Just last week, the AP reported that Donald Rumsfeld, his popularity dropping precipitously, suddenly seemed to be hiding. After years of high-profile interviews and televised briefings, it seemed like the White House, in full campaign mode, wanted to shield a controversial failure like Rumsfeld from public view to bolster the campaign’s prospects. But the Washington […]
Forgive my morbid fascination with the plight of Illinois’ Republicans, but it’s just too interesting to ignore. Nearly a month after Jack Ryan quit the Senate race in the midst of a sex scandal, Dem Barack Obama is still without a GOP challenger. It sounds as though the upcoming debates may be awfully boring — […]
Nine years ago, then-Speaker Newt Gingrich demonstrated his legendary outside-the-box thinking by floating an idea to give families in poverty a tax credit to by a laptop computer. “Maybe that’s expensive, maybe we can’t do it, but [we should send] . . . any signal that we can send to the poorest Americans that says, […]
We were bound to find out eventually who reserved a Senate office building room for the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s recent “coronation.” Kudos to the Washington Post for solving the mystery. Sen. John W. Warner’s office acknowledged yesterday that the Virginia Republican arranged for religious activists to use a Senate office building last March for […]
Republicans may hope to use a moderate façade in prime time during the party’s national convention next month, but behind the scenes, the GOP has left one powerful special interest in charge: Big Tobacco. My friend Andrew, who knows more than a little about this issue, noticed a Newday report yesterday that emphasized security concerns […]
No wonder Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) is thinking about quitting politics in two years; he’s just not very good at it. When Republicans needed to replace Trent Lott two years ago, they turned to Frist, a senator who seemed likable and had a compelling personal narrative. The White House, which helped orchestrate the […]
It’s no wonder John Edwards’ “Two Americas” speech resonated so well; it’s all true. The Wall Street Journal, on the front page no less, offered a tremendous analysis on how economic growth in recent years has been terribly one-sided and that the post-recession recovery has “taken two tracks.” I’ll give you one guess which income […]
It’s encouraging to see the U.S. policy on the execution of minors getting some much needed attention. A broad array of individuals and groups ranging from Jimmy Carter to Mikhail Gorbachev and the American Medical Association to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops urged the Supreme Court yesterday to declare that it is unconstitutional to […]
Bush will make his way to Iowa (swing state — 7 electoral votes) this afternoon for one of his insipid “Ask the president” events. Don’t be surprised, however, if questions are limited to complementary softballs. Admission to the event may be free of charge, but it is not open to the general public. In fact, […]
No wonder John Kerry emphasizes the White House’s Halliburton ties at every possible opportunity: there’s just so much to work with. The latest embarrassing revelation for Cheney’s former company that keeps winning lucrative no-bid contracts from the administration is word that a grand jury in Texas is investigating Halliburton’s business dealings with Iran, the same […]