As frustrated as the base of the Democratic Party may be in this late stage of the health care reform battle, few have reflected on the force behind every legislative battle this year: Rahm Emanuel.

In a blunt remark to the Wall Street Journal, the White House...

What kind of an America would we suddenly create if the President were to sign into law a health care bill with a mandate to buy private insurance? An America where millions would be covered, but bankrupt, broke, financially kaput. And unhealthy, too.

Wait--what?

You guessed it. All the...

One year after Candidate Obama inspired the world to vote for symbolic "change," the Democratic Party is now deeply divided by two divergent, and seemingly irreconcilable, approaches to reform.  If President Obama fails to grasp soon why his idea of reform has alienated key parts of his base--and if he...

Even worse than Joe Lieberman's threat to veto the health care bill, the Connecticut senator's ego may well have distracted Americans from the real issue in the debate over the public option: Will Americans actually be able to choose it or will it just be a health care ghetto for...

Lately, I am starting to wonder if Congress should put forward an amendment requiring every health insurance policy sold in America to come with a warning label: "Caution: Health Insurance May Be Hazardous To Your Health." 

This idea may seem strange at first, but when you think about it...

Forget the Swine Flu.  America is suffering from an outrage pandemic.

Like everybody else in America, I was surprised when the Nobel committee awarded the 2009 Peace Prize to Barack Obama.  I was pleased, but surprised.  Apparently, just about the only living creature not surprised was Bo the First Dog. ...

In a rhetorical gambit destined to sew confusion and frustration among supporters of  health care reform, Democrats in the House seem poised to take the widely supported idea of health insurance "public option" and transform it into something that seems neither "public" nor, in the near future, "optional." 

This...

As the battle heats up to pass meaningful health care reform with a robust public option, a video has emerged that captures the raw emotions of Americans suffering under the cruelty of the current system. More than any video I have seen, this short clip amplifies the moral imperative for...

In the latest signal that he will not echo voter pleas for a robust "public option," President Obama used his Weekly Address to draw attention away from the issue that has galvanized the most ardent supporters of health insurance reform in America.   

Emphasizing that the main goal...

With fists pounding on exterior windows like a street mob out of a 1930s newsreel, a crowd of right-wing agitators against health insurance reform descended on a town hall meeting in Tampa, Florida, "banging on windows" until police and organizers were forced to end the event. The result? A...

As Democrats fan out across the country to hold town hall meetings on health care, a small group of loud and angry "teabag" protesters have been shouting over speakers, disrupting proceedings, and grabbing the headlines.   In response, some Democratic strategists have called for the town hall organizers to open...

Recently, Glenn Beck sat on the comfy couch of Fox's morning show Fox & Friends and declared that President Obama is a racist who hates white culture.   Of the three hosts who convened this broadcast gem, the one who disagreed with Beck -- Brian Kilmeade -- had recently declared...

Given all the vocal fear that has spread throughout the national healthcare debate, I was surprised by the virtual absence of emotion in President Obama's press conference performance yesterday.  As a candidate, his speeches about "change" were so powerful that they spawned a pop culture industry.  And yet, now that...

Every time I tune-in to the "debate" on health care, it amazes me how utterly asleep Congress and the media are with respect to this issue.

They, are, clueless.

Supposedly, the health care debate is between one group of people who make fortunes via the insanely profitable insurance...

Today, James von Brunn became the latest domestic terrorist to express his political views with an act of murder, in this case an attempted mass murder. National Holocaust Museum security guard Stephen Tyrone Johns, by contrast, joined an inspiring list of American heroes who have stopped a terrorists bullet with...

As a Jewish American, I am not embarrassed to admit the part of President Obama's Cairo speech that jumped out at me was his strategic and symbolic reference to the "Holocaust."

OK, I am a little embarrassed.

The fact is, I find it strange to even admit that...

The violent killing of yet another American doctor at the hands of yet another right-wing political activist forces us to ask a crucial question: Why does the right-wing anti-abortion movement in America repeatedly give rise to people who see murder as a legitimate form of protest?

The answer does...

Anybody keeping score of which party controls the first few innings of the confirmation debate should make note of how many times "baseball" gets repeated in the political chatter over the next 48 hours.

When a new President mentions baseball twice in the first few minutes of his first Supreme...

Lately, the only thing worse than Dick Cheney's bald-faced lie that the Bush administration policies "kept us safe" is the gaggle of mainstream journalists mindlessly repeating it.

My question for journalists working for CNN, MSNBC, FOX, ABC, CBS, NPR and the like is very simple: Exactly what kind of...

Politicizing the Holocaust, equating the Obama administration with totalitarian communism, telling Jewish voters that the destruction of Israel by a Nazi-like threat is 'imminent'--such were the talking points in Newt Gingrich's speech to the American Israel Political Action Committee.  And that was just the first few minutes.

Without exaggeration, it is...