Political Commentary

January 22, 2015

Obama’s Approval Rating and the Outlook for the 2016 Presidential Election By Alan I. Abramowitz

With the 2014 midterm election in the rearview mirror, the attention of pundits and political prognosticators has quickly shifted to the outlook for the 2016 presidential election. On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State, First Lady, and U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton appears to be the prohibitive favorite to emerge as the nominee. On the Republican side, however, there is no clear frontrunner, and early maneuvering by prospective candidates has intensified with the announcement by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush that he is seriously considering a run for the White House. In addition to Bush, several prominent current and former Republican officeholders have already signaled their interest in running, including 2012 Republican nominee Mitt Romney, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.

January 21, 2015

Restate of the Union by John Stossel

President Obama sure is consistent. His State of the Union address sounded like his other speeches: What I've done is great! America is in a much better position. We've created a manufacturing sector that's adding jobs. More oil is produced at home. I cut deficits in half!

January 20, 2015

Government Created the Housing Bubble and Financial Crisis -- and Could Be Doing so Again By Michael Barone

What caused the financial crisis? How can we prevent another one from happening again? The answers you most often hear to those questions are (1) greed and deregulation and (2) the Dodd-Frank law.

But they're patently inadequate. Greed -- or the desire for monetary gain -- has always been with us and always will be. And no one has convincingly linked financial deregulation to the crisis. Dodd-Frank, enacted to increase regulation, confers too-big-to-fail status on very large financial institutions, which incentivizes unduly risky behavior and penalizes smaller competitors.

January 20, 2015

Stop Making Excuses for Nonvoting Millennials by Froma Harrop

The recent economic crisis hit the American middle class hard. But for the youngest adults trying to gain a foothold in the good life, it's been devastating.

January 16, 2015

Why the Violent Extremists Welcome Attacks on Islam by Joe Conason

Whenever an act of horrific terror enrages the West, a predictable second act ensues. Furious commentators and activists on the right erupt with blanket denunciations of Islam, Muslims and their supposed plots to enslave us all under Shariah, urging that we ban the religion, stigmatize its faithful and restore the Judeo-Christian exclusivity of America. Sometimes a few even seek retribution in attacks on mosques, individual Muslims and anyone unfortunate enough to "look Muslim."

January 16, 2015

Protecting a Tolerant Society Against the Intolerance: A New --- and Old --- Challenge by Michael Barone

How far should a tolerant society tolerate intolerance? It's a difficult issue, one without any entirely satisfactory answer. And it's a current issue in the days after 40 world leaders and the U.S. ambassador to France marched together in Paris against the jihadist Muslim murderers who targeted the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

January 15, 2015

Gilded Youth and Their Pain By Froma Harrop

A Hollywood-handsome Princeton grad recently shot his hedge-fund-founder father to death. The alleged reason: Thomas Gilbert Sr.'s plan to cut his allowance by $200 a month. You can imagine what the tabloids are doing with the story.

January 15, 2015

Harry Reid & The Senate Survivors By Geoffrey Skelley

If history is any indication, it would be hard to pick against Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) if he runs for another term next year. His races are often close, but he has shown a remarkable amount of resilience over the years, frustrating Republican attempts to dislodge him. In fact, by some measures Reid has had a tougher time retaining his seat than any of the longest-serving senators during the century-long era of popular Senate elections. He is, in many ways, the heartiest of the “Senate survivors.”

January 14, 2015

The Better Option by John Stossel

It's easy to "fire" a business that rips you off. Just go to a different one. It's a lot easier to patronize another business than to get government to fix the problem.

January 13, 2015

Can Jeb Bush -- or Anyone -- Come up With a Platform for Primaries, General and Presidency? by Michael Barone

There are likely to be many surprises in a race for the Republican presidential nomination that has something like 20 plausible potential candidates. The first of those surprises came in the last hours before New Year's when Jeb Bush announced he was setting up an exploratory committee to consider running for president.

January 13, 2015

License Plates Are Not Bumper Stickers By Froma Harrop

A group called the Sons of Confederate Veterans has asked Texas to issue a license plate featuring the Confederate battle flag, which many consider an emblem of slavery. Texas said no, and the sons are suing because the state accepts other messages for specialty plates.

The sons have a point.

January 9, 2015

What 'Je Suis Charlie' Should Mean to Us By Joe Conason

Not long after 9/11, the leading figures in France's Champagne industry decided that they would hold their 2002 annual awards gala in New York rather than Paris. At no small expense, they displayed solidarity with New Yorkers -- and America -- at a time of sorrow and fury, like so many of their compatriots. It was one more instance when the French renewed the bond that has existed since this country's founding.

January 9, 2015

Martin Anderson: A Remembrance by Michael Barone

Lou Cannon has a nice remembrance in RealClearPolitics of Martin Anderson, the economist and adviser to Ronald Reagan who died last week at 78. He touches on all of Anderson's accomplishments, from his successful advocacy in the Nixon White House to abolish the military draft to his unearthing, with his wife Annelise Anderson and Kiron Skinner, the handwritten drafts of Ronald Reagan's radio speeches, which show the impressive breadth of Reagan's reading and depth of his thinking.

January 8, 2015

Playtime Is Over for Obamacare's Foes By Froma Harrop

Friends of Obamacare, horrified that the Supreme Court has taken a case that could blow up the federal health insurance exchanges, should recalibrate their dread. While the health reforms were safely humming along, there was little political price for demanding their demise. Thanks to the Supreme Court, now there is.

Years of carpet-bombing assaults on Obamacare have left many Americans thinking that they don't like the Affordable Care Act. But close down the federal exchanges covering 6 million people (so far) in 36 states and they may think otherwise. With a vengeance.

January 8, 2015

The New World Order By Larry J. Sabato

Well, that didn’t last long! By that, we mean our pre-Christmas ordering of the GOP presidential field. We shouldn’t be surprised. Politics never takes a long holiday break anymore.

First prize for early maneuvering goes to Jeb Bush. His unexpected, all-but-in announcement on Dec. 16 stunned his competitors and the political community. Bush didn’t just accelerate the entire process, including forthcoming announcements by rivals, but he also gained a leg up in conventional wisdom’s positioning.

January 7, 2015

Trust by John Stossel

Trust -- society depends on it.

January 6, 2015

Family Fragmentation: Can Anything Be Done? by Michael Barone

How big a problem is family fragmentation? "Immense," says Mitch Pearlstein, head of the Minnesota think tank Center of the American Experiment. "The biggest domestic problem facing this country."

January 6, 2015

The Rich and Their Anti-Vaccine Quacks by Froma Harrop

California parents are refusing to vaccinate their kindergartners at twice the rate of seven years ago. So the Los Angeles Times reports. The result has been the return of measles and other serious diseases that can lead to paralysis, birth defects and death. The state is now suffering a whooping cough epidemic -- it's amazing to say -- in the year 2015.

But the real shocker in the story is this: The rise in "personal belief exemptions" -- a loophole in the law requiring parents to have their children vaccinated -- is highest in rich coastal and mountain areas. For example, an astounding 23 percent of students at the Santa Cruz Montessori obtained belief exemptions and are not vaccinated.

January 2, 2015

David Koch Loves Manhattan by Froma Harrop

One may start the day at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. On the way in, you'll pass through the new David H. Koch Plaza -- the result of a $65 million gift from David H. Koch.