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: * Over the last 72 hours, there’s been quite a bit of delegate movement. Unless I missed some, Barack Obama has picked up seven since Friday at noon — Oregon’s Jenny Greenleaf, Georgia’s […]
A friend of mine asked me yesterday whether I planned to watch HBO’s “Recount,” a movie about the 2000 election fiasco in Florida. I admitted that I would not. It’s not that it doesn’t look like a good movie. In fact, I’m sure it’s great — the cast is terrific, and it was directed by […]
We’ve been hearing for about a generation now about “Reagan Democrats” — white, working-class voters who voted Republican in the 1980s, and who pundits believe Democrats have to get back if they hope to be competitive on the national level again. (That the Democratic candidate has won more votes than the Republican candidate in three […]
When former Republican Rep. Bob Barr announced that he would seek the Libertarian Party’s presidential nomination, many assumed he’d get the party’s nod. After all, he’s a fairly high-profile figure who’d be in a position to help Libertarians raise their profile and win some votes. But Barr wasn’t about to get the nomination without a […]
There’s obviously been considerable discussion of late about Hillary Clinton’s reference on Friday to Bobby Kennedy’s assassination in June 1968, with some suggesting that Clinton is continuing to campaign just in case tragedy strikes. (I, for what it’s worth, don’t buy into this interpretation.) But yesterday, when scrutinizing the controversy, Fox News aired the kind […]
The House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Karl Rove this week, in order to get his side of the story on, among other things, his possible role in the imprisonment of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman. This morning, George Stephanopoulos asked Rove directly if he had been in communication with the Justice Department about the prosecution. Rove […]
One of the week’s more contentious disputes came between Barack Obama and John McCain over benefits for the troops, highlighted by McCain’s opposition to a bipartisan expansion of the GI Bill. Obama questioned McCain’s priorities; McCain lost his cool and attacked Obama for not having served in the military; and the dispute got a little […]
Former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner (D) certainly looked like a top-tier presidential contender last year, and had begun taking steps towards throwing his hat in the ring. In the 11th hour, however, Warner backed off, ultimately deciding to run for Virginia’s open Senate seat. Bu as it turns out, Warner still has a decent chance […]
Newsweek published the results of a new poll, which shows John McCain doing quite well among white voters, leading Barack Obama by 12 (52% to 40%), and leading Hillary Clinton by four (48% to 40%). This isn’t especially surprising — white voters overall preferred Bush to Kerry in 2004, Bush to Gore in 2000, Dole […]
As a rule, when a rival makes a mistake — or, at least, something perceived as a mistake — a candidate is supposed to pounce and exploit the error. In the midst of the frenzy surrounding Barack Obama’s “bitter” comments, for example, Hillary Clinton was rather aggressive in pushing the argument that Obama’s remarks were […]