Thomas Schaller

So last night was New Year’s Eve, and a group of 25 or so media types from So last night was New Year’s Eve, and a group of 25 or so media types from Time, Bloomberg and McClatchy (and, later on, our own TAPPED alumn, Garance Franke-Ruta) were out at 801 Grand, a chop house […]

Mike Huckabee’s campaign today took a turn from the unconventional to the bizarre. At a noon press conference at the downtown Des Moines Marriott, Mike Huckabee rolled out his new “Enough is Enough” television response ad by announcing that he was not running the ad and had told stations to pull it. Huckabee said the […]

The conventional wisdom of electoral campaigns is that one can only peak too early. I think The conventional wisdom of electoral campaigns is that one can only peak too early. I think Mike Huckabee’s Iowa experience disproves this. Given this year’s absurdly early, January 3 Iowa caucus date, the Huck-a-whirl peaked at what seemed like […]

Schaller here: I’ll be covering the Republicans from Iowa this week for the Prospect, with Dana on the Democratic beat. Not to tread on her turf, but from my hotel room here in Des Moines I couldn’t help notice that Hillary Clinton, a few moments ago in a speech she gave in Maquoketa, was touting […]

My lord, was Joe Biden ever so right about Rudy Giuliani’s “subject, verb, 9/11” crutch. Here’s Da Mayor on the Benazir Bhutto assassination: “The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is a tragic event for Pakistan and for democracy in Pakistan. Her murderers must be brought to justice and Pakistan must continue the path back to democracy […]

I recently spoke with a political friend — somebody close enough to I recently spoke with a political friend — somebody close enough to Mike Bloomberg’s team to know — who suggested that Hizzoner would be most likely to jump into the presidential contest if the Democrats nominate Hillary Clinton and the Republicans tap Mike […]