ABC News’ Jake Tapper has caused quite a stir with an item this morning about a speech Bill Clinton delivered yesterday in Denver. In a long, and interesting speech, he characterized what the U.S. and other industrialized nations need to do to combat global warming this way: “We just have to slow down our economy […]
Following up on an item from a couple of weeks ago, Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly told his television audience recently that John Edwards was wrong to assert that there are 200,000 homeless U.S. military veterans. He told his viewers “there’s not many of them out there,” and said he would intervene to help veterans sleeping […]
Following up on a brief item from yesterday, it’s probably worth noting that a certain third party candidate is moving forward with plans for a fourth presidential campaign. (Apparently, the results of the first three weren’t quite clear enough.) Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate who ran for president in 2000 and 2004, said he is […]
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: * California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has said he expected to stay neutral in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, but apparently made a decision after Rudy Giuliani withdrew: “Schwarzenegger will endorse John […]
When Alberto Gonzales would periodically stop by the Senate Judiciary Committee for oversight hearings, it was extraordinarily painful. The bulk of the poor schmo’s answers, when he wasn’t feigning a faulty memory, were so breathtakingly dishonest, it was almost comical. Michael Mukasey, in this sense, is a breath of fresh air. His callous disregard for […]
Now that Democrats feel pretty confident about which Republican they’re going to face in November, the race for the Democratic nomination appears poised to enter a slightly different phase: Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton will probably start making the case that they can beat John McCain in a general election, and their rival can’t. To […]
In 2001 and 2003, Bush pushed two massive tax-cut packages through Congress, with near-universal Republican support. Indeed, it was something akin to a GOP fealty test — to vote for the White House tax cuts was to be a good Republican. In the Senate, two GOP lawmakers balked — Lincoln Chafee, who later left the […]
After skipping a couple of Republican presidential candidate debates lately, I thought it was time to get back in the game. After all, the field is down to just four candidates, which led me to believe that last night’s event, at the Reagan Library in California, might be a little more substantive than most. Indeed, […]
Today’s edition of quick hits. * As a long-term economic policy, I’m not sure this is going to cut it: “The Federal Reserve cut a key interest rate by half a percentage point today, the second rate cut in nine days, in an aggressive move to try to prevent a recession. The central bank cut […]
The latest anti-McCain attack ad is surprisingly captivating. Kevin Drum noted that he loves it because “it’s just so … Republican.” It attacks viciously, it smears without compunction, and the production values are first rate. It’s great. The question is, will $20 million worth of airplay (or whatever it’s getting) be enough to save Mitt […]