueberries, jagged coastlines, verdant forests, meandering waterways, beaches, boating, lighthouses. The sun rising over the foaming ocean and setting behind craggy mountains.

Endowed with so much beauty, the Pine Tree State may well have attracted more American artists than any other except New York. Since the 1800s, thousands—from Thomas Cole, Winslow Homer and Marsden Hartley to Andrew Wyeth, Berenice Abbott and Alex Katz—have flocked to its picturesque terrain. There, sometimes in isolation and sometimes in groups, they captured the mystique of Mother Nature and plumbed the depths of human nature.

But if Maine’s place in American art history is well known, its wealth in art museums is not. Nearly 20 years ago, the state set out to change that, creating the Maine Art Museum Trail. This year, it added the Monhegan Museum of Art and History, making a circuit of eight.

Last month, I traveled the trail, beginning with the Ogunquit Museum of American Art, located in an old fishing village about 35 miles south of Portland. Then I went north, mostly on I-95, to the Bates College Museum of Art in Lewiston, the Colby College Museum of Art in Waterville and the University of Maine Museum of Art in Bangor.

From there, I turned south on scenic, winding two-lane roads lined with bright purple lupine, visiting the Farnsworth Art Museum in Rockland, the Bowdoin College Museum of Art in Brunswick and the Portland Museum of Art in Portland. Between the Farnsworth and Bowdoin, I detoured to the new addition, taking an hour-long ferry ride (each way) from Port Clyde to the carless Monhegan Island.

By the end, I had driven about 425 miles and discovered a diverse array of art in these disparate museums, some 73,000 objects ranging from ancient Assyrian reliefs (at Bowdoin) to objects made in Maine in 2015 (at several).

This summer, a sampling can be seen in “Directors’ Cut,” a special exhibition at the Portland Museum composed of highlights chosen by the eight museums’ directors from their collections.

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Gaston Lachaise’s ‘Ogunquit Torso,’ modeled in 1925 and cast in 1928. PHOTO: OGUNQUIT MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART

The Ogunquit Museum decided to showcase members of the artists’ colony that sprouted there near the turn of the 20th century with a selection of traditional landscapes by the likes of Hamilton Easter Field. More interesting, to me at least, were its sculptures: “Young Girl” (1927) by Robert Laurent and “Ogunquit Torso” (modeled 1925, cast 1928) by Gaston Lachaise. These voluptuous versions of the female body, neither having anything to do with Maine, are among just a half-dozen three-dimensional artworks on display in “Directors’ Cut,” which inadvertently reveals how little sculpture has figured in Maine art.

Maine did produce one esteemed sculptor, by adoption: Louise Nevelson, born in what is now Ukraine, grew up in Rockland, though she moved to New York as a young adult. Still, the Farnsworth owns the second-largest public trove of her work and sent one of her trademark abstract, monochromatic assemblages, “Dawn Column I” (1959). Made partly from found wood and painted white, it was part of her early installation piece “Dawn’s Wedding Feast,” which was shown the year it was made at a landmark exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. The Monhegan sent another of her sculptures, this one painted black, the small “Cryptic XXX” (1966). It is accompanied, smartly, by a little photograph illustrating her initial inspiration for these intricate pieces—the driftwood shacks on an island that she viewed from Monhegan.

Those two museums also allow comparison of landscape paintings by Rockwell Kent, too often known only for his illustrations. The Farnsworth’s brushy “Maine Coast” (c. 1907), a relatively free rendition of a snow-covered meadow and mountain, contrasts with the precise “Monhegan, Village at Night” (c. 1950), a dark scene slashed by a glowing sunset, sent by the Monhegan.

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‘Town of Skowhegan’ (1988), by Yvonne Jacquette. PHOTO: COLBY COLLEGE MUSEUM OF ART/YVONNE JACQUETTE, COURTESY OF DC MOORE GALLERY

Colby sent seven Maine landscapes, dating from 1913 through 2007 and illustrating a mix of styles and vantage points. Katz’s “Twilight” (1977), a night sky punctuated by a silhouetted tree, fairly glows. In “Burning House, Night, Vertical” (2007), Lois Dodd, a painter of light and color, uses pink, peach and violet to create beauty in a terrifying scene (devoid of people, thankfully). And “Town of Skowhegan” (1988),Yvonne Jacquette’s colorful aerial view, seems alive, with cars rushing along a swerving highway, a tiny bulldozer at work, and the bluest waves lapping the shore.

Only the Portland museum defied expectations—with two contemporary sculptures and a dozen recent photographs by Maine artists, not a single landscape or seascape among them. Some images, like Paul D’Amato’s view of a leggy transvestite, “Man in a Woman’s Underwear, Portland Series: Underground” (1993), are even provocative.

But “Directors’ Cut” is neither a substitute for the trail nor a narrative of artists who heeded the call of Maine. To get the full picture of what these eight museums offer, visitors must take to the road.

On my trip, the Ogunquit, wedged into a landscaped garden just off a winding residential road, was exhibiting a show of rural Maine photographs that has now closed. But aside from such changing exhibits, it has one gallery with selections from the permanent collection, including a row of representative landscapes by Hartley, Kent, Fairfield Porterand a notable Charles Burchfield, “North Wind in March” (1960-66). With red maple trees bent from the blast and snow falling from the clouds, “North Wind” can give viewers the chills.

Bates, also relatively small, has three exhibitions this summer, starting with an uneven sampling drawn from its permanent collection. I spent more time in “Points of View,” recent photographs of Maine by four artists. Shoshannah White’s black-and-white pictures of the root systems of native plants, captured by using technology that includes microscopic equipment, then modified slightly with paint, embellished with metal dust and encased in beeswax, are captivatingly ethereal.

Bates has also hung a gallery of photos of Hartley, dating from his youthful travels to formal in-studio images taken shortly before his 1943 death by George Platt Lynes. Among the most intriguing is a 1925 photo by an unknown photographer showing a frowning Hartley, in blazer, tie and khakis, sitting on the beach at Cannes and holding a document in his hand.

Next came Colby, whose 8,000-object collection spans art in America from colonial days to the present, spiced by small holdings of European, Asian, pre-Columbian and ancient art. The checklist of American artists there reads like a who’s who ( James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Thomas Eakins, Mary Cassatt, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Georgia O’Keeffe, Robert Rauschenberg, Sol LeWitt and Richard Serra, to name a few) and also contains lesser-knowns like California artists Joan Brown and Robert Bechtle. More important, nearly everything on view is of very high quality.

The galleries are hung beautifully—arranged chronologically and thematically with thoughtful juxtapositions. For example, Bechtle’s lonely “20th Street—Early Sunday Morning” (1997), which uses light and shadow in an homage to Edward Hopper’s “Early Sunday Morning” (1930), hangs not far from “Columbus Circle at Night” (2010), which plays with light and reflections of it in glass, by photorealist Richard Estes.

Colby’s numerous strengths include two large galleries of Modernism (plus a separate wall of Hartleys), two walls of folk-art animals and two galleries of western art. I found many paintings and photographs to admire in the contemporary galleries, which—granted—are not filled with the transgressive works found at many museums. But several are enigmatic. Uta Barth’s photograph “Ground” (1995), for example, is a light-filled, highly blurred, nearly barren landscape with only a few leaves in the upper right corner in focus.

Though on a campus with 1,850 students and in a town with a population of about 16,000, the Colby outshines many museums in much larger cities.

I moved on to the University of Maine museum, which concentrates on contemporary art. There, I found four exhibitions squeezed into a small space. One gallery contained selections from the permanent collection by Estes, Wyeth, Abbott, Katz and Marin. None stood out, so I entered “Blind Spot,” a show of work by Anna Hepler, said to be one of Maine’s best-known living artists. Ms. Hepler makes soft sculptures and large, patterned woodcuts. They relate to nature, but as with much contemporary art, they are also about process and materials. For example, she uses plastic bags to make crocheted pieces.

I soon departed for Wyeth territory—the Farnsworth, which celebrates Andrew, the most esteemed; his father, N.C., and his son James. Aside from its Wyeth Center, a separate building now filled with “The Wyeths, Maine and the Sea,” the Farnsworth is presenting two large galleries of Maine watercolors by Andrew. As ever, his technical mastery is superb and his compositions, like “Southern Comfort” (1987), a light-filled portrait of his sleeping dog, are evocative. But the Farnsworth has much more, by many artists, including Fitz Henry Lane, Robert Indiana, Frank Weston Benson and George Bellows.

The Monhegan museum, charmingly unpretentious, is an outlier, jamming historical photographs and artifacts as well as paintings by artists who worked there into what once was the lighthouse keeper’s home. The best works seem to have been sent to “Director’s Cut,” however, including “Gulls Descending” (c. 1960), a vivid close-up of four seagulls in flight by James Fitzgerald, whose estate was left to the museum.

The assistant keeper’s house, filled each summer with a special exhibition, is this year showing Lamar Dodd, an academic from the state of Georgia who experimented with genres ranging from rugged realism to abstraction, but never found a niche that would bring him fame.

Bowdoin is the opposite of the Monhegan. Founded in 1813, it is one of the country’s oldest art museums and aims to be encyclopedic. One of its masterpieces, Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of Thomas Jefferson (c. 1805-07), was commissioned by one of the college’s founders, James Bowdoin III, when he was designated as envoy to Spain. The painting has been interpreted as an assertion of democratic values: Though posed as a European royal would have been, Jefferson sits in a simple chair wearing simple dress; only in the background are a classical column and rich drapery.

There is much else to spend time with in the permanent collection, but Bowdoin also organizes ambitious special exhibitions. This summer, it has “Night Vision: Nocturnes in American Art, 1860-1960,” which illustrates how artists including Hopper, Childe Hassam, Edward Steichen, Joseph Cornell and many more depicted moonlight scenes, newly electrified urban streets, even fireworks. It’s a brilliant idea and, based on my preview, well done.

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Portrait of Winslow Homer in New York (1880) by Napoleon Sarony. PHOTO: BOWDOIN COLLEGE MUSEUM OF ART

Finally, I went to the Portland Museum, with its strong collection of American art, especially—yes—Homers, and a complement of contemporary art. No matter how many Homers you have seen by now, two here will stand out: “Weatherbeaten” (1894), showing a stormy ocean crashing against the rocky shore, and “Wild Geese in Flight” (1897), whose focus is not the birds in the title but two intertwined dead birds below them. Here, Homer deals magnificently with the beauty of nature, the confrontation between man and nature, and death itself.

Portland, too, is also the only place in Maine to see a broad collection of European art of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the only place to see how Courbet, Monet and others influenced American artists—not a bad way to end my time on the trail.

Having visited these eight museums in four days, I reflected on the circuit, which has many ups, a few downs and occasional misses. To no one’s surprise, nature is a strong presence in the collections of these museums—even in the works of recent years, which perhaps is unusual. If I have one complaint, it is that the art is rather unadventurous. In a state as untamed as Maine, the art might have been, on occasion, a bit more bracing.

Ms. Dobrzynski writes about culture for many publications and blogs at www.artsjournal.com/realcleararts.