Kemp was a total blue-sky guy, which made him very likable, but not entirely credible as a politician. I covered both of his presidential campaigns, watched his unlikely alliance with Bob Dole–your classic thundercloud guy–in 1996, and spent more than a few hours talking about urban issues in his office. He was a happy ideologue, [...]

At first, I thought that Bibi Netanyahu’s position that the U.S. had to make progress on getting Iran to stop its nuclear fuel enrichment program before he’d start negotiating with the Palestinians was a joke, a rhetorical extravagance intended to get the U.S. to put a little more pressure on Iran. But, it appears, he’s [...]

As promised to commentator 53_3, here’s my take on Saturday’s launch in Arlington, Virginia of the National Center for a New America, the latest iteration in the GOP’s search for a new identity. My favorite fun fact about the event? It was inside the Beltway….

Mark Salter, the longtime aide to John McCain, has an essay of sorts about how the media increasingly acts like a bunch sweat-stained wretches clutching dollar bills at the edge of a dusty barn cock fight ring. (My image.) Here are Salter’s words: Winning the hour assumes there is news made in this town every [...]

He was a sunny and unapologetic supply-sider, who famously declared: “I do not worship at the altar of the balanced budget.” He also was one of the first to recognize–and to speak out about–his party’s failure to reach out to African-Americans and to those who had been left behind by Reaganomics. President Obama said today: [...]

Has anyone else been getting these robo-calls? “This is the second notice that the factory warranty on your car is about to expire.” I started getting them on my cell phone about a month ago and now I’m getting them morning noon and night – like 2am night. According to some useful research by a [...]

Both sides of the aisle spent all week lamenting/celebrating Arlen Specter’s party switch and the potential for a 60 vote Democratic majority in the Senate. But Specter’s swap leaves the Senate Judiciary Committee without its most prominent GOP moderate. In any other committee that wouldn’t matter but in the Judiciary Committee one minority vote is [...]

1. The AIPAC prosecution is abandoned. Journalists celebrate the death of another leak case, though the news comes too late to help reverse the embarrassment of Jane Harman. 2. David Brooks confirms with the usual academic citations what mothers have been saying for generations: Practice, practice, practice (makes a genius). 3. Anita Dunn’s (official) arrival [...]