Patrick Caldwell

Newt Gingrich is set to launch an official 2012 campaign for the presidency. He’ll be the first major contender with an official campaign; the other candidates have generally setup exploratory committees rather than full-bore presidential bids. Because of his strong name recognition from his stint as speaker of the House in the ‘90s, news organizations […]

Stories covering Senate gridlock border on the redundant by this point, but Republican senators are once again arbitrarily posturing against President Obama’s nominees. The Washington Post reports that 44 Republicans sent the president a letter pledging to block whomever Obama nominates to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). At the same time, 19 Republican […]

During the 2004 election, the GOP pushed anti-same-sex marriage amendments onto the ballot across the country to turnout their base voters for George W. Bush’s re-election campaign. LGBTQ civil rights may once again be at stake in the 2012 election season if a series of connected state-level conservative organizations have their way. At The Minnesota […]

At the risk of adding to the overabundance of coverage devoted to a fringe candidate, it looks like Donald Trump‘s joke of a campaign is finally dead in the water. Two polls out today show that the reality TV star has lost his support among New Hampshire Republican voters. In the last poll of the […]

The reports that Republicans were abandoning Medicare reform in advance of today’s White House summit were quickly refuted by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. “Eric made very clear that our position is the Ryan budget which — as you know — assumes a debt limit increase and includes Medicare, Medicaid and $715 billion in mandatory […]

The Economist examined the U.S. government’s bookkeeping methods and noticed that our economic models tend to present a rosier outlook than the equivalent European number crunching: Take public-sector debt. The definition used in Washington, DC, is “federal government debt held by the public”, which stood at 62% of GDP at the end of 2010. But […]

The death of Osama bin Laden reignited debates over Bush-era detention policy. On Monday, conservatives rushed to claim that the CIA was only able to locate bin Laden as a result of information gained during “enhanced interrogation” sessions. While the details of the hunt for bin Laden are still being laid out, The New York […]

Yesterday Mitt Romney confirmed that he will skip the first GOP presidential debate scheduled for this Thursday in Greenville, South Carolina. Romney’s decision is the latest delaying tactic among prominent 2012ers, with each of the major candidates holding off on making the full commitment to a presidential run. Only four candidates — Tim Pawlenty, Ron […]

Osama bin Laden’s death was at first one of the rare political occasions that united liberals and conservatives. Today, however conservative writers began using the mission’s success as evidence for the effectiveness of the “enhanced interrogation” techniques (aka torture) that were implemented under the Bush administration. As President Obama said during his address late last […]