To understand changes in the political map, we naturally tend to look for contemporary explanations. But American political alignments are not written on an empty slate. Beginnings matter, and the civic personalities of states tend to reflect the cultural folkways of their first settlers.
You won't hear me straining to defend Phil Gramm, the Texas Republican whose penchant for grating commentary sunk his 1996 bid for the presidency before the New Hampshire primary. It was really just a matter of time before the former senator, serving as John McCain's economic advisor, put his foot in it: Gramm opined that Americans complaining about the economy were "whiners."
Touring America's oilrigs and nuclear plants, John McCain sometimes sounds as if he'll produce enough wind to power the nation all by himself. So strongly does his current rhetoric smell of methane -- the gas emanating from manure -- that he might even qualify for an alternative energy tax incentive.
Leave the presidential contest aside for the moment. At other levels of politics, the Republicans may eventually file the 2008 campaign under the Double Jeopardy category of "It Just Keeps Getting Worse". Surely, GOP House strategists are asking themselves whether they are cursed this year.
As Sen. John McCain and the GOP leadership nationalize the drill, drill, drill message, the Republican Party might conceivably be riding a summer political rally. The question of offshore drilling, along with expanded domestic energy production, has suddenly become the biggest political and economic wedge issue of this election. Is there a Republican tsunami in the making?
The conventional wisdom has it down pat: A bad economy works against the candidate from the party in power as voters take out their rage and fear on the president's party and back the challenger, just like they did in 1992.
The knives are out for my friend Bill Clinton. Again.
Barack Obama had it half right when he said that the McCain campaign would focus on raising voters' fears about him.
In a rare burst of bipartisan consensus, Sens. John McCain and Barack Obama have agreed on a dreadful proposal: Open more of America's fragile coastlines to offshore oil drilling.
Just when you think you've got the presidential race figured out, something comes along to upend your carefully wrought conclusions.
When is the McCain campaign going to get serious? It seems to be marking time with softball ads, more appropriate to the soundbites campaign media spokespeople exchange with one another than to strategic paid media hits.
What does Barack Obama have to do with Britney Spears and Paris Hilton? Absolutely nothing, as far as I can tell. A mentally unstable party girl and an heiress/party girl? Did I miss the part where Obama's father was a hotel magnate, where he couldn't be trusted to take care of his children, where he literally partied till he dropped?
There will be no more business as usual for housing lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac if John McCain is elected president. That's McCain's clear message in a recent hard-hitting op-ed in the St. Petersburg Times and in various straight-talk media interviews.
Forced to cancel a planned visit to an oil platform off the Mississippi coast last week because of inclement weather -- and the untimely leaking of hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil by a shipwreck in the vicinity -- John McCain finally got his photo op at a Bakersfield derrick on July 28. Speaking on site, the Arizona senator delivered extraordinarily good news to the beleaguered gasoline-consuming public as he explained why we must drill offshore.
We who obsess over universal health coverage may soon confront a startling development: The only candidate on a major-party presidential ticket to have proposed and implemented a universal plan could well be a Republican. I speak of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, now high on the list of John McCain's possible running mates.
It looks like a clean sweep for Alaska in the Senate and House. Both of the Republican incumbents, Sen. Ted Stevens, in office since 1968, and Rep. Don Young, who has held his seat since 1973, appear to be going down to defeat.
We have no earthly idea if Virginia Governor Tim Kaine is Obama's choice for Vice President. All we know is that distinguished reporters who claim to have good sources are calling and saying that Kaine is on the short-short list.
In the contest for president, Barack Obama is a magnetic candidate supported by a disciplined, well-organized campaign. John McCain seems wooden, with a campaign that appears to be in shambles.
The principal reason why former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has climbed to the top of Sen. John McCain's practical wish list for vice president is the possibility that he could bring Michigan's 17 electoral votes to the Republicans for the first time since 1988.
If you read, watch and hear the media describe the campaign of 2008, it appears to be the most one-sided contest since Reagan trounced Mondale in 1984. McCain always comes across as borderline senile, lethargic, and pitiful while Obama is awash in media heroics and theatrical flourishes.
