Terence Samuel

A few months ago, before things got really ugly in the New Jersey gubernatorial race, Jon Corzine told me he thought this week’s election results in Virginia would be more telling about the national mood than those in his own race in New Jersey. “I think if Tim Kaine wins, that would really spell trouble […]

All week Senate Republicans have been using the word “stunt” to describe the closed-door meeting on prewar intelligence that Democrats forced on them earlier this week. An apoplectic Bill Frist came before the microphones to declare, “This is a pure stunt that is being performed by Senator [Harry] Reid, Senator [Dick] Durbin, and their leadership.” […]

Jack Abramoff, Tom DeLay, and Michael Brown. Karl Rove, Scooter Libby, and Bill Frist. And now Harriet Miers. Iraq, Social Security, high gas prices, Katrina, Wilma, and Iraq again. And Harriet Miers. Miers is not under indictment or investigation. In fact, there is every reason to believe that up to this point she has served […]

Virginia has been on my mind lately. Let’s begin with the conclusion: Virginians are a politically ornery group of people likely to do an occasionally amazing thing politically, and we are about to find out how pissed off they are at George W. Bush. But before we get to that, though, the ugly events in […]

Oh, how the winds have shifted and how ill they blow for the majority. Tom DeLay is under indictment, Bill Frist is under subpoena, Harriet Miers is under attack, and George W. Bush is under 40. “President George W. Bush’s job approval rating has fallen to a new low of 39 percent in an NBC […]

Anyone who thinks that Bill Frist’s presidential prospects have been extinguished by a few questions about a rancid-looking little stock sale that may or may not be insider trading is either blissfully naive or a confirmed amnesiac. Bill Clinton, remember, got to be president even with the Gennifer Flowers tape hanging around his neck, and […]

Now that he’s patched up his silent feud with the Democratic governor of Louisiana, George W. Bush is spending so much time in the Pelican State it looks like he’s running against her. It’s all part of his effort to convince Americans that he does know a disaster when he sees one. But with his […]

Well, go on, admit it: It’s hard not to like John Roberts. What’s not to like about a smart, surprisingly witty, appropriately modest guy who brings his “A” game to the party? Despite the weird dynamic that developed in the first days of the confirmation hearings in which Republicans practically begged Roberts not to answer […]

A few years ago, sitting in the hot embrace of a New Orleans afternoon, drink in hand, I was suddenly struck by the city’s singular appeal to the senses, to the spirit; its exuberant response to human appetites — the food, the music, the architecture, the voodoo, the people living in the moment. In that […]

There are dead bodies floating in the streets of New Orleans. No one knows how many, or how long it will be before they are all recovered. The mayor of New Orleans says that hundreds are dead for sure, but that the body count will likely run into the thousands. The images of the devastation […]