Mori Dinauer

Before Bush‘s surrogates started comparing him to Lincoln, they used to compare him to Truman. The president himself liked the latter comparison, because he could find solace in being an unpoular president in his time, only to be vindicated in the future. Well, it looks like Bush may even be exceeding Truman in unpopularity, according […]

Two things are noteworthy about Fareed Zakaria‘s short column, “The End of Conservatism.” First, Zakaria hitches conservatism’s demise to an abandonment of conservative principles by conservative politicians. But even if we could agree on a set of conservative principles, that is something different from a set of conservative policy proposals, whose efficacy, Zakaria avers, were […]

The truly mystifying thing about William Kristol-cum-NY Times columnist has nothing to with the fact that he’s a serial liar. Or that he writes banal copy. Or even that he is a transparently partisan writer. Nor is it even the mystery of why the Times hired him in the first place. Rather, the true mystery […]

Ross Douthat takes a long look at the effect of the surge on the political debate over Iraq and concludes that while perception of the surge’s success makes it difficult for Democrats to appease their anti-war base, the surge also makes it tricky for Republicans, particularly John McCain, to campaign on success in Iraq for […]

Last Friday, Chris Bowers wrote a stern post in which he promised to leave the Democratic Party if the superdelegates did not vote in accordance with the results of the pledged delegates. In a similar vein, Miles Mogulescu at the Huffington Post issued a call to build a “Grassroots Movement to Prevent the Democratic Presidential […]

If anecdotal evidence is any indication, tomorrow’s “Potomac Primary” should confirm the nationwide trend of enthusiastic turnout at Democratic primaries and caucuses. Yesterday’s festivities in downtown D.C. celebrating the Chinese New Year didn’t deter If anecdotal evidence is any indication, tomorrow’s “Potomac Primary” should confirm the nationwide trend of enthusiastic turnout at Democratic primaries and […]

Even though Super Tuesday is behind us, there’s still plenty happening in the Even though Super Tuesday is behind us, there’s still plenty happening in the Prospect‘s own backyard. Virginia is part of what’s been dubbed the “Potomac Primary,” and this red-trending-blue state could offer insight into which Democratic candidate is best positioned to capitalize […]

John McCain received a warm introduction from George Allen and Tom Coburn, but not so much from the audience. At first, McCain looked a bit uncomfortable, but quickly adopted the attitude of a man accepting his party’s nomination (“I’d be deeply humbled and honored to receive your nomination…”). In that tradition, McCain sought to demonstrate […]

Just now, during his address to the CPAC convention, Mitt Romney described the “difficult decision” he had to make, remarking that “because I love America, I feel I must now stand aside.” Romney then linked his own presidential campaign with a larger effort to fight the war on terror: “We cannot allow the next president […]

With the departure of With the departure of John Edwards from the race for the Democratic nomination yesterday, the focus now turns to how the vacuum left by his campaign will affect the campaigns of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. First there is the question of delegates, which turns out to be the easiest puzzle […]