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House Adopts Know-Nothing Approach to Middle-East
By John Nichols
The Congress of the United States went out of its way this week to embarrass itself.
At issue was a House resolution "calling on the President and the Secretary of State to oppose unequivocally any endorsement or further consideration of the ‘Report of the United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict' in multilateral fora."
The point of the resolution was to tell the Obama administration in general, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in particular, to do everything in its power to prevent serious consideration of the Goldstone Report, a study of alleged violations of international human rights laws and humanitarian standards by the Israeli Defense Forces operating in Palestinian territory on the Gaza Strip.
(21) CommentsNovember 5, 2009
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A Year Later, Obama Needs to Start Campaigning Again
By John Nichols
MADISON, WI --One year ago Tuesday, Barack Obama redefined American electioneering to such an extent that it was possible to believe that the success of his transformational campaign would lead to a transformational presidency.
After all, he had already changed most of what America "knew" about politics.
The freshman senator from Illinois had not only won an election for the presidency of the United States on November 4, 2008.
(195) CommentsNovember 4, 2009
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House Wins Offset Gubernatorial Losses for Obama, Dems
By John Nichols
White House aides announced Tuesday night that President Obama was not watching off-year election results on television.
Actually, the president should have been watching.
Indeed, he should have stayed up late.
(284) CommentsNovember 3, 2009
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Bloomberg Wins, But Barely
By John Nichols
Yes, of course, everyone was watching Virginia, New Jersey and upstate New York on Tuesday's off-year election night.
But one of the most dramatic stories played out in New York City, where Mayor Mike Bloomberg forced a rewrite of the city's term-limit law so that he could seek a third term.
Bloomberg left a Republican Party tha had turned exceedingly unpopular in the nation's largest city, spent an estimated $100 million of his own money and collected endorsements from the major daily newspapers and more than a few Democratic elected officials.
(35) CommentsNovember 3, 2009
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Four Off-Year Election Scenarios
By John Nichols
Yes, yes, we've all heard the "all-politics-is-local" bromide with regard to off-year elections.
While it is no longer an operative, let alone true, statement – as the nationalized election cycles of the Bush years so clearly confirmed -- there is one certainty with regard to the pop punditry of former House Speaker Tip O'Neill: Winning players and parties never use it, while losers invariably rely on it.
O'Neill, himself, never took the local line all that seriously when Democrats were doing well. Famously, he hailed the off-year election results of 1981 (Democrats won the Virginia governorship and lots of mayoralties) as a signal that his party was coming back from the battering it had taken a year earlier at the hands of Ronald Reagan's Republicans.
(2) CommentsNovember 3, 2009
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Tale of Two Special Elections: One Shifts Right, The Other Left
By John Nichols
The Washington Post positions itself as a "must-read" daily almanac of the political class – a reliable source of information and insight regarding all things electoral.
That goes double for congressional elections, since the Post is the "hometown paper" of the federal government's company town.
As such, the Post can be expected to follow congressional contests with a rigor and clarity that exceeds that of talk-radio and talk-TV, right? Wrong.
(63) CommentsNovember 2, 2009
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"Tea Party Activists Are the New GOP"
By John Nichols
Richard Viguerie, the legendary hard-right activist who spent much of the past decade arguing that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney were too liberal, now declares that the days of even the most minimal moderation are now over in the Republican Party.
"Tea Party Activists Are the New GOP," says Viguerie.
There is little reason to argue with the man whose direct-mail campaigning funded the rise of the Republican right in the late 1970s and who grumbled loudly when Newt Gingrich, Bush, Cheney and Republican leaders tried to soften the party's roughest edges.
(317) CommentsNovember 1, 2009
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Pelosi's Not-So-Robust Public Option
By John Nichols
The public option was always a compromise for serious supporters of health-care reform, who -- like Barack Obama when he was running for the Senate in 2003 -- knew that a single-payer "Medicare for All" system was what America needed to provide health care to everyone while controlling costs.
But, in the reform legislation debuted Thursday by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the compromise was even more compromised than had been expected.
Pelosi says the legislation is "historic," and celebrates the fact that is does still include a public option -- a component many pundits had said was destined for abandonment.
(148) CommentsOctober 28, 2009
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Warrior-Diplomat Asks of Afghan War: "Why and to What End?"
By John Nichols
About the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan -- not merely the proposal to surge more troops into the quagmire but the occupation itself -- he says: "I want people in Iowa, people in Arkansas, people in Arizona, to call their congressman and say, 'Listen, I don't think this is right.'"
Who is this radical peacenik who fails to recognize the necessity of the mission in Afghanistan, let alone the role that it plays in the broader "war on terror"?
His name is Matthew Hoh.
(112) CommentsOctober 27, 2009
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What If, Instead of Fox, Team Obama Tackled Insurance Profiteers
By John Nichols
Suppose President Obama and his aides had decided to take on the worst offender among the big insurance companies this fall.
Suppose the White House had highlighted the failure of the company to provide quality care, the abuses in which it has engaged and the behind-the-scenes campaigning by a self-interested corporation to influence the health-care debate in a manner that helps it while harming Americans.
Suppose presidential aides highlighted the initiative in broadcast and cable interviews and reinforced the message with carefully crafted talking points that said the insurance company's top officers were not helping Americans to get medical care but rather engaging in self-interested profiteering.
(176) CommentsOctober 26, 2009
John Nichols
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