The vice president is a firm believer in the idea that the best defense is a strong offense. With this in mind, Dick Cheney went to a friendly audience, a gathering at a conservative think tank called the American Enterprise Institute where his wife is a “scholar in residence,” to give the nation an update […]
The White House isn’t in the best of positions right now. You know things are bad when economic growth is weak, unemployment is at its highest level in years, the trade deficit is at all-time highs, the budget deficit is at a record $455 billion — and Bush is so anxious to stop talking about […]
I’ll admit it: I have no idea what makes political reporters jump on a story. Occasionally what appears like a scandal-in-the-waiting will pop up and I’ll expect journalists hungry for a Pulitzer (or hoping to be the next Woodward & Bernstein) to pounce on it. Then, much to my chagrin, nothing happens. Niger-gate seemed to […]
I distinctly remember the Democratic Party’s attitude — at both the leadership and grassroots level — in advance of the 1992 presidential election. At the time, the party faithful wanted, more than anything else, to find a “winner.” We had suffered too many embarrassing defeats to look at the ’92 field and think about ideology; […]
I saw on ABC News’ The Note that Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and Ten Kennedy (D-Mass.) held a pretty important press conference on Capitol Hill yesterday about the Bush administration’s claims regarding the Iraqi threat before the war. Levin and Kennedy released a copy, The Note explained, of “the formal report that President Bush sent […]
The incessant efforts of the Bush White House to connect Iraq and Al Queda have been suspect since the accusations first started flying. Now, however, the joint congressional inquiry into terrorist attacks of 9/11 will reveal, according to a UPI report, that the administration had “no evidence” of Iraq’s involvement with 9/11 and that there […]
It now seems clear that “two senior administration officials” did, indeed, identify undercover CIA agent Valerie Plame to newspaper columnist Robert Novak. The question now turns to figuring out which two senior administration officials are responsible. As I mentioned yesterday, there’s little doubt as to why Plame was identified. The administration was doing its best […]
While most of the attention from last week’s debacle in the House has focused on Pete Stark calling Scott McInnis a “fruitcake,” the real culprit was Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas. It was Thomas, after all, who substituted the pension bill at the last minute, refused to delay the vote to let Dems read […]
It’s Britain’s fault. Oh wait, no one’s buying that. It’s the CIA’s fault. No, that doesn’t work. It’s the Democrats’ fault. Scratch that; it doesn’t make any sense. It’s the media’s fault? That doesn’t sound right either. As of today, it’s Stephen Hadley’s fault. Hadley, Bush’s deputy national security adviser and #2 at the NSC […]
The Senate Judiciary Committee voted to send Bill Pryor’s nomination to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to the Senate floor this afternoon. The final vote was 10 to 9 — 10 Republicans voting for him and 9 Dems voting against him. Specter, the “undecided” vote, joined with the Republicans today, but refused to say […]