When the Washington Post added Michael Gerson, Bush’s former chief speechwriter, to its stable of columnists, I tried to give Gerson the benefit of the doubt. He’s a former journalist, he can turn a phrase, and when it comes to former speechwriters joining major papers, William Safire sets a pretty low bar. With that in […]
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: * John Edwards’ campaign has released probably the hardest-hitting spot of the Democratic campaign, issuing a YouTube clip this morning accusing Hillary Clinton of engaging in the “politics of parsing.” * Speaking of […]
Apparently, you reality-huggers have been so focused on facts and veracity that you missed the big news: we won the war in Iraq. In fact, the whole conflict is over. We know this, of course, because Andrew Bolt, a conservative columnist in Australia, says so. In a piece today, Bolt proclaims, “The battle is actually […]
It’s been a discouraging week when it comes to the right and torture. The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page argued that waterboarding doesn’t necessarily constitute “cruel, inhuman or degrading” treatment of U.S. detainees. The National Review’s Rich Lowry argued, in Matt Yglesias’ words, that “torture a defining value of the American conservative movement.” But a […]
Earlier this week, we learned that the Consumer Product Safety Commission, which is responsible for reviewing thousands of consumer products to look for potential health risks, wants less money, a smaller staff, and weaker rules for product safety. Given recent events — most notably, toys from China with lead “issues” — the CPSC should want […]
Last week, The Onion, which is a satirical publication, ran a very amusing editorial cartoon, mocking right-wing attitudes. The cartoon asked, “Halloween: What is it teaching our kids?” It depicted a kid trick-or-treating with a bag that read, “Something for Nothing,” under the caption, “Everyone deserves hand-outs!” Proving once again that today’s right is practically […]
As has been well documented this week, Rudy Giuliani’s latest radio ad includes a patently false claim about healthcare. Confronted with reality, the campaign vowed to keep lying. And sure enough, that’s exactly what the former mayor is doing. In fact, Giuliani isn’t just repeating his lie about cancer rates, he’s expanding on it. From […]
Today’s edition of quick hits. * The market is almost back to where it was when Bush took office nearly seven years ago: “The Dow industrials suffered one of its biggest declines of the year Thursday, plummeting more than 360 points after a Citigroup downgrade served as a blunt reminder to Wall Street that the […]
To the benefit of all humanity, Donald Rumsfeld is no longer the Secretary of Defense. But once in a while, we gain some insights into just how peculiar a man ol’ Rummy really was during his lengthy — he was the longest serving Defense Secretary in U.S. history — tenure at the Pentagon. Consider, for […]
The UK’s Telegraph has been running an interesting conversation piece lately, ranking the top 100 most influential liberals and conservatives in U.S. politics. Each day, the British paper unveils another grouping of 20 on the left and 20 on the right, in ascending order. Today, for example, we find a grouping on the right that […]