Ezra Klein

This Matt Bai quote nicely illustrates one of the more frustrating tensions in political journalism. Generally speaking, political writers don’t think so much of political scientists, either, mostly because anyone who has ever actually worked in or covered politics can tell you that, whatever else it may be, a science isn’t one of them. Politics […]

This New York Times story has some weird ideas about the relationship between the President and the Congress. First, it says: Mr. Obama is taking a gamble in outsourcing the drafting of his agenda’s details to these five veteran lawmakers and others in Congress, each with his own political and parochial calculations. It’s not exactly […]

To mark the release of their new Progressive Movement project, CAP has a 40-question quiz evaluating how progressive you are. I am, in general, not a fan of these little quizlets, and this one’s no exception. The first statement I got, for instance, asked whether I agreed with the statement “Free market solutions are better […]

Matt Yglesias reads the Wall Street Journal talking about “distressed assets” and offers a clear explanation of one of the under-discussed facets of the banking problem. Namely, that the banks are being crushed under the weight of loans backed with distressed assets, not assets. The problem is not what the banks have. It’s what they […]

Congratulations to Ross Douthat, who will be replacing Bill Kristol at The New York Times. It’s a great choice for many reasons, but what I’ve come to appreciate most in Ross’s writing and look forward to most in his column is his deeply held and well-defended faith. One of the great failings of political commentary […]

By Ezra Klein I’m writing this from beautiful LAX airport, which I’m sure has benefited from a number of earmarks in its time. There’s no way, for instance, that there can possibly be this many Hudson News kiosks without federal subsidies playing a role. (Actually, snark aside, that’s sort of true: The inability to bring […]

I have an inconveniently scheduled plane flight bisecting my day, so I’ll be popping in and out as wifi allows. In the meantime, Dylan Matthews will be by to keep you all entertained.

Igor Volsky takes some shots at the president of the NFIB for saying that it’s hard to say where they’ll compromise before there’s anything specific on the table, but that’s actually a perfectly sensible position. Volsky, of course, knows what comes to his mind when he hears the word “compromise” because he, like most political […]

If CNBC wants to retain a shred of their credibility and not lose money because they lost market share because the broader public is convinced that they employ frauds, they should stop picking fights with Jon Stewart. .cc_box a:hover .cc_home{background:url(‘http://www.comedycentral.com/comedycentral/video/assets/syndicated-logo-over.png’) !important;}.cc_links a{color:#b9b9b9;text-decoration:none;}.cc_show a{color:#707070;text-decoration:none;}.cc_title a{color:#868686;text-decoration:none;}.cc_links a:hover{color:#67bee2;text-decoration:underline;} The Daily Show With Jon StewartM – Th 11p / […]

I’d feel better about touting this poll showing 73 percent of Americans want a public health insurance option if I could find the poll language somewhere. What you can say though is that the case for the public insurance option is a lot more straightforward than the case against it. The issue’s supporters are simply […]