[ Posted Monday, July 25th, 2011 – 16:11 UTC ]
There is a grand tradition in Washington -- which is followed by both parties, at various times -- of avoiding big and politically-delicate problems. This tradition used to be called the "blue-ribbon commission," although for some reason the "blue-ribbon" part isn't used much anymore. But whatever you call it, this political dodge is created for one purpose and one purpose alone: to waste time. To the best of my knowledge, no commission (blue-ribbon or otherwise bedecked) has ever come up with a solution to anything which has been thus implemented by the politicians (again, of either party) to solve a big problem (although you could make an argument for the base-closing commission, I guess). But virtually all of these commissions have succeeded wildly on their main objective of wasting as much time as possible.
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[ Posted Friday, July 15th, 2011 – 16:50 UTC ]
Are we seeing the new model of Barack Obama's presidency? Is this (in the parlance of Silicon Valley) "Obama 2.0"?
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[ Posted Friday, June 24th, 2011 – 16:13 UTC ]
Well, it's certainly been an eventful couple of weeks, hasn't it?
We're back on our regular weekly schedule here after returning home from our second trip this month (this one to Netroots Nation), after which I can firmly conclude that flying, these days, sucks. Big time. Sigh.
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[ Posted Tuesday, May 17th, 2011 – 16:50 UTC ]
So we're now down to a "Gang of Five," I guess.
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[ Posted Monday, May 9th, 2011 – 17:12 UTC ]
In roughly two months, President Barack Obama is going to announce the beginning of the end of America's longest war. He could not have known, when he initially set this summer for the beginning of the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan, that the timing would work out so perfectly. With Osama Bin Laden now dead, it's going to be a lot easier to begin pulling out of Afghanistan. The only question left to ask is how fast this drawdown will be accomplished.
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[ Posted Tuesday, March 1st, 2011 – 18:08 UTC ]
We are now roughly twenty months away from the next presidential election. But, rather surprisingly, only one Republican has announced he's running for president -- and he's not exactly a "top tier" candidate. So one has to wonder, where are all the Republicans?
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[ Posted Wednesday, February 16th, 2011 – 17:33 UTC ]
The revolutionary tidal wave (or, if you prefer, the "Tunisami") sweeping the Middle East and North Africa spreads ever wider, as in country after country young protesters take to the streets in an attempt to change their countries' governments. But don't expect an outcome equal to the (mostly) peaceful overthrows in Tunis and Egypt in every single country now affected by this "people power" movement. There are major differences from country to country, both in terms of the form of government (and the military), and in terms of the likelihood of a victorious outcome for the protesters.
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[ Posted Friday, December 24th, 2010 – 19:34 UTC ]
Welcome back to our annual year-end awards column!
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[ Posted Friday, December 17th, 2010 – 17:45 UTC ]
My apologies to anyone tuning in who was expecting to see the 150th "Friday Talking Points" column, since it will be pre-empted for two weeks here. But the good news is we're doing so to bring you our annual "McLaughlin Awards," which are even more fun!
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[ Posted Monday, October 4th, 2010 – 13:34 UTC ]
President Obama got a bit of a bounce in his monthly poll average in September, but the news is of a decidedly mixed variety. There is good news and bad in the numbers from last month for Obama, and it's looking like there won't be much of a pre-election change in his numbers which could help congressional Democrats out on the midterm campaign trail.
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