Why doesn't Harry Reid force an old-fashioned filibuster that could make Republicans look silly? Because he can't.

The Senate Majority Leader must get 60 votes to start the health care debate -- which he aims to try tonight -- and he'll need that many again when it comes time to...

All of us who concerned about the future of the planet have misunderestimated the opposition from those who are not. We thought that the flooding of web sites, talk back radio, television chat shows, letters columns in newspapers, blogs, with tens of thousands of mindless repetitions of a few talking...

There's a strong feeling that Congress is bucking Obama and isn't being called to task for it. For the first time, Obama's approval ratings are below 50 percent (Gallup poll says) and calls for Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's resignation are growing louder.

Sarah Palin's managed to suck up a...

I've been blogging since June of 2006 and have not avoided controversial issues or people. But something I recently posted at Psychology Today, "Sarah Palin's Lies" (now posted in full below), elicited more vitriolic comments and personal e-mails than anything else I've ever written. Here are a few examples:

Our illustrious (cough, cough) White House press corps showed it could get to the bottom of a story with impressively journalistic and probative skills this week. The story that so obviously required multiple questions to President Obama on his trip to Asia? Whether he's eating enough, and whether he's losing...

As Obama's Department of Education touts its charter-school-propelling "Race to the Top," whose regulations were issued last week, let's heed the moral of the fable that we all learned in grade school: In the end, the Tortoise beats out the Hare.

Alan Gottlieb recently wrote about a plan...

Last week I argued in my column that, even though I strongly oppose the Stupak amendment because I am pro-choice, if things come down to a bad choice -- a national health care bill with the Stupak language -- or a worse choice -- no health care bill at all...

I missed Sarah Palin. I'm glad she's back. Seeing her frosted, teased coif, (albeit less brassy and pouffy than before) makes me nostalgic for the election when we were all exploding with hope and optimism and Tina Fey's hilarious Saturday Night Live sketches.

Newsweek gave us a much needed...

If you are sitting in class taking a test, and you've chosen to sit amongst your bone-headed, slacker friends, don't turn to them for help when you can't figure out of any of the answers. They may all tell you the same thing, but they'll all be wrong.

That's the...

With all the reports coming out that recommend we scale back on life saving medical exams there is one we might soon see from still another group of experts.

This one concerns depression. It concludes that diagnosis, medication and counseling won't work anyway, so why bother trying. After all,...

Leave it to a spunky Northern California bookseller to steal some of the thunder away from Sarah Palin.

Bookshop Santa Cruz, located in Downtown Santa Cruz and known for its long history of commenting on politics and political books, is now offering an "essential" item as a...

Feminist blogger Kate Harding often takes issue with how cynical the progressives on Daily Kos write about abortion politics, but on Nov. 10, they found some common ground. Two days after the House voted to approve health care reform and the Stupak Amendment, which seemed to catch...

Chaos descended upon the University of California campus this week when thousands of student protesters faced off against armed police after UC's Board of Regents approved a 32 percent increase in student fees, and also a 15 percent midyear tuition hike (it's still unclear if raising tuition midyear is...

This week, Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Daniel Akaka succeeded in pushing through a major veterans' health services bill.  According to the committee's press release:

Just before Christmas in 1999, I got off a flight from Hong Kong to San Francisco with a frail, 13-month-old baby girl in my arms. Until a week before, that baby had lived in a Chinese orphanage after being abandoned at a railway station, with little care or nourishment in...

Dissent may be patriotic; hate and racism aren't.

The National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC) has been keeping track of the vile Holocaust/Nazi/fascist/treasonous/anti-Semitic/racist rhetorical comparisons leveled against President Barack Obama and other Democratic leaders; I feel dirty just overseeing the collection of this...