Jason Linkins

Last night, Ted Cruz, who is vying for the Republican nomination in the Senate race to determine who will take over Kay Bailey Hutchison's seat, completed his first task -- he forced the establishment favorite David Dewhurst into a July 31 runoff election.

There's no reason that...

Because we need a daily reminder of the obscene amounts of money that are sloshing into our politics, like so much Union Carbide goop into all the known sources of potable water, Politico reports Wednesday that "Republican super PACs and other outside groups shaped by a loose network...

If the polls are any guide, then former Virginia Sen. George Allen is basically a lock to win the state's GOP Senate primary, after which he will immediately plunge into what looks to be a corset-tight race with his fellow former governor Tim Kaine, the Democratic...

On Tuesday, The New York Times published a lengthy article on the process by which the Obama White House decides whom to dispatch from this earth with robot drones. There's a couple of things worth noting upfront.

First, given the access the Times was accorded to write...

For as long as politicians have been using Twitter, politicians have been embarrassing themselves on Twitter.

This is because they're mostly dimwits who have only gotten where they've gotten in life because smarter people purchase them with special interest money, point them to where they can buy...

Hello, everyone! Welcome once more to this ever-continuing saga of Sunday morning political shows and my attempts to provide a poorly-spelled, nonsensical alternative so that you might live a free and happy life. My name is Jason, and I'd like to wish all of you a very happy...

This week, the 2012 election season finally got to pig out on an empty-calorie feeding frenzy, in which everyone in the media pretended to have some sort of lofty conversation about the role of private equity in society while actually reminding everyone else that political elites are completely removed from...

Ana Marie Cox, columnist for the Guardian, joins me today for a brief conversation.

ANA MARIE: Hey, you there?

JASON: Sure, what's up?

ANA MARIE: I need to complain about a Politico thing!

JASON: Okay, I am here for you.

ANA MARIE: Today's feature story, by Mike...

We have apparently entered the part of the 2012 mid season where the rapid accumulation of polling data is met by a burgeoning field of experts who think everyone should ignore the data in new and exciting ways that not everyone agrees upon completely.

Should you care about the...

The Morning Joe crew got very excited today, because -- as you may already know -- former Sen. Alan Simpson (one of the titular heads of that whole “Simpson-Bowles Commission” that failed to approve an official plan to provide fiscal solvency) is really upset at a flyer produced...

For a long while now, the hotly contested Senate race between Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) and his Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren has centered around on Warren's claim to Native American heritage -- when and where it was made, what impact it has wrought, et cetera. It was never particularly clear...

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) is shocked -- SHOCKED! -- that gambling is going on at JPMorgan, and that this gambling led to a multibillion-dollar loss on a "hedge" that was actually something that looks a lot more like an insane and irresponsible bet. But Shelby has nothing bad to say...

The Washington Free Beacon -- which, if you don't happen to be playing the home game version of Washington's blog soap opera, was conceived of as a conservative counterweight to Think Progress -- has a massive scooplet today about a woman named Stacii Jae Johnson.

Who on earth...

The presidential escapade continues to draw most of the media's attention these days, but there are actually some interesting downticket primaries to watch in Arkansas and Kentucky Tuesday night. Over at the Plum Line, Jonathan Bernstein provides the essential warm-up, and points to a downticket primary in Kentucky...

I'm typically a big fan of Molly Ball's work for the Atlantic. But I'm afraid that in explicating this week's private equity-Bain Capital brouhaha that spiraled into a internecine bit of mixed-messaging spatter between the White House and Newark Mayor Cory Booker -- gripping the fluttery hearts of many inside...

Jeff Greenfield has heard all of your wild-eyed ideas about the possibility that President Barack Obama might pursue some election year gambit and switch out Joe Biden for Hillary Clinton atop the 2012 ticket, associated political hacks of America, and he would like you all to cut it...

The New York Times' Jeremy Peters reports that the new Crossroads GPS ad "Basketball" is set to "become one of the most heavily broadcast political commercials of this phase of the general election."

If President Barack Obama is going to lose one of these Democratic primaries, it obviously won't be to some convict in West Virginia or to anti-abortion performance artist Randall Terry in Oklahoma. However, it could happen in Arkansas tonight, where he is challenged on the ballot...

What began in Indiana continued in Nebraska this week, as long-shot state Sen. Deb Fischer scored an underdog victory in Nebraska's GOP primary for the U.S. Senate, besting the efforts of two candidates more firmly established in the state's political hierarchy -- state AG Jon Bruning and state Treasurer Don...

Nate Silver has taken a look across the great pollscape of American politics and has some good news for Democrats -- their odds of keeping control of the Senate have improved:

When we last took an overview of Senate races in December, Republicans appeared to be slight favorites...