Bill Daley By Susan Estrich
For a while there, I was worried that Barack Obama might actually be content to be a one-term president so long as he could say he accomplished what he set out to do.
Political Commentary
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January 8, 2011
January 8, 2011
Washington Goes Supply-Side By Lawrence Kudlow
"Stop the bad stuff" is what John Boehner told a bunch of us at breakfast a few weeks before the election. That's how he defined the GOP mission. Now he's speaker.
January 7, 2011
Governator Flubbed His Exit, Won't Be Back By Debra J. Saunders
In his last remaining hours as California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger issued three sentence commutations. The most notable went to the son of former Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, Esteban Nunez, who is serving time for voluntary manslaughter.
January 7, 2011
Immigration Reform No Place for Games By Froma Harrop
Consider this immigration case from Canada: Three years ago, a Mexican sister and brother moved illegally to Toronto. Brenda Garcia, 30, filed for refugee status, claiming fear of persecution back home for being lesbian. Her brother, 18-year-old Daniel Garcia, enrolled in a Toronto high school. Both said they might be killed upon returning to Mexico City.
January 7, 2011
2011: A Fiscal Reckoning That Cannot Be Avoided By Howard Rich
While the extension of Bush-era tax cuts dominated headlines during the recently-concluded lame duck session of Congress, the coming year will bring with it a renewed focus on public debt – whether policymakers like it or not.
January 6, 2011
Uniforms By Susan Estrich
My little neighborhood sandwich shop was invaded today by a horde of high school students from a school I'd never heard of. The students were more diverse than the neighborhood.
January 6, 2011
Wily Old Dems Take on Whippersnapper Republicans By Michael Barone
Curious fact, unearthed by Gerald Seib of The Wall Street Journal. The average age of Republican House members in the new Congress convening this week is 54.9, younger than the Republicans' average age in the previous Congress, 56.5. But the average age of House Democrats has risen, from 58 to 60.2.
January 6, 2011
Initial Rating For All 2012 Senate Seats By Larry J. Sabato
Over the next four weeks, the Crystal Ball is going to roll out its very first look at the 2012 contests for Senate, Governor, House, and President.
January 5, 2011
How to Defeat Obama By Dick Morris
The pas-de-deux between the Republican House and the Democratic president and Senate can get old pretty quickly. The Republican House passes repeal of ObamaCare. The Senate either kills it or Obama vetoes it. The Republican House passes spending cuts. The Senate ... you get the drift.
January 5, 2011
More Loud Voices, Please By Tony Blankley
As we begin a new year, it may be useful to look back to one particular piece of advice that George Washington gave us in his farewell address. In paragraph 28, he reminded us that:
"It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?"
January 5, 2011
Supply-Side Obama? Trust but Verify By Lawrence Kudlow
The past is not always a prologue to the future. But looking at some of the big winners and losers of 2010 does provide some strong hints of a positive 2011.
January 4, 2011
Sacramento -- Can Jerry Brown Do It? By Debra J. Saunders
As he was sworn in as governor at Sacramento's Memorial Auditorium on Monday "with no mental reservations," Brown gave Californians reason to be optimistic that he might succeed where predecessors Gray Davis and Arnold Schwarzenegger failed. In the face of a $28 billion shortfall, Brown's team is floating savvy cuts in California government.
January 4, 2011
Mystery of the Missing Millionaires By Froma Harrop
A daffy Wall Street Journal editorial about the "vanishing millionaires" of Oregon lit a spark in a fairly humorless week. It offers the usual boilerplate about the rich fleeing to tax-friendlier provinces because their state raised taxes, but this time with a great visual: "One-quarter of the rich tax filers seem to have gone missing."
January 3, 2011
Personal Well-being Overshadows Income Inequality By Michael Barone
Consider one conundrum in American politics. Income inequality has been increasing, according to standard statistics. Yet most Americans do not seem very perturbed by it.
December 31, 2010
The Death Penalty Debacle By Susan Estrich
California has more prisoners on death row than any other state. Last year, according to the Los Angeles Times, it added 28 more, for a total of 717, contrary to trends elsewhere.
December 30, 2010
New Soldiers in the Fight Against the Drug War By Froma Harrop
Profound thanks are due televangelist Pat Robertson for stating so clearly what many of us have been screaming in the wilderness for years -- that the criminalization of marijuana is a plague on young people. May he lend courage to politicians who know better but won't do the right thing for fear of seeming "soft" on drugs.
December 30, 2010
Is Hacking Your Spouse's E-Mail Truly a Crime? By Debra J. Saunders
Michigan prosecutor Jessica R. Cooper's bio boasts that she is a "pioneer in the world of women in the law." As it turns out, she is a pioneer in the world of busybodies in the law as well. Cooper is the Oakland County prosecutor who charged Leon Walker, 33, with a felony for hacking into his now ex-wife's e-mail, as he suspected that she was having an affair.
December 29, 2010
No Comeback for New Comeback Kid By Tony Blankley
Don't believe all the Washington talk that President Obama had a great lame duck session and goes into the new year and the new 112th congress with the whip hand. Utter nonsense.
December 29, 2010
Zachary Furnish-John By Susan Estrich
Born on Christmas day in California to a surrogate mother, weighing in at 7 pounds 15 ounces.
The son of proud fathers Sir Elton John and his civil partner David Furnish.
No statement as to whether or which of the two was the sperm donor.
December 28, 2010
Libya and Oil Spell Commercial Warfare By Debra J. Saunders
Twenty-two years ago last week, Pan Am Flight 103 exploded over Scotland. The terrorist attack killed 270 people, including 189 Americans and 11 Scots on the ground in the small village of Lockerbie.
