In the Arena

13 Days Till Iowa: Remember Rick Perry?

Davenport, Iowa

Is it elitist to expect that a candidate for President of the United States have a passing familiarity with the English language? Rick Perry is a mud-track biker when it comes to fluency, slipping and sliding …

14 Days Till Iowa: Newt Crushed

Hiawatha, Iowa

“I was chatting with some young people on my way to the podium,” Newt Gingrich told about 100 people at a rally near Cedar Rapids last night, “and it was clear how our campaign differs from the other campaigns …

Clarification: Israel’s National Security

A few hours ago, I received an anguished email from my friend Jeff Goldberg, who was incensed that I’d written this sentence:

“It’s another thing entirely to send American kids off to war, yet again, to fight for Israel’s national security.” [emphasis his]

Jeff had jumped to a silly conclusion. I was concerned about sending …

15 Days Till Iowa: Travel Day

Two weeks out, and Iowa is doing its Iowa thing–anyone, and I mean anyone, can win these caucuses. We’ve seen late surges before–Obama and Huckabee in 2008, Kerry in 2004 and so forth–but this is a case where multiple candidates are neck and neck, something I haven’t seen since the Democratic race in 1988.

16 Days Till Iowa: The Race Distilled

The Des Moines Register has a comprehensive piece today about all the terrible things that could happen to Newt Gingrich between now and the caucuses, but the real news of the morning was the interviews that Romney gave Fox and Gingrich gave CBS–together, they represent a perfect distillation of what the Republican presidential race is …

17 Days Till Iowa: Let’s Talk Obama

After a youth spent immersed in the romance of The People, with the populist movement of the 1890s and the united front of the 1930s among my favorite periods in American history, I’ve come to have grave doubts about populism over the past 30 years. No, it’s actually been longer than that: If you read classic works of American history, …

18 Days Till Iowa: Last Night’s Debate Part II–Newt Edition

Last night’s debate was particularly fraught for Newt Gingrich, but I don’t know if it was for good or ill. Will Iowans remember him fumbling around trying to rationalize his $1.6 million relationship with Freddie Mac in the first half of the debate…or will they remember the red-meat eloquence of his second-half answers about the …

18 Days Till Iowa: 4 Important Answers From Thursday’s Debate (Part 1)

Last night’s Fox News debate in Iowa was a far more complicated thing than previous sessions. Most of the candidates had nice moments, Newt Gingrich had some tough ones. I have no idea how it will impact the race. But there were 4 moments, 4 answers to questions posed by the rigorous Fox News moderators, that deserve some further …

Hitch Gone

My reaction is similar to Andrew Sullivan’s, though I wasn’t as close to Christopher as Andrew was. Hitch and I had several memorable–to me, at least–sparring sessions. When we debated in England, just before 9/11, he attacked me from the left. When we debated in America, after 9/11, he attacked me from the right. His “inconsistency” …

Wyden-Ryan: A Move Toward Health Care Sanity

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 deal.

19 Days Till Iowa: Previewing The Zany Debate

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 …

20 Days Till Iowa: The Paul Boomlet

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 time, and saying …

21 Days Till Iowa: Watching the Lincoln-Douglas Debacle

Silly me. I’d been hoping for a real, substantive debate on foreign policy issues between Jon Huntsman and Newt Gingrich on Monday. The format was capacious; there were no silly gotcha questions–just mutually agreed upon topics for discussion. It was similar to the way Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas debated the most profound topic …

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