View image | gettyimages.com It’s the season for pandering to the base, which is as good a time as any to ask whether the glorious, fascinating mess that is today’s Republican Party can ever unify enough to win back the White House-or whether unity is something they should even be after. Because it may well […]
Blog: Paul Waldman
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Photo of the Day, Departure Edition
View image | gettyimages.com Attorney General Eric Holder says goodbye to Justice Department employees on his last day on the job. Tonight on Fox: What crimes has Attorney General Loretta Lynch already committed, and what is she covering up?
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Ted Cruz Is So Done With the Senate
View image | gettyimages.com Ted Cruz was the only senator to miss the vote on Loretta Lynch’s confirmation as attorney general, despite his vociferous objections to her nomination, because he was on his way to a fundraiser-a circumstance that generated some predictable mockery. Yet as Philip Bump tells us, Cruz has actually missed lots of […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
How the Media Rig the Presidential Primaries
View image | gettyimages.com The primary game, I’m afraid, is rigged. In a perfect world, all contenders would start from the same point, equally able to assemble a compelling candidacy and make their case to the voters. In this world, however, the reporters who cover the race have already decided that only a few candidates […]
Posted inPaul Waldman
Photo of the Day, Wrath of Nature Edition
View image | gettyimages.com View from Puerto Varas, southern Chile, of a high column of ash and lava spewing from the Calbuco volcano, on April 22, 2015. Chile’s Calbuco volcano erupted on Wednesday, spewing a giant funnel of ash high into the sky near the southern port city of Puerto Montt and triggering a red […]
Posted inAmerica and the World
The Trouble With Drone Strikes
Today, President Obama revealed that a drone strike in Pakistan killed two aid workers who were being held by al Qaeda, one an American named Warren Weinstein, and the other an Italian named Giovanni Lo Porto. This is obviously generating news because there was an American killed, while the accidental deaths of innocent civilians don’t […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Don’t Get Bored With the 2016 Campaign Yet
Yesterday, The New Yorker‘s George Packer pronounced himself bored with the 2016 campaign in particular and American politics in general, and though I think he’s wrong, I understand where he’s coming from. But if those of us who have devoted our lives to politics can’t find enough about it to sustain our interest, what hope […]
Posted inPaul Waldman
Photo of the Day, Choo-Choo Edition
View image | gettyimages.com This is a Central Japan Railway maglev train returning to the station after setting a new speed record of 603 kilometers per hour, or 374 mph. And you pay extra to get on a pokey Acela just to get to New York 15 minutes faster.
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Sincerity Is Overrated
View image | gettyimages.com We spend an awful lot of time in campaigns talking about a set of personal qualities candidates may or may not possess that revolve around honesty. Is the candidate truthful, honest, sincere, candid, authentic? The New York Times asked yesterday whether Hillary Clinton’s focus on inequality was sincere: “the former secretary […]
Posted inMoney, Politics, and Power
Only Connect, Says Rick Perry, Only Connect
It’s a little strange that Rick Perry has gotten so little attention so far in the presidential race. OK, so his 2012 run was kind of a disaster, but the guy was the governor of the country’s second-biggest state for 14 years, and he’s as conservative as they come. Why should he get less notice […]
