If you missed Richard Clarke on Meet the Press yesterday, you missed a clinic on how to spurn the GOP smear machine. Here was a credible, experienced public servant offering a point-by-point response to each of the baseless attacks, and just importantly, highlighting the underlying purpose of Bush’s character assassination — distracting attention away from […]
John Kerry’s appearance yesterday at the New North Side Baptist Church in St. Louis seemed to go well. While his campaign rhetoric tends to deal far more with policy than piety, Kerry did what most candidates do when they appear in a house of worship — he laid out his principles in a religious context. […]
Like last Friday, I thought I’d wrap up the week with some state-by-state polling data. All of these results come from polls conducted and/or released in the last 10 days. Ohio (20 electoral votes) Ohio Poll — Kerry 46, Bush 44, Nader 5 Comment: This is consistent with other recent polls showing Kerry capitalizing on […]
As The Carpetbagger Report has grown, so too has the amount of correspondence I receive. A surprisingly large number of them are creative, witty, and astute. With this in mind, I thought I would blatantly steal, I mean, pay homage to Eric Alterman’s fine work at Altercation by unveiling my own version of Slacker Friday. […]
Let me see if I get this straight. The Democratic Party, with its regional and ideological differences, fresh off a difficult primary season featuring the largest field of candidates in U.S. history, is rallying together in unity. The Republican Party, with its demands for obedience and its total control over every branch of the government, […]
As long as I’m offering updates on pending controversies (see below), I thought I’d mention that Reps. Tom Feeney (R-Fla.) and Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) have not yet formally unveiled their nutty “Reaffirmation of American Independence Resolution.” They promised it’d be introduced this week; maybe they’re getting cold feet. Last week, I explained that the Feeney-Goodlatte […]
I’m still thinking about what to call this one. MediBribe? BribeCare? Bribe & Gloom? In any event, the House Ethics Committee announced yesterday that Reps. Kenny Hulshof (R-Mo.) and Mike Doyle (D-Pa.), both relative moderates, will head up a bi-partisan investigative subcommittee to explore who offered Rep. Nick Smith (R-Mich.) a bribe on the House […]
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned a truly bizarre piece of legislation that would empower Congress to overturn Supreme Court rulings, throwing separation of powers effectively out the window. I wanted to give you an update. As you may recall, Rep. Ron Lewis (R-Ky.) unveiled the “Congressional Accountability for Judicial Activism Act” (H.R. 3920) […]
Everyone remembers the old Will Rogers line, “I’m not a member of any organized political party; I’m a Democrat.” I’ve always begrudgingly accepted this as fact. Dems just aren’t in the GOP’s league in enforcing any sense of party discipline. Maybe it’s a symptom of our ideology, but the Democratic congressional leadership has traditionally been […]
I mentioned yesterday that a fundraising scandal before a Texas grand jury may lead to an indictment for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas). As Roll Call noted, DeLay has even started quiet discussions with GOP leaders about a plan on how to proceed should he have to give up his leadership post. The Houston […]