You know it’s a Friday afternoon if the White House sends out the latest list of presidential pardons. Here are today’s lucky winners, all of whom were convicted of non-violent crimes. Some swing states represented, but no campaign contributors.
Bibi and Barack Meet: So Much for the Fireworks
Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continued their icy relationship in front of the cameras Friday after what the President somewhat ruefully called “prolonged” talks, suggesting that Bibi had delivered one of his trademark multi-part lectures on the requirements of Israeli security. The two were correct and diplomatic, …
Jon Huntsman’s First Foray into New Hampshire’s Retail Politics
Mary Kaye Huntsman surveyed the crowd of 60+ people spilled across Juliana Bergeron’s lawn on Main Street in Keene, New Hampshire. Her husband, Jon, had just finished his first event of the day and the couple lingered to chat …
The White House Twitters, but That’s Just the Beginning
In the more-fun-to-read, newsstand magazine this week, I have a piece about White House efforts to be more online, including a scene from last week (pictured above, courtesy of the White House) when message man David Plouffe (pointing) watched Twitter, while President Obama spoke in Texas about immigration. Here are some more …
Trumka’s Message to Democrats: The Money’s Not in the Bank Yet
In a speech at the National Press Club on Friday, AFL-CIO head Richard Trumka drew predictable contrasts between the mega-union’s members and its political enemies
(e.g. firefighters running into burning buildings vs. the Scott Walkers of the world), but he also took aim at Washington’s behavior on the whole—suggesting that Democrats …
A Dramatic Reading of the Gingrich Campaign’s Epic “Literati Sheep” Statement
John Lithgow does it justice:
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Pawlenty’s Moment
Tim Pawlenty has already been running for President for weeks and even months now. But candidates nowadays stretch out the process of announcing their candidacies into as many incremental steps as possible, including the establishment of a “leadership” PAC and an exploratory committee. Pawlenty even had to take back an unintentional …
A Mainstream Republican Isolationist?
There’s plenty to chew over in Jon Huntsman’s first interviews as a proto-presidential candidate, but perhaps the most substantial position he staked out today is a foreign policy one. Earlier this year, when Haley Barbour was flirting with a run, he made quite the splash by breaking from mainstream GOP orthodoxy and espousing skepticism …
Huntsman, the Moderate, Endorses Ryan Medicare Plan
Ever since GOP House budget committee chairman Paul Ryan unveiled a plan to, among other things, voucherize Medicare, Democrats have been practically gloating about the opening Ryan created. One by one the 2012 GOP presidential candidates are being asked whether they endorse Ryan’s plan, praised as courageous by many conservatives, in …
Bibi and Barack, the Sequel
I’ve already registered my skepticism that not much will come of Obama’s assertion yesterday that “the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps.”
The statement is not, as many are claiming today, a demand for a return to pre-1967 borders: 1967 lines refer at most to the deployment of …
Governor Moonbeam: California’s Responsible Adult
SACRAMENTO—Forget the former California governor who’s once again a tabloid sensation. Let’s talk about the former California governor who’s once again a California governor. Jerry Brown, the Golden State’s 34th and 39th chief …
Morning Must Reads: Retaliation
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- Former Obama aides’ independent expenditure group Priorities USA Action is up with its first ad of the 2012 cycle, hitting Mitt Romney on local stations in South Carolina this weekend.
- Romney et al. accuse Obama of “throwing Israel under the bus” in Thursday’s speech, even though
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Campaigning in the Twitter Era
Sure, Newt Gingrich has been a center of media attention before, but a lot has changed since he was in office in the 1990s. And part of Gingrich’s problem is that he’s unused to modern media.
His troubles started in a …