The push toward health care reform entered into a new phase this week. Senate Democrats struck an as-yet undefined deal on the public option, essentially dissolving it with mandated non-profit insurance options and the lowering of the age for Medicare eligibility from 65 to 55. Though the Congressional Budget Office...

The recent back and forth, they-said-we-said between the CIA and Congress over unknown classified intelligence programs is another example of a Congress that simply flounders from one issue to the next. Marc Ambinder of The Atlantic gamely summarized the situation (emphasis mine):

"Because the executive branch retains a stranglehold...

Leave it crusty media guru Nicholas Carr to dig up obscure quotes related to writing and journalism. Via Carr's Rough Type, a doozy from French poet and bureaucrat Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine who, in an 1831 letter, had this to say:

Before this century shall run...

The Democratic Party, best known for its self-destruction and infighting, has found itself at the end run of across-the-board electoral victories in 2006 and 2008 and opposite a marginalized opposition party in a lather of directionless ire. The political environment is less like the era of LBJ and more that...

Public opinion polling is a maddening fact of life for anyone who follows politics. Polls come with cross tabs, tracking numbers and margins of error. It is also a reality that pundits can find, regardless of their views, poll numbers reflecting their particular argument. While some polling groups are more...

Perhaps the best chance for a real third party in American politics lies in a hypothetical union between Blue Dog Democrats and Centrist Republicans -- they certainly share almost the same amount of scrutiny and criticism from either side of the aisle, and sometimes the bullied rally together to defeat...

I could go for a steak. Or eggs. Or steak and eggs and bacon and mashed potatoes and mac and cheese. On a bun. Anything from this blog, really.

Errol Morris’ spots for Miller High Life are to blame, really. You can (as I did) watch all 80...

In a recent piece in The Daily Beast, Michael Lind offers a solid blueprint for a liberal nightmare: Rising populist sentiment in the working class base of the Democratic Party could very well cost the Left both its agenda and even a second term for President Obama. A...

A week or so ago I wrote a blog post summing up the arguments surrounding the possible creation of an arts czar/culture minister. I came out in favor of senior staff-level liaison for the various arts, humanities and culture entities in and around the government. The arts and...

For this to-the-hilt liberal, “Libertarianism in the Age of Obama” seemed like a shady name for the talk Nick Gillespie and Matt Welch, the top brass over at Reason Magazine, were slated to give via The Modernist Society (think hipsters, alcohol and more hipsters). But as a now...

I can safely say the breadth of the 2008 election, more than anything else during my 24-year span on this earth, brought me into a political consciousness. And while I am now an Obama supporter, I found myself keying into America’s political debate well before I was fully aware of...

The US Congress has once again delayed issuing a bailout of America’s auto industry to the tune of $14 billion. Regardless of where you stand with Detroit, what makes this situation disheartening is the fact that it’s simply one piece in the growing knot of economic, domestic and foreign policies...

Let's calm down.

Perhaps the best indication of Obama's promising transition is the fact that ideolgoues on the left and right are tired of being short changed. While keeping major progressive reforms such as health care, the economy and Iraq in his sites, the President-elect's choices for his administration have...

Take a look at Salon's new section, Open Salon. It's another free for all, (a "social content site"), of sorts, for unprofessional commentariat of all stripes. Much in the same way The Huffington Post cemented the importance of crowd-sourced (anyone can write) journalism and punditry with its successful...

The city of Baltimore was alight Tuesday night, and for good reason. Percentage-wise more people there watched the debates than most of the country. A record 85 percent of registered voters turned out on Election Day. Sixty-four percent of the national electorate—the most in generations—came out...

While some attention is being paid to newspaper political endorsements as a whole, frankly they all sound the same. As an admitted Obama supporter, I still find it disheartening that editorial boards seem to reflect the politics they cover: vague boilerplate.

Yes, Seed Magazine is pro-Obama,...

The "exchange" over at New York magazine vaguely circled around credit default swaps, the mortgage crisis, if John McCain and Phil Gramm are to blame, and the shaky issue of suggesting loans to minorities were at the heart of the crisis.

First, a chunk of the exchange between...

Generalized voting records can be tricky. Barack Obama is, as all Democratic Pary Presidential nominees are, "the most liberal member in the Senate." As Obama pointed out in the first debate, it's pretty easy to be liberal when you're constantly voting opposite of George W. Bush.

"For one, while the...

The 2008 presidential election is already brimming with heated controversies concerning voter suppression, with both sides of the aisle in full combat mode. First, there’s Michigan.

The Michigan Messenger, a branch of the Center for Independent Media, brought to light incendiary evidence that suggests the Republican party...

Fate loves a little irony, and it finds plenty in the convergence of two of America's struggling industries: cars and journalism. The magazine Esquire published its 75th anniversary issue on September 8 with a cover sporting the courageous new "e-ink." This includes a panel of flashing images on the...