One of the disappointments of the Obama administration thus far has been the extent to which it has embraced the traditional U.S. policy toward Castro-run Cuba. Yes, the president lifted Bush 43-era restrictions on Cuban-Americans traveling to the isolated island, but that leaves in place a travel ban for the...

The torture memos are being released today and will undoubtedly appall us.

But keep in mind that there is precedent for the U.S. government torturing:

All eight of those brought to trial ... were locked up in single cells, each only 3.5 feet wide by 7 feet long. Six had...

Laura Tyson, on the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board, says that the "Democratic coalition is badly broken." Do you suppose that struggle over how to deal with the financial crisis is taking its toll on the party?

I had forgotten, but other new presidents have given don't-call-it-a-State-of-the-Union addresses -- Reagan, Clinton and both Bushes gave early-term speeches to Congress that were explicitly billed not as States of the Union.

Of course the States of the Union speech was not always called "State of the Union" and has...

Remember welfare? The GOP does, fondly. Not that they want pre-Clinton welfare programs back, they just want the issue back (kind of how they miss the Cold War but not the Soviets).

So they're trying to bring welfare back, as an issue anyway.

Jack Farrell over at US News's...

Over at US News's opinion section, we asked African-American scholars and political experts for their reactions to the Obama Election, and got seven great answers from the likes of Cornel West, the NAACP's Benjamin Jealous, Rep. Kendrick Meek and others.

You can check out the whole...

There's been a lot of good stuff about the nutty comments coming from the right regarding "real America," pro-American parts of the country (read: small towns), and how much we liberals (read: big city) hate the country.

But if you haven't you should check out Jack Farrell's latest...

Jonathan Alter has a great piece up looking at the progressive resurgence through which our country is going.

I obviously am particularly favorably inclined toward this passage:

The Schlesinger theory of the cycles of history still makes the most sense. Over the past century, we've moved in roughly 30-year...

John McCain is going on the attack. Again.

How many assaults has McCain launched against Barack Obama? There was He's a celebrity egomaniac (this coming from the gang that brought you: We can't solve the financial crisis without me!). There was He's inexperienced (if only Illinois was...

Richard Clarke certainly thinks that al Qaeda and Osama might be pro-McCain.

Don't believe the urban myth that Nancy Pelosi was somehow responsible for the failure of the financial bailout. But also don't believe believe that the blame for this falls squarely with the House GOP leadership.

Monday's vote was a failure of presidential leadership.

I'm not talking about cracking skulls...

We've all heard John McCain's tired joke about the pork barrell spending on bear DNA (a paterniy issue or a criminal one -- so funny the first dozen times you hear it ... less so the next 100 times).

I never actually knew the details of the bear DNA...

Why aren't people making more of the fact that John McCain was flatly, factually wrong about Pakistan being a "failed state?"

John McCain wants the health care industry to be more like the banking industry.

This from a McCain article in Contingencies, the magazine of the American Academy of Actuaries:

Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the...

Aside from the obvious, Sarah Palin also brings energy to the GOP ticket--and I don't just mean in the sense of having more verve than her twice-her-age (more or less) running mate.

And I also don't mean it in the sense of bringing energy to a moribund conservative...

So it was 150 years ago today (August 21, 1858) that Abe Lincoln and Stephen Douglas first ascended to a hastily-constructed stage to debate the issues of the day. Well, the issue of the day.

Over at USNews.com's opinion page, we've started a "Past & Present" feature looking at...

I was both bemused and annoyed the other night to watch the Hardball crowd try to separate John McCain from the wildly negative tone that his campaign has recently taken. (I'm not the only one who noticed it.)

Andrea Mitchell and company essentially said that John McCain is not...

What exactly is a win in Iraq? John McCain and his writers apparently had trouble defining it to The New York Times's op-ed page, and all we really do know is that once we achieve it, McCain would be happy to have troops there for another 100 years. Or something.

Two good questions.

Not so much.