In a debate on Hardball last week, I was asked about McCain's flip-flops vs. Obama's, which is like contrasting Bonnie & Clyde with an alleged jaywalker.

Of course, it should be no crime that a person or candidate changes her/his mind based on new information...until the Bush Team turned ignorance...

It will be forgivable that Obama opted out of the public finance system IF he appoints a White House "Democracy Czar" to obtain pro-democracy reforms, like repairing the broken presidential system he rejected.

I'm a life-long zealot for public funding of public elections but Obama's refusal to opt-in to...

Forget the relative skills, races, proposals and funds of Obama and McCain. Does an awful economy doom the nominee of the party in power, short of a calamity for the challenger? Probably yes, as Air America's 7 Days panel discusses. Events are in the saddle.

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Many Democrats are fretting the fact that while a generic Democrat presidentially beats a generic Republican by 15 points, an Obama-McCain contest now is a near-tie, with RealClearPolitics putting the electoral math at 272-266 for Obama. But the Democrat is significantly stronger than today's polls indicate. While he certainly sounds...

If you add it up, John McCain had an unusually weak week, last seen angrily using his POW status to respond to Obama's criticism of his opposition to veterans benefits much as George Bush would reach for 9/11 to answer any criticism. Electorate to McCain: you were a heroic POW...

There was lots of hard news this week -- West Virginia, John Edwards, appeasement, McCain's 2013 Space Odyssey -- but it was Bill Moyers who uttered some hard truths on 7 Days in America on Air America. (Listen to the show here.)

Moyers is, simply, a national treasure, a...

I was the split-screen bystander on Hardball last night when Chris Matthews exposed Kevin James as the quintessential right wing slandering bloviator.

James was of course pathetic but his -- and Bush's and McCain's -- strategies aren't so funny. Basically, when you've lost an argument because facts and history...

This week three below-the-fold scandals threatened three politicians while Sen. Obama stayed "clean," in the good meaning of Sen. Biden's adjective of a year ago. Because Barack Houdini easily escaped the chains of Rev. Wright and because of "the math" after the North Carolina romp, it certainly looks like it's...

Each week the blogs, cable-fests and Sunday shows overanalyze a new mime... and post-Pennsylvania, it's the angst that Democrats will splinter and hand the election to McCain. Among other topics, this one came up on this week's 7 Days in America, with Headliner (and Clinton surrogate) Bob Kerrey arguing that...

What's the matter with... Philadelphia?

There didn't seem to be much "brotherly love" in either of the pivotal Democratic presidential debates held there -- not in the Russert-Williams grilling of Hillary Clinton last October and not in the Gibson-Stephanopoulos cross-examination of Barack Obama last Wednesday.

Was the one thing each...

Was Dave Petraeus really Bill Murray in Groundhog Day?

This past week saw General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker come back to Capitol Hill for many more hours of grilling and stalling -- for what's now irrefutably clear is that "stay the course" really means not the mission in Iraq so...

Now that John McCain last week elaborated his economic and foreign policy views in major addresses, the weakness of his candidacy is clear: it's not that he'll be 72 if inaugurated but has a 72 year-old agenda. If you like gunboat diplomacy and pre-Depression laissez-faire economics, McCain is your bridge...

While the Obama campaign stresses math and Clinton momentum post-Ohio/Texas -- and some journalists can't resist predicting who will win, should win, should quit -- the fact is that many voters haven't yet effectively spoken. Including all Democrats in your two states because of your controversy with the DNC.
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Here it comes: Obama supporters denouncing suprdelegates as "party bosses" who could dictate who the nominee is and Clinton supporters insisting that Florida/Michigan delegates be seated based on those primaries' voters.

Such appeals don't compute. Sure any of us could have originally come to a different method...

At yesterday's Des Moines Register Republican presidential debate, Rudy Giuliani stated, "I think I've had an open transparent government and an open transparent life." As I know from my eight years as the NYC Public Advocate monitoring city services, the Giuliani administration was about as transparent as the Iron Curtain.

Here's the big difference in the presidential primary contests: with less than a month to go, Republicans favor None-of-the-above while most Democrats could vote for All-of-the-above.

Polls show that Republicans are largely dissatisfied with their field since there's no Reagan or even Bush among them -- someone...

Dear Anderson Cooper,

It's been a year since Rudy Giuliani threw his halo into the ring -- and it's past time for the national press to penetrate his 9/11 Teflon to get at his record and character. It could start with you tonight at CNN's YouTube...

Rudy Giuliani earlier this week bragged that he didn't clear it with lawyers before he evicted Yasser Arafat from a UN event at Lincoln Center because, said the Mayor with his characteristic modesty, he's a "leader."

"I didn't hesitate -- like Hillary Clinton to answer...