The Carpetbagger Report

Barack Obama’s decision to skip the public financing system has really enraged the nation’s newspaper editors. I’ve already explained why I think all the hand-wringing is unnecessary. In fact, in some instances, the criticism is backwards — by sidestepping public financing and raising his own war chest, Obama will rely less on outside, independent groups, […]

Way back in 2006, the president delivered a State of the Union address that actually pretended to care about energy policy. Bush graciously acknowledged that we “have a serious problem: America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world.” The president argued, persuasively, that we need to “break” the […]

David Broder’s take on a journalist’s professional responsibilities sounds about right: “People think that we are part of the establishment and therefore part of the problem. I mean, what bothers me is the notion that journalists believe, or some journalists believe, that they can have their cake and eat it too…. You can be a […]

If any presidential candidate’s campaign should be a finely-tuned machine, it should be John McCain’s. Not only has he been a political insider for decades, but this is his second presidential race, and he’s effectively been running for two years. There was a very rough patch around April 2007, but McCain has had plenty of […]

CNN’s Jack Cafferty did an on-air commentary a few days ago on John McCain’s major policy flip-flops for months now. It’s a “delicate dance,” Cafferty said, “and if McCain’s not careful, he’s liable to break a hip.” Yesterday, CNN’s Wolf Blitzer followed up by asking the question, “What’s wrong with a politician who changes views?” […]

As a rule, there’s very little point in arguing with far-right activists. We all know the saying about wrestling in the mud with pigs. But I’ve been amazed this week by the bizarre nature of the policy discussion over oil drilling, and when I saw that Hugh Hewitt had tackled the subject in a lengthy […]

In late March, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.), the co-chairman of John McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign, raised a few eyebrows when he said he hadn’t endorsed McCain this year, and didn’t have any plans to do so. “When I endorse someone, or when I work for someone, or commit to someone, I want to be behind […]

First Amendment law is pretty unambiguous about where the church-state line in drawn in public school classrooms, which is why it’s disappointing to hear about teachers who continue to impose their religious beliefs onto students. But while there’s no shortage of incidents involving teachers promoting creationism, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a controversy […]

I’m reasonably confident that Barack Obama is well-positioned for Election Day. But I’m not this confident. Barack finally has his bounce. For weeks many political experts and pollsters have been wondering why the race between Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain had stayed so tight, even after the Illinois senator wrested the nomination from […]

First up from The God Machine this week is an interesting legal dispute in California about the responsibilities of medical professionals who have religious qualms about their work. We’ve heard quite a bit about pharmacists who don’t want to fill prescriptions for medication they find morally objectionable, but what about doctors refusing to treat some […]