Liberal Talk Radio

One of the weird things about the legislative process is that a congressman can propose an amendment, and vote for it, but then not have to vote for the actual bill to which the amendment is attached. It’s bizarre. Apparently the same principle does not apply to earmarks: Top members of the Appropriations Committee might, [...]

Republican Rep. Ray LaHood is Obama’s choice for Transpo Secretary. Erica Barnett rounds up the reax here. Take John Ashcroft. When he was nominated for Attorney General back in 2001, the big concern was that he was a hard-right anti-choice guy. But no one remembers Ashcroft’s tenure at the DOJ for his take on abortion. [...]

The unions are stoked about Obama’s choice for Secretary of Labor, Rep. Hilda Solis. I’m still a bit disappointed that the Labor Secretary wasn’t rolled out with the rest of the “economic policy team” a few weeks ago, but maybe she hadn’t accepted yet. Anyway, the symbol of nominating a latina Congresswoman from East L.A. [...]

Hillary Clinton returns to work at the United States Senate: At which point, Mrs. Clinton returned to her Senate office to find that her staff had set up a Ping-Pong table while she was gone.

Last week I suggested that an Obama administration, of it were extremely lucky and everything went smashingly, might eek out 3 big achievements in the first term: wind down the war, reform health care, and institute a cap and trade regime to cut carbon emissions. After thinking about it for a bit, it occured to [...]

The talk of Obama asking Clinton to be his running mate is heating up again after her less-than-stellar performance last night in IN and NC. Can I just say this would be a bad idea? And not only because you’d have Hillary’s negatives dragging down the ticket. Obama would be a fool to allow Hillaryland [...]

It’s a cliche to talk about how undemocratic the U.S. Senate is, with it’s filibusters and non-proportional representation. But I think the recent cloture vote on the the Lilly Ledbetter Act highlights this fact pretty acutely, and is worth exploring a bit. To recap, the bill was: named for an Alabama woman who lost a [...]

Bush has nominated Gen. Petraeus to head the U.S. Central Command, replacing Admiral William Fallon. Fallon wasn’t too keen on the whole “bomb Iran” thing, so he got canned. But remember, Bush always listens to his “commanders on the ground!” Politics never enters the equation, of course!! And, of course, who could possibly be more [...]

Years hence, when historians pour over this era, they will find impossible to understand how so many beautiful, sad ironies appeared in one short amount of time. Consider, for example, the client list of the D.C. Madam: The client list included Senator David Vitter, Republican of Louisiana; Randall L. Tobias, who stepped down as deputy [...]

The New York Times pleaded with the candidates in an op-ed yesterday to devote a little time to developing a real urban agenda: By now, many Americans have heard the presidential candidates talk about issues close to the heart of rural America. They fell all over themselves to praise ethanol in Iowa and condemn nuclear [...]