Blog: TAPPED

LIKE CATS AND DOGS. I’m all sorts of with Tom on this one. Pet perfection, thy name is canine. And having met Tom’s dog before, I can attest to the inevitability of such feeling within him. But are we atypical, or evidence of a larger liberal affection for pups? Well, the fine folks at Neuroscience […]

I UNDERSTAND THAT TRYING TO INFER LOGIC FROM INSTAPUNDITRY IS FUTILE, BUT… Glenn Reynolds asserts that Iran has been at war with the United States “since 1979.” My question: when does he start calling for Michael Ledeen to be put on trial for high treason for helping to sell arms to a country the U.S. […]

DIXIE-CATS. Hmmm. Cat ownership is highest in the Republican South. Tom Schaller is a dog person. Tom Schaller wants Democrats to try to win without the South. Coincidence? –Garance Franke-Ruta

WORKING MOMS OR CONGRESSWOMEN? ALWAYS BOTH. The NYT features a profile today of freshman Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand. The article points out the balance of campaigning while in office and the struggles of Democrats to differentiate themselves from their Republican counterparts on Iraq, but the article also notes that Gillibrand is a wife and mother of […]

FUNNY IF YOU KNOW FARSI? A friend forwarded me this YouTube video forwarded to him by a professional contact in the Iranian government, Atom Ahmadinejad, which is apparently making the rounds in Iran, and which mocks the president’s nuclear aspirations to the tune of an Iranian children’s song. No word on who made the video, […]

BLACK VELVET. I know this may generate a storm of “cat-hater” invective directed at me, but frankly, I don�t care: My name is Tom Schaller, and I�m a Dog Person. My wife and I have a gorgeous, 90-pound black lab named Max. He was rescued by the Silver Spring�s (MD) Lab Rescue after being found […]

WASHINGTON: THE FIRST DECIDER. I find George W. Bush’s tendency to butcher presidential history one of his most irritating traits. Praising George Washington’s unbreakable will, ability to stand up to multiple challenges, and belief that freedoms ought not to be enjoyed by American’s alone, President Bush stopped just short of asserting that President Washington would […]

MIDDLE CLASS, OR SWING VOTERS? To much fanfare, including a glowing column from David Brooks, the new report from the “strategy center for progressives” known as Third Way has arrived: The New Rules Economy: A Policy Framework for the 21st Century.” expands the argument that Third Way has made elsewhere, which is mostly that the […]

PARTY LIKE IT’S 1983. In response to U.S. plans to base anti-ballistic missile interceptors in Poland and the Czech Republic, a Russian general yesterday hinted that Russia might withdraw from the Intermediate Range Nuclear Force Treaty, and even start building SS-20s again. General Solovtsov also said that Poland and the Czech Republic will find themselves […]