[ Posted Monday, February 11th, 2013 – 17:29 UTC ]
Tomorrow night President Obama will give the first State Of The Union address of his second term. We'll all react to this speech in different ways, but the reaction of Congress will be the usual: alternating wild and raucous applause with stony glares of disapproval, depending on the particular subject being addressed. After the speech is over, Congress will go back to what it loosely calls "work," and largely ignore the speech's suggestions for legislation. Some things the president asks for will get addressed in typical roundabout fashion, but many other things will be completely dropped for political reasons of one sort or another. It didn't always used to be this way, though, at least not on the surface. Congress used to take the president a lot more seriously, which is a tradition that seems ripe for revival.
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[ Posted Friday, February 8th, 2013 – 18:03 UTC ]
We begin with cats and birds this week. Iron-lovers across the land were dismayed by the news that the Monopoly folks were discontinuing their favorite token, but cat-lovers were enthused by the feline token which will take its place. Being America, this was done via online voting. In avian news, the Baltimore Ravens won the Super Bowl. The bird is the word!
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[ Posted Thursday, February 7th, 2013 – 17:21 UTC ]
This is a reader-participation sort of a column. In fact, it's not really a column at all, instead just trolling for comments from you folks. Just to warn everyone up front.
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[ Posted Wednesday, February 6th, 2013 – 16:23 UTC ]
President Obama ended up his first term by consolidating the job approval polling gains he made in his re-election. His numbers have settled into a new range, and were remarkably steady all month long. Obama's "second honeymoon" period with the public may not last more than a few months, but for now seems to be holding steady. With the election fading into the past, Obama's in a pretty good position right now in terms of "political capital," but this will likely change as legislative reality sets in.
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[ Posted Tuesday, February 5th, 2013 – 18:05 UTC ]
It is fashionable nowadays for pundits to decry the partisan polarization in Washington, and to bemoan how "broken" Congress is. Nothing will get done with such divided government, such conventional wisdom dictates. We're in for a long and bitter two years of legislative gridlock. I try to be an eternal optimist (while still staying within the bounds of reasonableness), and I can't help but wonder if this thinking may turn out to be wrong. Perhaps -- just perhaps, mind you -- the 113th Congress will be able to actually get a few important things done.
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[ Posted Monday, February 4th, 2013 – 17:42 UTC ]
It is the Monday after the Super Bowl, so to use an apt football metaphor, I am going to punt on today's column.
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[ Posted Friday, February 1st, 2013 – 18:48 UTC ]
We seem to have a gang problem on Capitol Hill once again.
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[ Posted Thursday, January 31st, 2013 – 18:04 UTC ]
Since I've written three full-length articles already this week, I'm going to slack off a bit and today just run with a few items which caught my eye. So, for once, a short column today. As always, these are presented in "three-dot" format, in homage to the late great Herb Caen...
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[ Posted Wednesday, January 30th, 2013 – 19:07 UTC ]
We stand at the beginning of a grand debate on immigration. America goes through these grand debates every generation or so, and what remains constant is that both sides in the fight can be counted upon to accuse the other side of "playing politics" with the immigration issue. This has, indeed already begun.
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[ Posted Tuesday, January 29th, 2013 – 17:40 UTC ]
Does comprehensive immigration reform have a chance of becoming law in 2013?
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