Not Yet Ready for a Welfare State By Michael Barone
Roadblocks. That's what Barack Obama has been encountering on the audacious path toward a European-style welfare state he has set out in his budget and other proposals.
Political Commentary
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March 28, 2009
March 27, 2009
A Benefit for Rape By Susan Estrich
What's Bill O'Reilly doing at a benefit for rape victims and their families?
March 26, 2009
STATEHOUSE ROCK: 36 Governorships on the Chopping Block in 2010 By Larry Sabato
We've had two good weeks of gubernatorial fun in the Crystal Ball, reviewing the early match-ups for the 2010 midterm Governor battles here and here. Now it's time to examine the remaining sixteen statehouses, all currently controlled by Republicans.
March 26, 2009
The Con Game of Blame By Joe Conason
As Barack Obama's economic advisers confront choices that vary from bad to worse in their mission to revive the financial sector and the broader economy, it is worth remembering that those choices were in essence inherited by the president, who is still new to his office. Listening to his critics, especially on the right, it would be easy to believe that the president is personally responsible for ballooning deficits, gigantic bailouts, ridiculous bonuses, nationalized institutions and careening markets. It would be easy to believe but entirely false -- and merely the latest episode in an old political con game that is all too typical of Washington.
March 26, 2009
Springtime for New England Republicans? By Froma Harrop
There was a time when New England sent lots of Republicans to Washington. These were fiscally conservative but socially liberal "Rockefeller Republicans," also found in the Northwest, Midwest and Mid-Atlantic states. As the party turned socially conservative and fiscally reckless, many Yankees departed.
March 25, 2009
Watching The Trillions Pile Up By Howie Rich
With another $2 trillion in federal interventionism announced within the last week alone, the price tag for America's economic "recovery" continues to soar to stratospheric, scarcely-comprehensible heights.
March 25, 2009
The Most Dangerous City in the World By Tony Blankley
In a world growing more dangerous by the week in this dark spring of 2009, Washington may be the most dangerous city in the world.
March 25, 2009
Looking for the Line By Susan Estrich
Nothing gets people's attention faster than picketing them at home -- which is not necessarily a reason to do it.
March 24, 2009
Economy and Health Care Are Married By Froma Harrop
The Duke basketball coach and most other Americans believe that President Obama is unwisely diverting his attention from the sick economy.
March 22, 2009
Congress, Overtax Thyself By Debra J. Saunders
There is no group more dangerous than one with some power, no scruples and leaders who think that they are really smart and that everyone else is really, really stupid.
March 21, 2009
A Hidden Agenda Behind the 90 Percent Tax? By Lawrence Kudlow
Taking advantage of the populist revolt against Wall Street and AIG bailouts, the House Democrats have passed a vengeance tax on TARPed financial firms that amounts to a 90 percent marginal tax rate on bonuses.
March 21, 2009
Card Check: Good for Unions, Bad for America By Michael Barone
The Obama administration's budget is full of proposals that threaten to weaken our staggering economy.
March 20, 2009
The Republican Vacuum By Susan Estrich
Imagine how different things might be right now if there were a Republican Party. I mean a party like the one led by Ronald Reagan, George Bush or Newt Gingrich; a party with a program, a single set of talking points, and the technological and communications advantages to get their message across. That kind of Republican Party. The kind that doesn't exist right now.
March 20, 2009
Statehouse Rock: 36 Governorships on the Chopping Block in 2010 By Larry Sabato
Last week the Crystal Ball conducted a historical overview of gubernatorial midterm elections in the past sixty years. Now we'll continue our initial analysis of the statehouse battles to come by assessing the situation in each of the 36 states hosting a contest for Governor in 2010. Let's start with the 20 Democratic statehouses on the ballot.
March 19, 2009
Tree Sitter Is Not in Berkeley Anymore By Debra J. Saunders
When Tristan Anderson, now 38, was living illegally in the trees at the University of California, Berkeley, to protest the administration's ultimately successful bid to cut them down to build a sports training center, life was good.
March 19, 2009
Push Back Against AIG's 'Brightest' By Joe Conason
Having long flattered themselves as "masters of the universe," the creative financiers of Wall Street and London are today exposed as grifters rather than geniuses. Their proud claim that society cannot prosper without them -- voiced so often whenever anyone raised subjects such as taxation or regulation -- would now provoke bitter laughter instead of credulous nodding.
March 19, 2009
'Then It's Securities Fraud' By Froma Harrop
Anyone who has watched "Law & Order" over the years, as I have, knows that the ending must feel right. The circumstances of the crime may be complex and the legal issues muddy, but in the end, most viewers are left feeling that some justice has been served.
March 18, 2009
Ron Silver By Susan Estrich
He was positively infuriating. I e-mailed his then-girlfriend, as the crowd was applauding him at Madison Square Garden in 2004, that I hoped she wasn't dating the (expletive deleted) anymore. She was.
March 18, 2009
Getting Too Ugly Too Soon By Tony Blankley
In the past few weeks, the language of national political debate has turned too ugly too soon. The temperature is rising, and I have felt it in the rising of my own political blood.
March 18, 2009
The AIG Outrage By Lawrence Kudlow
This whole AIG fiasco -- where the entire political class is suddenly screaming over bonuses paid to derivative traders in AIG’s financial-products division -- is just a complete farce. What it really shows is how the government has completely bungled the AIG takeover.
