Here’s the 25-page Congressional Budget Office “preliminary estimate” of the Senate bill with the House package of changes. Much, much more here and on Time.com once I’ve had a chance to comb through and absorb all the policy implications. There are no earth-shattering changes. The Senate bill with the reconciliation package would reduce the federal [...]
The U.S. military “took” the Afghan city of Marja, in the poppy-growing heart of Helmand Province, a few weeks ago. Now comes the hard part, as this story by the NY Times’ Rod Nordland makes clear. It reminds me a bit of the “taking” of Baghdad in three weeks after the start of the Iraq [...]
As Jay and I have pointed out, by the time Election Day rolls around, most voters probably won’t care much what procedures or sweetheart deals Democrats employed in their efforts to pass health care reform. Democrats are more likely be judged by the generic measure of whether they were for or against health care. (This [...]
Where is the CBO score? There were hints the score would come last week. The by the weekend. Then Monday. Then Tuesday. Earlier today, Talking Points Memo reported that “multiple sources in the House and Senate” said to expect a score by “late today.” NBC’s Luke Russert just tweeted that the score would be out [...]
I’ve said many times the current anti-Washington mood makes congressional incumbents act like they’ve never been there before. Nowhere is this more apparent than in carefully staged campaign ads. But Blanche Lincoln is taking a slightly different tack in her latest TV spot, hoping her recent ascent to the chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee [...]
Okay, fellow Catholic school alums, which side would you put your money on to prevail in this one?: WASHINGTON — Catholic nuns are urging Congress to pass President Barack Obama’s health care plan, in an unusual public break with bishops who say it would subsidize abortion. Some 60 leaders of religious orders representing 59,000 Catholic [...]
The latest from our White House Photo Blog. Anyone else suspect the Democrats might be warming up to that whole Department of Peace idea?
Abe Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League has, according to Andrew Sullivan, indirectly accused General David Petraeus of “blaming the Jews for everything.” I’m not sure that Foxman had Petraeus, specifically, in mind–or maybe just the vast majority of humans who are concerned about Israel’s continuing colonization of Palestinian lands. This is, after all, the same [...]
Here’s a story from me out of Kentucky, where I went a few weeks ago to look at the GOP primary for Jim Bunning’s Senate seat. It’s hard to say who’s running a worse campaign, Rand Paul who has no message discipline and lacks charisma or Trey Grayson who doesn’t even post his events on [...]
