Over the last 10 or so days, supporters of the administration’s Iraq policy have insisted, repeatedly, that Iraq’s new “de-Baathification” law is proof of long-awaited political progress. John McCain, who’s been wrong about every aspect of the war for six years, said the law is evidence that “we’re succeeding politically.” Fred Kagan, an architect of […]
Huckabee struggles to compete with empty campaign coffers
Two weeks ago, Rudy Giuliani’s campaign was humiliated when we learned that it was so broke, senior campaign aides would not get paid for the month of January. Now, Giuliani isn’t the only one suffering from serious financial difficulties. Some of Mike Huckabee’s top advisers are working without pay and some field directors have been […]
Playing ‘the war card’ — measuring the mendacity
The notion that the Bush White House took the nation to war under false pretenses is not exactly a new concept. I suspect most of us can rattle, off the top of our heads, a variety of jaw-dropping whoppers that the president and his team told about Iraq before we invaded nearly five years ago. […]
Tuesday’s Mini-Report
Today’s edition of quick hits. * Market watching today, as you might imagine, was not for the faint of heart: “Stocks ended lower, but off the worst levels of the session as worries about a global economic slowdown eased and investors continued to sort through the implications of the Fed’s emergency interest-rate cut. The Dow […]
Seeking yet another Friedman Unit in Iraq
As soon as “six months” became a ridiculous cliche overused by supporters of Bush’s Iraq policy, I’d hoped we’d have a moratorium on the phrase. No one should ever be able to say, “We need six more months” in relation to the war again, without being laughed at. Too harsh? Tell you what, take a […]
Market uncertainty and the presidential campaign
TNR’s Brad Plumer had a line this afternoon that immediately made me chuckle. His headline read, “Does a Financial Crisis Help Romney?” and Plumer said: Yeah, I know, this post plays into all the worst stereotypes about political journalists (there’s a market meltdown happening, and we just want to talk about the horse race…). The […]
Fred Thompson exits stage right
I have a small confession: I really believed that Fred Thompson would be a major force in the presidential campaign. When Thompson was still in the “testing the waters” phase, he was generating quite a bit of excitement, while the rest of the GOP field was faltering. While each of the major GOP players had […]
Sorry Messrs. Bloomberg, Broder — there’s no 3rd-party clamoring
One need not look too hard to find a “moderate” pundit projecting his or her own desire for a third-party presidential campaign onto the public. This became especially fashionable a couple of weeks ago, when NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg and a bipartisan group of allies chatted in Oklahoma about some kind of independent bid. (Unity08 […]
Obama’s faith-based appeals — excessive or understandable?
Last night, Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, and Barack Obama, unprompted, started talking about Democratic electability in November. They all made reasonably good points, but Obama added a comment that, under normal circumstances, would have been terribly disappointing. Obama was explaining his take on reaching out to people outside the traditional Democratic fold, and noted “the […]
Giuliani and his ‘constant loyalty tests’
At this point, highlighting Rudy Giuliani’s many serious flaws almost seems gratuitous. His presidential campaign has become something of a laughing stock, exacerbated yesterday by a poll showing him running third in his own home state. It’s tempting to wait to kick the guy until after he’s off the ground. But, even if we operate […]