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Mary Lynn Jones

Mary Lynn F. Jones is a Washington-based writer. Her work has also appeared in The Chicago Tribune, National
Journal, the Washington Business Journal and Barron's Guide to the Most
Competitive Colleges. A native Washingtonian, Jones has been a regular
political commentator for WMAL-AM and has made numerous radio and television
appearances, including on National Public Radio's "Talk of the Nation"
and Fox
News Channel. Mary Lynn received her master's degree in journalism from
Columbia University and her bachelor's degree from Wellesley College.

Recent Articles

Money Matters

Mary Lynn JonesApr 04, 2003

Washington has been abuzz the last few days about the $7.4 million Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) raised for his presidential campaign in the first three months of this year. Granted, it's an impressive number and a good start to the campaign. But it's nowhere close to the amount of money the party's eventual nominee will need to raise to have a good chance of defeating President Bush next year.

Channel Changer

Mary Lynn JonesMar 31, 2003

There was good news last week, and it came from an unusual source: CNN. After months of staffing up on such big names as Aaron Brown, Paula Zahn and Connie Chung, CNN decided to let Chung go. And television news will be the better for it.

Chung -- whose big accomplishments on other networks have included prompting then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich's (R-Ga.) mom to call Hillary Clinton a bitch and then-Rep. Gary Condit (D-Calif.) to deny that he killed intern Chandra Levy -- applied that same tabloid approach to her CNN show, which lasted less than a year. Over the last few months, she's devoted airtime to such true-crime subjects as Robert Blake, Laci Peterson and Clara Harris, leaving Brown and Larry King to spend more time on actual issues of importance -- like Iraq.

Senator's Senator

Mary Lynn JonesMar 27, 2003

There have been few great public intellectuals in the Senate in recent years. The chamber has more than its share of show horses, of course. It has workhorses, too. But very few men and women stand out for their ability to shape and move the nation's debate forward based on intellectual merit. Former Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.) was one of those senators.

The Republican Railroad

Mary Lynn JonesMar 25, 2003

In July of 1994, just four months before Republicans swept the elections and won control of Congress, then-Rep. Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) blasted the Democratic leadership for trying to ram health-care reform legislation through Congress without giving the minority party a chance to be heard. "It is fundamentally wrong for America," he said, "for people who are supposed to be elected every two years, who are supposed to be sensitive to the concerns and the needs of the American people, to deliberately and ruthlessly run roughshod over the American people."

Oil Slick

Mary Lynn JonesMar 24, 2003

Buried under all the war coverage last week was a piece of news damaging to the Bush administration's domestic agenda: Its plan to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) was defeated narrowly in the Senate. ANWR drilling, of course, was the central plank of George W. Bush's energy platform. He'd even urged Congress to pass it on the basis of national security, the idea being that if we drilled for oil at home, we wouldn't need to import so much from abroad and thus be vulnerable to the whims of dictators such as Saddam Hussein. The defeat of ANWR should have garnered more news coverage because it's the most promising sign yet for Democrats that Bush is vulnerable in 2004.

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