The Carpetbagger Report

When Bush announced his latest escalation policy for Iraq in a televised address a couple of weeks ago, he also mentioned that he’d like Congress to create a “new, bipartisan working group that will help us come together across party lines to win the war on terror.” Bush said it was a good idea — […]

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: * Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), the former chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, formally declared this morning that he’s running for president. The 14-term conservative set up a presidential exploratory committee earlier […]

For the president’s critics, the State of the Union was a boring disappointment, filled with half-truths and missed opportunities. He defended an indefensible policy in Iraq; he made ridiculous budget claims, he ignored Katrina reconstruction, and he unveiled awful (and largely rehashed) health care and energy policies. There wasn’t much to like. But as it […]

I saw a surprising number of headlines yesterday about the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office’s budget estimates, and how the federal government really is on track towards balance by 2012. It’s probably worth taking a moment to remember that it’s completely untrue. The federal budget deficit will fall to $172 billion this year and $98 billion […]

U.S. News’ Paul Bedard highlighted a political cartoon yesterday from Paul Combs, a syndicated cartoonist, who drew a piece arguing that Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign is burdened by “baggage.” You can take a look at the cartoon for yourself (cartoonists generally get upset about republishing without permission, so I won’t include it here), but it […]

That Fox News Channel — recently labeled the “Fox Nothing Channel” by Keith Olbermann — is a blight on the nation is not exactly new information. But questions are how to deal with a massive, successful propaganda network, with no professional standards or concerns for objective reporting, are fairly new. Take Barack Obama, for example. […]

Today’s edition of quick hits. * During the unexpectedly fascinating opening statements yesterday, were Scooter Libby’s attorneys signaling the White House for a pardon? Hmm. * Bush managed to go through the entire SOTU without mentioning Katrina, New Orleans, and/or rebuilding. I thought the president gave it too little attention last year, but literally nothing […]

There’s one paragraph from last night’s State of the Union address that’s been bugging me all day: “Next, there is the matter of earmarks. These special interest items are often slipped into bills at the last hour — when not even C-SPAN is watching. In 2005 alone, the number of earmarks grew to over 13,000 […]

I haven’t seen the video, but the transcript of Dick Cheney’s interview with Wolf Blitzer from this morning points to a rather heated interview. Here’s one of the more interesting exchanges. Q: The President himself speaks about a nightmare scenario right now. He was contained, as you repeatedly said throughout the ’90s, after the first […]

It seemed like it’d be fairly easy. The House already passed a measure to raise the minimum wage in a “clean” bill (no extraneous amendments or tax cuts), with broad bipartisan support. The president has indicated that he’d sign it. The public backs it overwhelmingly. And yet, when the measure came to the floor today, […]