[ Posted Monday, July 6th, 2015 – 16:10 UTC ]
The Democratic presidential field is shaping up into a one-on-one contest, at least at this early stage of the race. While Jim Webb, Martin O'Malley, and Lincoln Chafee are all now official candidates, none of them has managed to either distinguish themselves much or garner much of any voter support. Which leaves Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders as the only two candidates capable of pulling in double-digit polling numbers among Democratic voters. Well, to be absolutely accurate, there are three Democrats who routinely manage this feat, but so far Joe Biden hasn't indicated whether he'll run or not. For now, it's Hillary versus Bernie, and the next few weeks could considerably sharpen up this contest.
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[ Posted Friday, July 3rd, 2015 – 17:35 UTC ]
It's officially a holiday since tomorrow's the nation's birthday and all, but since this column took a vacation last week, we thought we'd better get a new column out today. After all, it's been an eventful two weeks!
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[ Posted Thursday, July 2nd, 2015 – 16:43 UTC ]
This week, the 18th and 19th people running for president announced their candidacies. Chris Christie became the 14th Republican candidate running, while Jim Webb became the fifth Democrat to enter the race. These announcements won't even be the final ones of this election cycle, as everyone fully expects both Scott Walker and John Kasich to also throw their hats into the Republican ring. I have to admit, though, that the sheer number of candidates has worn me down. I have what could be called "candidate fatigue" at this point. It's tiring even keeping track of this big a pack, and even though the campaign has barely begun in earnest, I'm already exhausted.
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[ Posted Wednesday, July 1st, 2015 – 16:43 UTC ]
June was a busy month for President Obama's job approval ratings. Lots of things were happening during the month, good and bad, and Obama's approval rating swung through an initial steep decline, but then at the end of the month experienced a spectacular recovery. What July will bring is anyone's guess, in other words. Obama wound up down for the month when the monthly averages were calculated, but they could very easily go right back up again in July. Here's our updated chart.
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[ Posted Thursday, June 25th, 2015 – 14:46 UTC ]
President Obama has been having a pretty good week. Actually, to be perfectly accurate, President Obama's legacy has been having a pretty good week. At the end of all presidencies, everything they've achieved and failed to achieve is lumped together under this term, so that historians can debate about the president's legacy for decades to come. It's a normal part of the American cycle. This week, Obama won a preliminary victory in Congress and he just won a resounding court confirmation of his biggest legislative victory to date, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (which has become the eponymous "Obamacare"). Next week, the Supreme Court is expected to declare marriage equality for all, in every state. As I said, a pretty good week all around, legacy-wise.
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[ Posted Wednesday, June 24th, 2015 – 16:30 UTC ]
Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, just became the 13th Republican candidate for president. Whether this will prove to be lucky or unlucky remains to be seen. Even though the field is already incredibly crowded, Jindal will not be the last Republican to announce -- there are at least two other contenders who will likely jump in (Scott Walker and Chris Christie), with the possibility of a few more longshot candidates as well. The more crowded the field gets, the harder it is going to be for any one of them to stand out, which is precisely Jindal's main problem.
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[ Posted Monday, June 22nd, 2015 – 17:17 UTC ]
So vexillology is in the news. Vexillology (as fans of The Big Bang Theory should already know) is the study of flags. A spirited debate is taking place about South Carolina's law which dictates that the Confederate battle flag be prominently displayed on the grounds of the statehouse. This flag used to fly over the statehouse dome, but was moved to a Civil War monument the last time this debate raged, as a form of compromise that was deemed politically acceptable at the time.
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[ Posted Friday, June 19th, 2015 – 17:30 UTC ]
It's been a rollercoaster week in the political world, beginning with Hillary Clinton shifting the gears of her campaign by holding her first big rally, which was immediately followed by the man we're going to call "Jeb! Bush!" finally officially announcing his own candidacy.
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[ Posted Wednesday, June 17th, 2015 – 17:29 UTC ]
Is Fox News on the brink of becoming (as Pinocchio might say) a "real news organization" instead of the wooden de facto propaganda wing of the Republican Party? This might have been seen as a wildly speculative (and unrealistic) question just a short time ago, but events seem to be moving quickly and it now can be seen as a distinct possibility.
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[ Posted Tuesday, June 16th, 2015 – 16:55 UTC ]
When the 2016 presidential campaign season began earlier this year, I started writing articles about every candidate when they officially announced their candidacies. I made a promise in many of these columns, that I would take each candidate seriously no matter what I personally thought their chances of winning were, or how much I agreed or disagreed with their platform. I promised not to be snarky, above all. I think that running for president is a serious business, and even though it does occasionally include what I would call "not really serious" candidates, I still wanted to give a measure of respect to each entrant to the race at the very start of their campaign. As I put it repeatedly, there will be plenty of time for being snarky later (usually on Fridays, of course).
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