And so, on page A3 of the Washington Post, appears my favorite political story of the day — about the link between South Carolina’s feared and (in some quarters) revered GOP hitman, J. Warren Tompkins, and the creation of an anti-Fred Thompson website called PhoneyFred.org. Tompkins is serving as Mitt Romney’s top South Carolina adviser …
Two thoughts on Gen. Petraeus’ opening remarks. First, his statement that the number of “security incidents” has declined in “8 out of the last 12 weeks” sounds very much like a statistic carefully constructed to gild a lilly lily. Second, MoveOn’s ad in the New York Times today makes some strong and fair points. But labeling Petraeus …
So first President Bush, fresh from his visit to al-Anbar province, reportedly tells the deputy PM of Australia that “we’re kicking ass” in Iraq — the “we” being U.S. forces. If the report is true, the comment makes one wonder if the President remembers how that “Bring ’em on!” remark went over more than four years ago. Then he referred …
McCain had the best line about Fred Thompson’s absence from the GOP debate on Fox last night — “maybe it’s past his bedtime.” McCain also happened to have the best debate. But how did Fred do? His Leno appearance went well enough, with Leno getting in a joke about Thompson’s manliness at Larry Craig’s expense (the Leno clip is here — …
I have a piece on Time.com raising the curtain on Fred Thompson’s announcement tonight that he is, offocially and finally, a candidate in the GOP presidential primary. Yes, he’s appearing on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno rather than in Manchester at the GOP presidential primary debate hosted by Fox News’ Chris Wallace. And yes, for good …
Robert Novak, who has had his finger on the pulse of the Republican Party since, roughly, the Lincoln-Douglas debates, declares in his latest column that “never before have I seen morale within the party so low.” Just when it seemed things couldn’t get worse for the GOP, Novak says, along came the Larry Craig embarrassment and John …
Bobby Ghosh reports that the Baath Party — yes, that Baath Party — is endorsing Ayad Allawi to replace Nouri al-Maliki as Iraq’s prime minister. You’d think, for a Shi’ite, that an endorsement from the Sunni-dominated outfit that Saddam rode to power and used to consolidate his dictatorship would be the political equivalent of a kiss …
Eric Pooley spent a lot of time on the campaign trail with John and Elizabeth Edwards trying to capture the essence of the candidate, his populist message and his Iowa-focused strategy for leapfrogging Clinton and Obama on his way to the nomination. Pooley’s excellent piece appears in the new print issue of Time, and on-line here. It’s …
A key Republican to watch for signs of a shift in position in the wake of the Petraeus report is Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell, the Senate Minority Leader. McConnell has, for the most part, been a reliable supporter of the President’s policies on Iraq, including the surge. But he’s facing an increasingly hostile political environment at …
So much for the hope held out by some in the GOP that Larry Craig would make this embarrassing episode go away quickly by announcing that he wouldn’t seek re-election. Instead, as the senator just made clear, for at least the next month (when, he said, he’ll announce his 2008 intentions), the Craig scandal will continue to percolate in …
So it’s not Chertoff — at least not yet. For now, Solicitor General Paul Clement will be acting attorney general. It’s unclear why some in the admin were leaking Chertoff’s name as Gonzales’ replacement — when that happens, it’s usually part of the pre-cooked rollout of a nomination. One possibility is that the White House wants time …
Here’s a piece on Rove’s departure that I wrote for the print issue that comes out tomorrow.
I wrote an item in the new print issue of Time about the “FISA modernization” bill that passed and how it’s likely to remain law through the end of this president’s term and beyond, despite the sunset provision. Even if President Bush’s successor is a Democrat, he or she will likely face enormous political pressure — from Republicans …
