himwhynot

Monica Potts says the “No Wedding, No Womb” campaign makes a classic mistake: shaming women for their sexuality instead of asking how to improve outcomes for children of single-parent households. Like most stories about the African American community picked up by the national media, this is a story about something that’s “wrong.” Certainly, there are […]

Matthew Yglesias says the Obama administration’s policy of disengagement has succeeded as spectacularly as the Bush administration’s policy of invasion failed: A perhaps true end for the war is currently scheduled for December of 2011 when all troops are set to be withdrawn. Still, nobody knows for sure what will happen if Iraqi leaders fail […]

Jamelle Bouie argues that it’s tempting to demonize conservatives with hyperbolic comparisons, but liberals have an obligation to the truth: Given the subject matter and his own influence, Moulitsas is sure to find a large audience for American Taliban. This wouldn’t be a problem if the book were a careful comparison of populist nationalist movements, […]

Tim Fernholz says last night’s speech may have felt like an inconclusive end to the war, but it marks a shift in the president’s focus to economic policy: It’s hard to imagine a different scenario for the United States’ exit from Iraq; our departure depended on the circumstances of our entrance and the murky twists […]

Paul Waldman looks at re-emergent anti-intellectualism in the GOP: We probably shouldn’t make too much of this — they’re just having a bit of fun, after all. But embracing Palin in all her nincompoopery must, in the words of the former Alaska governor herself, “stab hearts” — at least some of them — at a […]

Tim Fernholz examines how America’s top financial diplomat is working to save the world from our mistakes: Undersecretary of the Treasury for International Affairs Lael Brainard, the United States’ most important financial diplomat, became concerned that the Europeans weren’t taking the situation seriously. The conventional response was clear: Greece would cut back on spending, while […]

Harold Pollack says the temporary federal high-risk pools won’t reach most of the medically uninsured: The Affordable Care Act includes a number of measures that go into effect in the short term — some of them this year, such as a regulation prohibiting insurers from denying coverage of children’s pre-existing conditions. That provision, along with […]

TAP talks with Shahid Buttar, a civil-rights lawyer and executive director of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, about recent constitutional flare-ups: Has the fact that there’s a Democrat in the White House — and one who has engaged in high-profile legislative battles over things like health care and financial reform — taken threats to […]

Joanne Kenen looks at the way that states are beginning to carry out the new health-care law in different ways — or not at all: So far most states are just toe-deep in reform. In both Washington, D.C., and the states, key decisions won’t be forthcoming for months. Many states will put off decisions until […]

Maria Abascal argues that while the new health-care law’s implications seem clear, the indirect effects could be critical: The full story, though, is more complicated. The act leaves in place a five-year waiting period for legal immigrants to qualify for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program. As a result, though they will be able […]