View image | gettyimages.com Jeb Bush, you may or may not be aware, spent much of his adult life as a “businessman.” I put that word in quotes because from what we’ve learned so far Bush doesn’t seem to have risen in the business world the way we normally think of people doing, by creating […]
Paul Waldman
Paul Waldman is a weekly columnist and senior writer for The American Prospect. He also writes for the Plum Line blog at The Washington Post and The Week and is the author of Being Right Is Not Enough: What Progressives Must Learn From Conservative Success.
Posted inPaul Waldman
Photo of the Day, Cold Day In Hades Edition
View image | gettyimages.com A bunch of politicians at a press conference, you say? Nay, this is something far more momentous. This is Democrats and Republicans at a ceremony signing the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015, better known as the “doc fix” bill, or more properly, the bill that ends the annual […]
Posted inEconomic Policy
The Real Reason Social Security Is the Third Rail of American Politics
View image | gettyimages.com Chris Christie still harbors hopes of becoming the Republican nominee for president, and in search of a way to convince conservatives that he’s one of them-and reinforce the idea that he’s a bold truth-teller who doesn’t care whose feathers he ruffles, and you might not agree with him but you’ll always […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Hillary Clinton’s Evolution On Marriage Equality Shows How Change Happens, and Why Parties Matter
Over the last few days, Chris Geidner of Buzzfeed has been documenting Hillary Clinton’s evolution on the issue of same-sex marriage, an evolution that may now finally be complete. First Geidner posted some interesting documents from the 1990s showing Clinton and her husband explaining their opposition to marriage rights, then he got the Clinton campaign […]
Posted inPaul Waldman
Photo of the Day, Theater of Protest Edition
View image | gettyimages.com I happen to think that most protests of this type range somewhere between useless and counterproductive. But I still love this photo, because it’s so dynamic-the flying paper, the confetti, the movement of European Central Bank president Mario Draghi (that’s him on the left looking like he’s ready to catch a […]
Posted inEconomic Policy
Where the Candidates Stand On Taxes
View image | gettyimages.com Tax day is a good time to wonder just what sort of changes to the tax code we might expect when we get a new president 21 months from now. Most of them haven’t produced lengthy position papers yet, but we can get at least a preliminary idea of where they’d […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Photo of the Day, Meet ‘n Greet Edition
View image | gettyimages.com That would be one Hillary R. Clinton, sharing a cup of nourishing coffee with some folks from Le Claire, Iowa. If you’ve ever been to one of these spectacles, you have to admire the ordinary people who find themselves chatting with a candidate as a surly scrum of photographers jostles each […]
Posted inLaw and Justice
It Turns Out People Can Be Persuasive When They’re High
I’m fairly certain she’s a “yes” on legalization. (Flickr/Jonathan Piccolo) The Pew Research Center has a new poll out on marijuana legalization, and in many ways it’s about what you’d expect if you’ve been paying attention to public opinion on this topic lately. Overall support for legalization is at 53 percent, and young people are […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Can Republicans Make Hillary Clinton the Mitt Romney of 2016?
View image | gettyimages.com Republicans have lots of time to come up with a central theme with which they can attack Hillary Clinton, and right now there are a bunch of GOP pollsters scrolling through real estate listings for the lake houses they’re going to buy with all the money they’ll make from running polls […]
Posted inPaul Waldman
Photo of the Day, Springtime Edition
View image | gettyimages.com The cherry blossoms are blooming here in Washington, which means there’s an intoxicating smell in the air and young people’s hearts turn to thoughts of love. Unfortunately, the Washington spring only lasts about a week and a half, after which we segue into the unspeakably hot and humid summer. Contrary to […]
