Sarah Palin's announcement that she would resign as Governor of Alaska is either the final word in a strange and frenetic episode of American political history, or it is a first step towards what promises to be, if nothing else, an unpredictable presidential campaign. Palin's speech announcing her decision made...

President Obama's recent remarks to a largely gay audience at a White House event celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots that he believes that after his term in office, gay people will be pleased with his work were a combination of strange, hopeful and, not least, puzzling. Obama's...

There is a great deal at stake in the upcoming battle over health care reform, in some respects more than we might think. Reforming our cumbersome and costly health care system and finding a way to ensure that all Americans have adequate health care has been a major goal of...

Throughout his presidential campaign, but more notably, during his presidency, President Obama has shown himself to have an impressive ability to accumulate political capital. During his tenure in the White House, Obama has done this by reaching out to a range of constituencies, moderating some of his programs, pursuing middle...

I am preparing myself for the comments to this post and am not expecting to feel good about what I read. However, I welcome this exercise in free speech and will read and think about even the most hateful comments. I would hope that all who read this post will...

It has been a bad week for New York State Democrats. Not only did they lose control of the state senate due to two Democratic state senators agreeing to vote on with the Republicans on leadership, but New York State's most powerful congressman and chair of the House Ways and...

The implosion of the Republican Party since Barack Obama's victory last November has provided ample fodder for pundits of all stripes. The bizarre plot turns such as the emergence of Rush Limbaugh as the de facto leader of the party, Michael Steele's bumpy ride as chair of the party and...

This has been a week of contrasts for our judiciary system. On Tuesday while the California Supreme Court handed down a decision that is the 21st century answer to Plessy v. Ferguson, President Obama announced the nomination of Second Circuit Supreme Court Appeals Judge Sonia Sotomayor for the US Supreme...

During the early part of this decade, Dick Cheney redefined the role of vice-president as he took on unprecedentedly large amounts of responsibility, particularly with regard to foreign policy. Today, Cheney seems to be redefining life after the vice-presidency. In the past vice-presidents, in some cases after unsuccessfully seeking the...

As President Obama prepares to make his first Supreme Court appointment, the religious right appears to be shifting gears away from focusing on abortion rights and turning their attention more to the question of gay marriage. This reflects a broader strategy on the part of the Christian Right to...

Arlen Specter's recent decision to switch parties was viewed by many Democrats as a great victory. It moved the Democratic Party closer to the magic number of 60 Democratic senators which would mean a filibuster proof majority. It also further demonstrated that the Republicans have not yet finished the downward...

Last week, the news that the Republican Party, was kicking off an initiative called the National Council for a New America, as part of an effort to rebrand itself, was somewhat lost due to the extensive coverage of Barack Obama's first hundred days as president and the news of Arlen...

The first hundred days of the Obama presidency have been an extraordinary time for our country and or president. Evaluating the president with a letter grade, even for an old academic like me, seems like a banal approach to a rich and complex story, but the world, and even the...

The information that is being released now regarding interrogations of suspected terrorists conducted by the US during the last several years makes it clear, for those who did not yet understand, that America does not torture, except of course when it does. The treatment of prisoners during the Bush years...

There is nothing in American politics quite like a mayoral race in New York City. The extraordinary ethnic diversity, byzantine election laws, range of necessary campaign tactics and, because it is the last place in the US where people still read newspapers, intense media climate, of New York makes politics...

Am I the only one who upon reading that the governor of Texas has now referred to the possibility of seceding from the union as one of "a lot of different scenarios", wondered why the good people of Texas hadn't thought of that before the 2000 election. On a more...

Rudy Giuliani seems to have joined Dick Cheney among the ranks of political has beens who still think President Obama will make us more vulnerable to a terrorist attack because he prefers a more thoughtful approach to the bluster and fear tactics upon which the previous administration relied. While

This week's G20 Summit in London is, of course, another opportunity for the world's leaders to meet our new president and for President Obama to introduce himself to many of these leaders, and in an important sense, to reintroduce America to the world. Much of the world, including many Americans,...

Monday saw a very interesting and telling moment as the newest iteration of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's banking recovery was met on Wall Street by a jump in the Dow Jones of almost 500 points, a gain of fully seven percent. The big gains on Wall Street occurred amidst several...

In the last months, because of the economic crisis a number of stories about the nature of American business have been brought to the attention of many Americans. These anecdotes include not only banks using bailout money for spas, travel and redecorating, CEOs of automobile companies flying on private jets...