Barack Obama is a unique individual in many ways, both great and trivial. He has set a lot of "firsts" (or, in some cases "first in a long time"). This list usually starts with his race. Whether you prefer the "first black president" or the "first biracial president," the list of "firsts" certainly doesn't stop with the color of his skin. He is the first president to come from the state of Hawai'i, for instance. The first post-baby-boom president (by some definitions, at least). He is only the third president elected directly from the Senate (the first since Kennedy). He is the first president (to my knowledge, at least) educated outside America at an such early age (maybe in post-revolutionary times this was common, but not so much in modern times). And, charmingly, it will be the first time since Amy Carter that there will be young "First Children" in the White House.

But instead of mining this trove of trivia, what Chris Matthews focused on last weekend (on his weekly show "The Chris Matthews Show") was whether Obama would say his middle name when he is sworn in next month. Sigh. Maybe we should all encourage Matthews' rumored run for the Senate, at least it would get him off the air for awhile.

[Ahem.]

Continue Reading »

There's an old inside-the-Beltway joke where a new House member is being shown around by a veteran of his own party. He is awed by entering the House floor for the first time, and is shown his new seat. He asks, pointing across the aisle to where the other party sits, "Is that where the enemy sits?" The older and wiser Congressman replies, "No, no, here in the House of Representatives we call our opponents 'the loyal opposition.' You're new, so you need to understand this. 'The enemy' is the Senate."

This joke came to mind while listening and reading to Republicans talk about tomorrow's runoff race between the incumbent Saxby Chambliss and his Democratic challenger Jim Martin. Because they're using a talking point which is false and which points out their own ignorance. And since it is ignorance we speak of, where better to begin than a Sarah Palin quote? (Ahem.) Here she is today, at a rally in South Carolina on "Saxby's" behalf (others have pointed out that she never used Chambliss' last name, but I refuse to believe it was because she can't pronounce it):

Continue Reading »

This past weekend, the ChrisWeigant.com website got a mild facelift. The most noticeable new thing is the Pledge Drive logo and thermometer, (which you should click on to find out what it's all about!)

Some other minor things on the site were fixed. Such as removing the Election 2008 stuff. I also simplified the list of links and moved them over to the right-hand side of the page, to balance the page overall a bit better. The top menu bar is a little lighter and less dominating. I moved the "Email Chris" link up to the top menu bar, which I've been meaning to do for a while now. And the main text in articles (both on the front page and in the articles itself) is a bit more spread out, hopefully making it easier to read. I may even move to a sans-serif font for the main text, but I'm still experimenting with web fonts, so that will have to wait for now.

But with all renovations come some bugs, and I can't test this on every browser, so I'm relying on you guys to let me know if there are problems, either with the new stuff, or just something that's been bugging you for a while about the site. I've opened this Note to comments, so let me know what you think here.

And thanks in advance for your patience if something's broken....

For only the third time in this column's two-and-a-half year history (see note below), I am turning over my soapbox to a guest columnist. As with both previous times, the author is a commenter here at Huffington Post.

Known as "LewDan," he took exception to a column I wrote, and let me know how he felt in the comments, and later through a private email exchange. While he wasn't exactly agreeing with what I had written, I found him to have a unique perspective on the issue of race in Obama's election and also found him to be an original and well-reasoned thinker. While we disagreed on some things, we did so respectfully and with the intent of making our positions clear to each other.

Because I was so impressed by his writing, I offered him the chance to write a column for the public to read. At first he deferred, but in the end I convinced him that others would enjoy reading what he had to say. The following began as part of our email exchange, and was rewritten as a column by Llewellyn Daniel, who describes himself as:

Continue Reading »

Deep into the interregnum (interpresidentum?... interpresidium?) between the outgoing Bush administration and the incoming Obama administration seems to be a good time to ask: Does this make sense anymore? Why does America wait two-and-a-half months between when we elect our leaders and when we actually let them enter office? And does it make sense to change it?

Continue Reading »

In the past few weeks, we've heard story after story of corporate excess, often in admonishments toward corporate executives from various congressional committees. CEOs on private planes! Gasp! Outrageous compensation packages and bonuses for executives! Who knew? Posh conferences in luxury resorts! Golly! Taxpayer dollars may pay hundreds of millions in stadium naming rights! Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!

Then, as I was preparing to write this, I read Representative Elijah Cummings' column at the Huffington Post today in which he expressed his outrage over the latest example of corporate excess to be uncovered -- Citigroup and the Mets' stadium-naming contract.

But you know what? I am not impressed by Cummings encouraging corporations to "stop the reckless spending." Because he and his fellow congressfolk can put on their faux looks of outrage and astonishment all they want, and "encourage" until they're blue in the face, but none of it adds up to more than hypocritical tut-tuttery in my book.

Continue Reading »

While today is not officially Turkey Day, I will warn you in advance that it's going to be a theme running through today's column, like gravy through a poorly-constructed dam of mashed potatoes. So to speak. And yes, this will include discussion of the recent Sarah Palin video, but before we get to that, we've got other turkeys to deal with first.

Ben Franklin notwithstanding (who wrote his daughter a letter suggesting among other things that the wild turkey was a more appropriate symbol for America than the bald eagle), the word "turkey" has come to denote, in a slang sense (from dictionary.com): (a) a person or thing of little appeal; dud; loser, (b) a naive, stupid, or inept person, or (c) a poor and unsuccessful theatrical production; flop.

Continue Reading »

Is Hillary Clinton eligible to become Secretary of State? Putting aside the question of what her chances of being appointed actually are (which I wrote about yesterday), is she even legally able to take the job if offered? The answer appears to be a strong "probably."

The question sounds like a technicality, but it is a technicality which comes straight out of the original text of the Constitution, which raises its profile a bit. From Article I, Section 6:

Continue Reading »

The term "red herring" has been around for hundreds of years. It specifically refers to taking a smoked (and therefore pungent) herring and dragging it across the trail of a fugitive, in order to throw off the scent of any tracking dogs in pursuit. The term's use has evolved (with the help of mystery writers everywhere) to now mean any intentional misdirection used to draw attention from other events or motives. And while I could be proven wildly mistaken, I think the whole "Secretary of State Hillary Clinton" circus will prove to be nothing more than a gigantic red herring. Something smells fishy about it, to stretch the metaphor a bit.

Basing my reasoning on absolutely no hard facts (which I fully admit up front), here's the scenario that keeps suggesting itself to my addled brain (and which, to my surprise, doesn't seem to have suggested itself to anyone else): during the discussions between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama (which took place between the end of the primary season and when she began campaigning for him), Hillary gets Barack to agree to this sideshow if he gets elected. She will be "offered" Secretary of State, which she will then decline "because there's so much to do in the Senate." But -- and here's the crux of my thinking -- she will gain by this situation by improving her prestige in the Senate and attaining more power than she normally would have (due to her low seniority status).

Continue Reading »

At 12:39 PM (Alaska time) Democratic challenger Mark Begich led the incumbent (and convicted felon) Senator Ted Stevens by 2,374 votes -- an improvement of over 1,300 votes in today's tally. By my thumbnail estimates, there appear to be just over 10,000 ballots left to count, meaning that Stevens' defeat seems likely at this point.

Today was the day when the final 25,000 votes were supposed to be counted by the state of Alaska. Again, just from my off-the-cuff figuring, it appears that around 14,000 of these ballots have now been entered into the totals for both Begich and Stevens. Meaning Begich increased his lead by a net 1,300, out of just 14,000 votes cast. And from what I hear, the remaining votes to be tallied today come from two districts where Begich either ran even on election day, or had a strong lead over Stevens. Meaning it would be something of a shock now if Stevens reverses the trend to hang onto his seat.

Continue Reading »