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David Keene

David Keene

keene123@washingtontimes.com

Editor at Large — David Keene, a trusted adviser to presidents, a longtime champion of personal liberty and one of conservatism’s most respected voices, is the former opinion editor of The Washington Times. An author, columnist and fixture on national television, Mr. Keene has championed conservative causes for more than five decades while offering advice to Republican presidents and countless candidates. He additionally served as chairman of the American Conservative Union and president of the National Rifle Association.
To read his obituary, please CLICK HERE

Columns by David Keene

A Republican Victory in Wisconsin Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

Reading Wisconsin’s 2020 tea leaves

When I ran into Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Brian Hagedorn at the state's NRA convention in mid-January, the temperature outside stood at 25 degrees below zero.

April 9, 2019
Democrat Electability Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

Democratic wannabes preen and crowd the line-up

Washington-based pundits and reporters keep telling us that the Democrats are looking for a presidential nominee who can win next November. CBS, CNN, NPR and Democratic strategists repeat the mantra that next year's primary voters will have "electability" as their first concern.

March 28, 2019
Illustration on packing the Supreme Court by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

Packing the Supreme Court

The 'progressives' controlling today's Democratic Party have little knowledge of our respect for the Constitution, history or institutions. They want what they want and they want it now — even if it means ignoring or rewriting the rules under which the nation has operated so successfully since its founding.

March 25, 2019
Illustration on the "nuclear option" in the Senate by Linas Garsys/The Washington Times

How a ‘nuclear option’ returned power to Republicans

The dinner I was enjoying with a senior Republican senator back in 2013 kept being interrupted as his cellphone chimed and he was forced to step away from the table to take the call from one or another of his colleagues.

February 19, 2019
Illustration on the problematic promises of Democrat candidates by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

Early promises of the Democratic wannabes

As the Republicans of 1940 maneuvered for the chance to take on President Roosevelt, H.L. Mencken observed that the ultimate winner would no doubt be "whoever promises the most with the least probability of delivering anything." Today's increasingly crowded field of Democratic presidential wannabes proves that little has changed in the decades since Mencken penned those words.

February 12, 2019
Illustration on the goals of H.R. 1 by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

How Democrats signal their plans

As every new Congress convenes, the majority party signals its priority with the introduction of House Resolution One. H.R. 1 is the bill the leadership intends to push hard and early to let the public know just what the new Congress wants and is all about.

February 4, 2019
FILE - This is an undated file photo showing Shoeless Joe Jackson. In 1917, two years before their scandalous appearance in the 1919 World Series, the White Sox beat the Giants in the World Series and Jackson batted .301. (AP Photo/File)

Baseball’s infamous bribery scandal of 1919

A century ago, baseball faced its darkest hour when eight members of the 1919 American League champion Chicago White Sox accepted bribes to throw the World Series.

January 2, 2019
Chicago White Sox first base coach Harold Baines poses with his life-sized sculpture during a ceremony before their baseball game against the Kansas City Royals, Sunday, July 20, 2008, in Chicago.(AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)

Harold Baines, both good and great

Once upon a time every American boy dreamed of becoming a major league baseball player. Harold Baines was one of those boys. Residents of St. Michaels, Maryland, where Mr. Baines grew up in the '60s, say he was rarely without his baseball glove. Before video games and before St. Michaels had become a tourist destination, the small Maryland Eastern Shore village was the sort of quintessential small town one associates with that era.

December 18, 2018
Boot to the Face Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

How the Chinese use technology to build their unassailable state

The fear of a nightmare future that inspired "Animal Farm," "Brave New World" and "1984" is rapidly becoming a reality in today's China, where that nation's Communist leaders have embraced the technology of the 21st century to craft a surveillance state few but these 20th century authors could even imagine.

December 4, 2018
Illustration on aspects of the newest 'Year of the Woman' by Linas Garsys/The Washington Times

Another ‘Year of the Woman’

Shortly after his confirmation in 1991, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas observed that "being black has far less to do with the color of one's skin than one's politics." This truth has become more obvious in the years since for women as well as African-Americans.

November 27, 2018
President Donald Trump awards Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, the Medal of Freedom during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Friday, Nov. 16, 2018. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Orrin Hatch deserves a Medal of Freedom

Last week, President Trump awarded Sen. Orrin Hatch, the longest-serving Senate Republican ever, the Medal of Freedom. In doing so, Mr. Trump emphasized the high personal regard in which he holds Mr. Hatch, but the medal was deserved not just because the president likes the senator, but because Orrin Hatch deserves recognition as a Senate great at the end of a distinguished career.

November 20, 2018
A man works with his fishing rod as the sun sets on the waterfront in the Red Hook section of the borough of Brooklyn on Thursday, March 22, 2012 in New York. (AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

Confirming Aurelia Skipwith

Last April, Aurelia Skipwith, the new deputy assistant secretary of the Interior for Fish, Wildlife and Parks arrived at a hotel for a speech. When she asked the desk clerk for directions to the ballroom, she got not only the directions she sought, but the observation that "you must be an Obama holdover."

October 29, 2018
Kermit Gosnell Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

Gosnell the murderer revisited

When Philadelphia police obtained a search warrant and raided Dr. Kermit Gosnell's clinic eight years ago, they were seeking evidence of illegal prescriptions for opioids and other addictive drugs. Gosnell would later be sentenced to 30 years in prison for running an illegal prescription mill, but they found much more.

October 22, 2018
Two-Faced Jon Tester Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

Montana voters don’t like politicians who tell them one thing and do another

Spending a little time in a state like Montana is enough to convince anyone that Washington is not the center of the universe. President Trump carried the state in 2016 by some 20 points and has been back here twice in the last month in an effort to help Republican State Auditor Matt Rosendale beat back Democratic Sen. Jon Tester's bid for a third term.

September 23, 2018
Illustration on political witchhunts by Linas Garsys/The Washington Times

Adrift in the age of #MeToo

The other day as my old friend Adam Walinsky and I were lamenting the craziness of the current political atmosphere, he asked me what earlier period I believe was as bad as the one we are living through today. Adam, a former speechwriter and aide to Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, once ran as the Democratic candidate for attorney general in New York and is a close student of history. I asked in return if he was thinking of the McCarthy era,

September 18, 2018
Illustration on Democrat political aspirations in the 2018 mid-terms by Alexander Hunter/The Washington Times

Weaving a ‘blue wave’ from impeachment fantasies

Democrats are convinced that the "blue wave" they've been counting on to set the stage for President Donald Trump's impeachment in a House of Representatives they control is out there and building. They continue to enjoy a four to six point "generic" advantage in the polls, and there is evidence that their voters are more anxious to turn out and vote than their Republican counterparts — two indicators that combine with the media's continuing effort to demonize Mr. Trump to give them more than a fighting chance to take the House.

September 11, 2018
Journalism Problem Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

Chuck Todd’s call to arms masks his own bias

NBC's Chuck Todd has taken to the pages of The Atlantic to call on his fellow journalists to take down Fox News, charging that Fox News founder Roger Ailes has waged a concerted 50-year campaign to divide the American people and demonize legitimate journalism.

September 9, 2018