In case there was any doubt, the early reports from the Huffington Post were true: Bill Kristol is, in fact, going to be a regular op-ed columnist for the New York Times. Times’ editorial page editor Andy Rosenthal defended the move. Rosenthal told Politico.com shortly after the official announcement Saturday that he fails to understand […]
It’s not exactly a secret that Fred Thompson’s presidential campaign isn’t going well. By some measures, that’s a surprise — he’s plenty conservative; he’s never flip-flopped on key issues; and he’s not a member of a religious minority that the GOP base finds offensive. Simply as a matter of process of elimination, this guy should […]
As it turns out, the reasoning behind the CIA’s decision to record interrogations on video, stop recording interrogations on video, and destroy the interrogation videos was all exactly the same: officials were hoping to avoid a public-relations nightmare. If Abu Zubaydah, a senior operative of Al Qaeda, died in American hands, Central Intelligence Agency officers […]
TNR’s Noam Scheiber had an interesting item the other day, gaming out possible post-Iowa-caucus scenarios, and describing the various “paths” Democratic candidates have to the nomination. First, the three easy scenarios: 1.) Hillary wins by more than a point or two, in which case the race is basically over. 2.) Obama wins convincingly (five points […]
It’s hardly a secret that the Bush administration has treated the rule of law as some kind of punch line for the better part seven years now, but Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick has done the political world a tremendous service by documenting the “Administration’s Top 10 Stupidest Legal Arguments of 2007.” Now, if you’re like me, […]
John Deady, a designated surrogate for Rudy Giuliani’s presidential campaign, and a leader with a group called “Veterans for Rudy,” was caught on video making some jaw-dropping comments about Muslims. Here’s what Deady said about Giuliani: “He’s got I believe the knowledge and the judgment to attack one of the most difficult problems in current […]
Years ago, when I worked for the Rev. Barry Lynn at Americans United, I was frequently amazed when he seemed pleased by the right’s personal attacks against him. It seemed to me that scurrilous, baseless attacks from far-right activists, which were fairly common, should be offensive and frustrating. I expected Barry to mind, but invariably, […]
First up from the God Machine this week is an interesting trend pointing to a rise in irreligion for the last several decades. Matt Yglesias, whose post features a nice chart, explained: One hears from a lot of secular people worries that the country is plunging over the edge into theocracy. At the same time, […]
In October, David Brooks, in an otherwise fawning column about Mike Huckabee, conceded that “his foreign policy thinking is thin.” That was obviously a dramatic understatement. Earlier this month, he didn’t know what the National Intelligence Estimate was. A week later, the former governor identified Thomas Friedman and Frank Gaffney as his biggest influences on […]
Recently cast off from Time magazine, presumably for writing shallow, predictable tripe, the Weekly Standard’s William Kristol is getting a promotion of sorts. The Huffington Post has learned that, in a move bound to create controversy, the New York Times is set to announce that Bill Kristol will become a weekly columnist in 2008. Kristol, […]