The National Republican Congressional Committee, in light of its many problems, has become something of a punch-line lately. As retiring Rep. Thomas M. Davis III (R-Va), a former NRCC chairman, put it, “The House Republican brand is so bad right now that if it were a dog food, they’d take it off the shelf.” But […]
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: * A new WSJ/NBC poll found that registered voters, by a 13-point margin (50% to 37%) say they would prefer a Democrat to be elected president in November. That’s the good news. The […]
The lead headline on the Politico right now reads, “Support for war effort highest since 2006.” This is based on late-February polling from the Pew Research Center, which found that 53% of Americans now believe “the U.S. will ultimately succeed in achieving its goals” in Iraq, which is up 11 points from September 2007. (The […]
Many of us have come to enjoy MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann’s ‘Special Comments,” not only because they tend to highlight the outrages of the Bush administration in stark and powerful terms, but also because Olbermann has a tendency to say things no one else in television news is willing to say. When Olbermann gets into high […]
Bobby Bright, the three-term mayor of Montgomery, Alabama, didn’t have a party affiliation, and when Rep. Terry Everett (R) announced his plans to retire, both parties pursued Bright to run for the seat. Bright chose to run as a Democrat — despite the fact that Alabama’s 2nd district is pretty solidly Republican — in part […]
This, alas, isn’t the first time. Two months ago, after Hillary Clinton commented on Martin Luther King and Lyndon Johnson, race became an unfortunate feature of the Democratic presidential campaign. It got worse, and more intense, after some campaign surrogates riles the dispute with some additional contentious remarks. Before long, Barack Obama and Clinton saw […]
There’s been considerable discussion, at least online, about John McCain reaching out and embracing televangelist John Hagee, despite Hagee’s record of attacking people not like him, most notably Catholics, Jews, and gays. But it’s worth keeping in mind that there’s another right-wing televangelist with close ties to McCain whose background deserves closer scrutiny. Meet Rod […]
Today’s edition of quick hits. * Oh my: “Merrill Lynch economist David Rosenberg, one of the most bearish Wall Street economists, says to look past the 1990-91 recession as a guide to the current downturn. The key difference: the depth of home-price declines…. The mid-1970s recession ‘not only saw a sharp and sustained rise in […]
This was the right call, and the only sensible move for Geraldine Ferraro to make. Dear Hillary – I am stepping down from your finance committee so I can speak for myself and you can continue to speak for yourself about what is at stake in this campaign. The Obama campaign is attacking me to […]
One would like to think the right would stop shrieking about immigration, if for no other reason, because it’s an electoral loser. When it comes to immigrants, demagoguery just isn’t working. At this point, it seems like a non-starter at the presidential level, and it’s not working out for conservatives down ballot. As the far-right […]