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“Coxcomb” is the O’Reilly Factor word of the day. It means “foolish dandy who is overly impressed by his own accomplishments,” and it flashes on the Fox News screen, just a moment before the start of the 13th Republican presidential primary debate, the last debate before the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses. Bill O’Reilly is either devilishly clever, or he’s such a coxcomb he knows not what he does. But still, he has done it. Another feather in his cap.
Thursday night’s Republican presidential primary debate in Sioux City, the last before votes are cast next month in Iowa, played out as a microcosm of the current race. As his rivals’ attack ads are beginning to chip away at Newt Gingrich’s lead in the key early state, Mitt Romney is making an aggressive case that [...]
The Medicare reform plan released Thursday by GOP budget prophet Paul Ryan and wonky Democratic Senator Ron Wyden is a rare hybrid strain. Politically, it’s the result of a collaboration between two men with very different ideological inclinations. On the policy, it maps out a kind of DMZ for the entitlement debate: an expansion of [...]
With all this presidential politics going on, it’s hard to keep up with some of the subtler and wonkier public policy developments. The always-excellent Matt Miller has a fascinating column in the Wapo today on the proposed health care compromise backed by Oregon Senator Ron Wyden and Congressman Paul Ryan. This could be a big [...]
The Romney campaign has been in full attack mode all week, mercilessly trashing its latest mortal enemy, Newt Gingrich. Every couple of hours a new email arrives from the Romney campaign with a subject line like, THIRD TIME’S A CHARM: GINGRICH IS RELIABLY UNRELIABLE ON THE RYAN PLAN (that one landed at 8:02 a.m. this [...]
The Republican presidential debates have been a fabulous spectacle, wildly entertaining, often substantive, absolutely great for democracy–and, now, symmetrical. Tonight’s Fox News debate, the last before the Iowa precinct caucuses, revolves around one question: What will Mitt Romney say when he is asked whether he thinks Newt Gingrich is zany?
Romney grapples with Newt. Gingrich pitches “bold ideas,” “new solutions” and ’90s nostalgia on air:
For Republicans concerned that a lengthy primary could hurt their chances against Obama in 2012, the biggest worry may not be Iowa or New Hampshire. In Texas, a fight over the legality of a redistricting plan is threatening to push the state’s primary from March 6 all the way to May 29, potentially enabling three extra months of expensive and damaging intra-party attacks between GOP candidates. And that’s not all that’s at stake.
This is one of those days when you can feel the zeitgeist twitch–is it possible that Republicans are already cooling on Newt Gingrich? Well, yes. Newt is the ultimate political impulse buy. He’s terrific at the periphery of the Republican debate, but when he starts moving toward the middle of the stage, and getting more [...]
