×
- One can draw many conclusions from the list of senators who voted for the debt-financed Medicare Part D legislation in 2003 and now complain about the debt supposedly produced by the deficit-neutral health-care reform legislation hitting the Senate floor this week. Are they economically illiterate? Clearly. Hypocritical? Absolutely. And is anybody in the press talking about it? Of course not -- they've got to compete with Entertainment Tonight this week, it seems.
- It is inevitable that politicians contradict themselves, but in the case of Tim Pawlenty, who is clearly laying the groundwork for achieving higher office, his flip on climate change is especially egregious. His new-found climate change skepticism is designed to appease the conservative base, but like Mitt Romney, Pawlenty's wider appeal was supposed to be his reputation as a reformer. Now Romney is a joke, and the man behind "Sam's Club" Republicanism is probably headed down the same path.
- The 2010 elections are a year away but I still see this situation where anti-incumbent sentiment runs high yet the opposition party remains deeply unpopular to be unique in midterm elections. Throw the lack of open congressional seats into the mix and it isn't clear how the GOP picks up more than a handful of seats.
- Remainders: The Senate blocks James Inhofe's Terrorism Cowardice amendment; Glenn Beck uses the power of analogy to argue against health-care reform; at some point in the past 20 years, conservative talking points eliminated hunger in America; Hoffmania is back in NY-23; and doesn't American journalism have enough problems without having to defend their decision to run columns from former Bush aides?
--Mori Dinauer
