“Scandal fatigue” can be common under the circumstances. After seven-and-a-half years of legal, moral, ethical, and political outrages, many of the scandals of the Bush/Cheney years start to blur together. Some are even forgotten, swept aside to make room for new, more offensive controversies. It’s only natural, then, to shift the focus away from the […]
In light of John McCain’s appearance before the NAACP’s national convention yesterday, Bruce Bartlett makes the case in a WSJ op-ed that McCain should argue that the Republican Party, all appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, is the party of civil rights. (If this sounds familiar, Bartlett wrote a book on this subject, called “Wrong on […]
When Al Gore endorsed Barack Obama a while back, the former Vice President said he’d continue to present ambitious agendas to address global warming, that may or may not be entirely in line with the Democratic agenda. He clearly meant it. Former Vice President Al Gore said on Thursday that Americans must abandon fossil fuels […]
On Tuesday, the conservative Washington Times ran a front-page item under the headline: “Shift on war hits Obama’s liberal base.” Sen. John McCain on Monday accused his Democratic presidential rival of flip-flopping on the war in Iraq, as a pair of new polls showed the Republican’s strategy of painting Sen. Barack Obama as politically expedient […]
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: * Interesting fundraising item from Roll Call: “Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) and the Democratic National Committee on Wednesday established a joint fundraising agreement with 18 state Democratic parties to funnel money into those […]
Barack Obama had planned an overseas trip as part of his presidential campaign for quite a while, but plans were delayed when the Democratic nominating fight took a little longer than expected. Now, there’s a window between the 4th of July, the Olympics, and the start of the conventions, and Obama is ready to head […]
Over the weekend, John McCain told the New York Times that he opposes gay adoption, even if the alternative is leaving a child in an orphanage. A few days later, McCain’s campaign reversed course and said the senator doesn’t actually believe what he said — “caring parental figures,” even if they’re gay, are “better for […]
The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Barack Obama’s campaign had raised $30 million in June, only marginally better than John McCain’ $22 million haul for the month. The Journal described Obama’s totals as “underwhelming,” and the Washington Post added that Obama’s finance machine was showing “signs of wear.” In response, Obama spokesperson Dan […]
By all appearances, Barack Obama has a genuine friendship with Sen. Dick Lugar of Indiana, despite the fact that Lugar is a conservative Republican. The two don’t agree on much, but they’ve worked closely on counter-proliferation — a point that Obama emphasized in a new TV ad unveiled on Tuesday. “The single most important national […]
One of the more painful aspects of the media’s coverage of the Democratic presidential primaries was the ridiculous coverage of Hillary Clinton’s pantsuits and cleavage. Now that the primaries are over, we’re less than four months from the general election, there’s an endless stream of substantive news stories to report, and Hillary Clinton isn’t even […]