The Carpetbagger Report

Roll Call noted today that Senate Republicans are poised to hold a special, behind-closed-doors retreat this week, in which the GOP caucus will focus their attention on “rebranding” themselves. It’s a tall order, especially given that old Culture of Corruption brand is still going strong. Agents from the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service raided […]

Over the weekend, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) said he expects Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to “revise” his deceptive testimony this week, or the matter would escalate. Yesterday, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said he’s not even willing to wait the full week. The Senate Judiciary Committee’s ranking Republican, Arlen Specter (Pa.), emerged from […]

We all had a good laugh last month when Dick Cheney’s office argued, in all sincerity, that the Vice President could ignore executive orders because he’s not part of the executive branch of government. Eventually, the Bush gang dropped the argument from their talking points, but not until they’d humiliated themselves. Yesterday, CBS News’ Mark […]

Today’s edition of quick hits. * Details are still a little sketchy, but Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts was taken to the hospital this afternoon after falling at his summer home in Maine. A spokesperson for the court said the hospital visit was just a “precaution.” * The O’Hanlon/Pollack op-ed that we talked about […]

It’s been clear for a while now, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious all the time: among Democratic presidential hopefuls, populism is in. (via Greg Sargent) Democratic Sen. Barack Obama lashed out at the power of the oil, insurance and pharmaceutical industries in blocking progressive policy in Washington as he sought to bolster his credentials as […]

There’s been some talk of late about impeachment proceedings for the Attorney General, but if the idea is going to go anywhere, lawmakers will need something specific to support. In other words, no one can endorse impeachment without an impeachment resolution. Tomorrow, some House Dems will take care of that. A group of House Democrats […]

Desperate for a white knight to come save the party from electoral ruin, the Republican establishment turned its lonely eyes to Fred Thompson. It was going to be awesome — he’d run a new kind of campaign that could start late because of the phenomenon — online and off — it would inspire. And how’s […]

It’s easy to forget, and most news accounts seem to overlook it, but the whole point of the White House “surge” policy was to provide Iraqis with the proverbial breathing room necessary to finally make some political progress. Bush has said repeatedly that he believes Iraq’s politics cannot be changed until there’s improved security conditions, […]

Atrios noted today that it’s “amazing that the rather obvious fact that for years the entire ‘Iraq policy’ has simply been to postpone leaving until after Bush leaves office has managed not to penetrate the skulls of some of our very smart pundits.” For what it’s worth, Bush and Gordon Brown held a brief press […]

The president’s ardent (and purely ideological) opposition to expanding S-CHIP to include more middle-class children has been getting more and more attention, slowly but surely. As Brian Beutler noted, Paul Krugman tackles the issue today, and in the process, distills conservatism into two paragraphs. [W]hy should Mr. Bush fear that insuring uninsured children would lead […]