Month: June 2008
-
Post-nomination Obama smear watch
Bringing you up to date on the Obama smear front, the RNC listed Barack Obama’s past profession as “street organizer” on an opposition research website; Fox News referred to Michelle Obama as Barack’s “baby mama” in an on-screen graphic; Washington Times editorial page editor Tony Blankley concluded a column on Obama by asking “Dictator or
-
How liberal is Obama on the economy?
There’s been a surge of stories describing the Obama/McCain debate over the economy as some sort of throwback to the 1980s. For instance, a day after NPR reporter Adam Hochberg described Obama’s economic plan as “heavy on working class populism,” NPR host Michele Norris framed Obama’s plan as “tax and spend liberalism” in an interview
-
GOP Cong. insiders on global warming
The National Journal Congressional Insiders poll asked a group of Republican and Democratic members of Congress whether “it’s been proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the Earth is warming because of man-made pollution.” In their responses, which are anonymous except for party ID, a disturbing 74 percent of Republicans said no. NJ provides a selection
-
NYT fact-checks McCain on taxes
The front page article in the New York Times on the presidential candidates’ economic plans includes excellent fact-checking of two misleading Republican talking points: [W]hile Mr. McCain has portrayed his tax cuts as benefiting the middle class, most of the benefits would go to the wealthy and to corporations, including his calls for the elimination
-
Wacky leadership PAC names
Apparently, Rep. Jim McCrery (R-LA) is so worried about the looming socialist threat that he named his leadership PAC Committee for the Preservation of Capitalism. Who knew capitalism needed preserving?
-
John McCain on other wars
Via Brad DeLong, Digby notes the irony of this passage from John McCain’s forward to David Halberstam’s The Best and the Brightest: It was a shameful thing to ask men to suffer and die, to persevere through god-awful afflictions and heartache, to endure the dehumanizing experiences that are unavoidable in combat, for a cause that
-
Ensign sets a low bar for GOP Senate seats
How bad are things looking for the Republicans in November? Congressional insiders and expert observers expect Democrats to pick up approximately 4-6 seats, which would give them 55-57 and leave Republicans with 43-45, but National Republican Senatorial Committee chairman John Ensign is publicly setting a goal of preserving a floor of at least 41 Republican
-
John McCain: “it’s a Google”
Who says John McCain is old and out of touch? Barack Obama may fist-bump his wife, but McCain can namedrop the hip new search engine that all the kids are using: Republican presidential candidate John McCain joked on Monday that Google, the popular Internet search engine, had made investigating his list of potential candidates a
-
Hillary’s loss: The defeat of dynasticism
If we can briefly set aside the debate over Hillary Clinton’s merits as a presidential candidate, it’s worth noting the ways in which her loss represents a victory for our democracy. First, two decades of Clinton/Bush dominance of the American political system will finally come to a close in January, preventing further entrenchment of the
-
Return of the ANWR bait and switch
Before leaving for Europe this morning, President Bush took the opportunity to claim that drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) would “give this country a chance to help us through this difficult period by finding more supplies of crude oil, which will take the pressure off the price of gasoline”: I’ll also remind