Writing about conservatives backing Barack Obama (dubbed "Obamacons"), Bob Novak reported this week that Colin Powell will likely endorse Obama. Given Powell's popularity and national security cred (tarnished though they may be by his loathsome pre-war presentation at the UN), this would be a coup for Obama. But Novak documents something even more significant: the overpowering sense of revulsion with Bush and today's Republican Party felt by many conservatives. The money quote is delivered by a long-time GOP loyalist: "The Republican Party is a dead rotting carcass with a few decrepit old leaders stumbling around like zombies in a horror version of Weekend With Bernie [sic], handcuffed to a corpse." I didn't think it could be done, but that tops Republican Rep. Tom Davis' classic "If we were dog food, they would take us off the shelf."
John McCain may not know what gas costs or when he last pumped any, or performed any other act not connected to politics or outpatient care, but he's had hundreds of town hall meetings.
One of the unalloyed joys (really) of being in show business is getting to meet and know people you've admired. While his comedy was dark, his spirit with his peers was generous.
The notion that capitalism, which is all about self-interest, can be amended somehow to be more about helping others -- and still be capitalist -- strikes many as hopelessly Pollyannaish and bizarre.
In national security terms, McCain is largely untested and untried. He's never been responsible for policy formulation. If he thinks he can use the national security debate to his advantage, he's wrong.
Amidst all the attacks on Obama's public funding "flip-flop," how much have you read in the old media about the fact that McCain has completely reversed himself on public financing -- and is currently breaking campaign finance law on a daily basis?
Karl Rove says Barack Obama is arrogant. Arrogant, of course, is a euphemism. In the monochromatic bunkers from which old-schoolers cling to power the true word they use is "uppity" when hurled at blacks.
In today's installment of McCain vs. McCain, the "straight talker" claimed credit for passage of the 21st Century GI Bill of Rights he opposed.
What the GAO report makes clear, above all else, is that contrary to what the mainstream media and the GOP would have you believe, the surge has not worked. It's time for the U.S. military to go home.
By taking an expansive position on capital punishment and siding with the Bush-and-McCain wing of the Court, Obama just made the distinction about what kind of Supreme Court appointments he might make less clear-cut. Perhaps that was the point.
The Bush White House has come up with an ingenious new way to take care not to faithfully execute the laws of the land.
If Scalia and Stevens were competent historians, then it might be worth reading what they write. But they are not. Both offer selective readings of history to support what seem to be pre-determined positions.
