Today’s edition of quick hits. * If the new Gallup daily tracking poll is right, the Democratic race hasn’t been this tight in weeks: “Gallup Poll Daily tracking shows a tightening of the national Democratic race, with Barack Obama now holding just a 3-percentage point advantage over Hillary Clinton, 47% to 44%.” A week ago, […]
Barack Obama seemed to take some pleasure yesterday in tapping into Democratic disappointment with the ABC News debate in Philadelphia on Wednesday. He emphasized, repeatedly, that the moderators didn’t ask a single substantive question for over 45 minutes, which he argued was part of a systemic problem with the political world’s “obsession” with “distractions.” It […]
When the Pentagon’s premier military educational institute trashes the war in Iraq as a “major debacle,” a “classic case of failure,” and a conflict that may not be winnable, it’s hard not to take notice. The war in Iraq has become “a major debacle” and the outcome “is in doubt” despite improvements in security from […]
John McCain, on Tuesday: “I propose that the federal government suspend all taxes on gasoline now paid by the American people — from Memorial Day to Labor Day of this year. The effect will be an immediate economic stimulus…. [B]ecause the cost of gas affects the price of food, packaging, and just about everything else, […]
Ordinarily, presidential endorsements from two former red-state senators, neither of whom are especially high-profile right now, wouldn’t be especially newsworthy, but I think today’s announcement that Sam Nunn and David Boren are backing Barack Obama is a little more interesting than most. The Obama campaign sent out a press release, noting the endorsement, and adding […]
For all the talk in recent weeks about Hillary Clinton’s initial reluctance to release her tax returns, John McCain’s identical reluctance has gone largely ignored. The difference is that the media devoted considerable attention to Clinton’s returns, and gave McCain a pass on his. The good news is, McCain finally released his tax materials today. […]
Bush’s Department of Housing and Urban Development has been almost comically corrupt and incompetent for years, but with Alphonso Jackson resigning in disgrace, the president has an opportunity to at least marginally salvage HUD’s reputation with a qualified nominee who can use the next eight months to get the agency back on track. It’s 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: * Rasmussen, which seems to have been hit or miss this year, shows the race in Pennsylvania tightening. Hillary Clinton now leads Barack Obama by three, 47% to 44%. On Monday, Rasmussen showed […]
It finally looked like we were getting somewhere. A couple of weeks ago, in a startling “60 Minutes” report, the nation saw the ways in which former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman had been railroaded and sent to prison under the most dubious of circumstances. Based on a variety of elements, Siegelman has argued that Karl […]
Guest Post by Deborah J. Vagins, ACLU Policy Counsel for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties [Editor’s Note: There were quite a few troubling Supreme Court rulings last year, but one of the more striking decisions was in Ledbetter v. Goodyear, in which the court ruled 5 to 4 that workers who face wage discrimination only […]