No posts until Monday

The Carpetbagger Report will be taking a couple of days off. I’ll return Monday, Nov. 3. Talk amongst yourselves. I’ll give you a topic: The Civil War was neither civil nor a war. Discuss.

Can’t we all just get along?

Forget about that Dean-Gephardt ticket in 2004. The AP reported today that “an angry confrontation” took place in Iowa yesterday between Dean and Gephardt staffers, leading a Dean staffer to be escorted from the permises. Apparently, Gephardt was giving a speech at a senior center in Des Moines. A Dean staffer went to the event, […]

Clark’s health care proposal wins praise

I was pleased to see that Wesley Clark’s health care proposal, unveiled yesterday, has been well received. In a nutshell, Clark proposes that the nation eliminate the Bush tax cuts on Americans making more than $200,000 a year and use some of the money — about $70 billion annually — to expand health insurance to […]

I guess we won’t be hearing about a Carl Levin endorsement of Howard Dean

Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) is a serious and well-respected lawmaker. Despite being an unwavering Democrat, even Republicans begrudgingly respect his work on the Senate Armed Services Committee. The fact that Levin is mad at Howard Dean probably won’t help the former Vermont governor in Michigan (home to early caucuses next year) nor on Capitol Hill. […]

Bush finds a new buzzword to repeat incessantly

If you listened closely to the Bush press conference yesterday, you may have noticed a new word that Bush seems to have latched onto. In explaining the importance of the war, Bush said, “The first step was to remove Saddam Hussein because he was a threat, a gathering threat, as I think I put it.” […]

Good news and bad news for Dean on building African American support

Even a casual look at national polling data shows that Howard Dean is building an impressive base of support among Democrats. One of the few weaknesses, at least at this point, has been Dean’s inability to gain support from African Americans. Indeed, the typical Dean rally, though almost always well attended, rarely features people of […]

Trent Lott sees Iraq and suggests we may want to ‘mow the whole place down’

I saw (via Billmon) that Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) was asked for his thoughts on the current difficulties in Iraq. His answer was disturbing, even for him. At first, Lott expressed concern for troop deployment. “We need to have a different mix of troops, is the key,” he told The Hill. “We may need to […]

‘Mission Accomplished’ sign? What sign? Did someone say something about a sign?

It’s hard to forget the image. On May 1, Bush was aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln congratulating the troops on a job well done. Above his head was a banner carefully placed to maximize the political benefit of the photo-op. It read: “Mission Accomplished.” The banner has come up several times in recent months to […]

Would the Bush administration use federal agencies to punish its critics?

Looking back at the Watergate scandal, it wasn’t just the break-in or the subsequent cover up that did Nixon in. One of the main problems Congress discovered — and wrote articles of impeachment over — was that Nixon was misusing federal agencies to punish his political enemies. It was an abuse of power of historic […]

Mark Kleiman’s excellent point on GOP tolerance in Louisiana

UCLA professor Mark A.R. Kleiman had a really good post the other day about Republicans in Louisiana taking great pride in their support for Bobby Jindal. Keep in mind, the Republicans’ recent history in Louisiana is pretty disgraceful. It was just 12 years ago that the GOP nominated former KKK leader David Duke to be […]