On Day 26 of the Bush gang’s stonewall over Jack Abramoff’s White House connections, a reporter noted to Scott McClellan that there are now several Republican lawmakers who believe the White House should come clean and release the materials. McClellan, predictably, dodged, and said, “Nothing has changed.” According to an item in the Wall Street […]
I regret not having done more thorough coverage of the Senate “fight,” if we can call it that, over Samuel Alito’s Supreme Court nomination yesterday, but my heart just wasn’t in it. The writing’s been on the wall for, well, several months now, so yesterday’s theatrics just weren’t as captivating as they could have been. […]
Part of the Dems’ message problem, it seems to me, is the too-many-balls-in-the-air problem. The party believes it needs to keep the focus on Bush’s warrantless-search program. And Abramoff. And Medicare. While also articulating a clear national security message. And a vision for how a Dem-run Congress would operate. If Dems narrow the focus to […]
The president has repeatedly emphasized his desire to see more public funds go to religious ministries to provide social services that have historically been offered through government agencies and secular non-profit organizations. It’s a drive that has some disturbing results when over $14 million goes to someone like TV preacher Pat Robertson. But Bush’s faith-based […]
Samuel Alito has the votes to be confirmed; Senate Democrats don’t have the votes to filibuster; and now that the fight is over, Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R-RI) is ready to stand up for his liberal Republican principles. Sen. Lincoln D. Chafee (R-RI) announced this morning in Providence that he will vote against the nomination of […]
In every president’s White House, there will be reporters who want more access and officials who want less. With Bush, this is a problem that’s become intensified. It doesn’t come up as often, but photo journalists are struggling with being shutout as well. For example, under eight years of Clinton, the White House distributed 100 […]
Almost a year ago, the Washington Post ran a front-page item on pharmacists who are refusing to fill prescriptions when medications violate their “personal moral or religious beliefs.” It caused a fuss, but the scope of the issue was not altogether clear. It was a solid article, but it was vague about how serious a […]
Today’s installment of campaign-related news items that wouldn’t generate a post of their own, but may be of interest to political observers: * Activist Cindy Sheehan announced over the weekend that she’s considering a campaign against Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) this year, in part because Sheehan believes Feinstein has not been aggressive enough in opposing […]
I’ve long believed that hand-wringing over Howard Dean’s DNC fundraising is unnecessary. The DNC collected over $51 million last year, which was about half of what the RNC took in over the same period, but was far better than the DNC’s fundraising in the last off-year cycle (2003). Indeed, under Dean, the gap had actually […]
The WaPo’s Dan Balz noted a couple of interesting results in the latest Post/ABC poll, particularly about the public’s desire for a change in the national direction. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows Bush with a lower approval rating than any postwar president at the start of his sixth year in office — with […]