National Democrats
The Obama Poll Bump
Dick Morris was quick to dismiss the AP poll showing President Obama’s approval rating at 60 percent. The sample was “too Democratic,” he said. Indeed. Well, if Dick’s squawking, Republicans must be squirming. Especially given the pitiful weakness of their presidential field so far. Now, I’ve cautioned Democrats about a post-bin Laden “bump”…
Read MoreA Quirk of History
I’m fascinated by odd coincidences in history – like John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both dying on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after the Declaration of Independence. What are the odds? What are the odds that a terrorist named Osama would be killed in a military operation ordered by a President named…
Read MoreJohn of Arabia
First we got into another ‘short war’ (over in Libya) then the war turned into a logjam then one morning I opened the newspaper and there was John McCain traipsing around Benghazi saying we ought to dive in deeper to break the logjam and next the Obama administration was sending the ‘rebels’ $25 million. …
Read MoreNot Set in Stone…
Last election President Obama’s Job Approval Rating defined how people voted – if you thought Obama was doing just fine (or sort of fine) you voted Democratic, if you didn’t think he was doing so fine you voted Republican (unless you were an independent or Democrat who’d voted for Obama in 2008 – then, most…
Read MoreThe Obama Bump
A caution for giddy Democrats who think the killing of bin Laden will reelect President Obama: This too shall pass. Remember President George Herbert Walker Bush. Eighteen months before the 1992 reelection, right after the four-day Iraq war, his approval ratings were at an astronomical level, near 90 percent. A friend reminded…
Read MoreLafayette Park
Osama’s dead and let’s hope Al Qaeda passes with him (or at least falls apart without him) but there’s one bit of grit in the gears that says maybe we paid a price for his villainy we hadn’t reckoned on. It’s the celebrating. The way we – especially our young people – seem…
Read MoreMorning in Young America
The media and political elites’ reaction to Osama’s killing was predictable. Not so that of Real America. Especially Young America. Democrats – understandably – were all but gloating that it was President Obama, the supposed Muslim Manchurian Candidate, who “got” bin Laden. MSNBC endlessly reminded us that President Bush had minimized the importance of…
Read MoreMission Accomplished
It’s been a bad week for the Obama-haters. First it turns out he was born in America. Then he orders the raid that kills Osama. Curses, foiled again! Now, how long will it take Donald Trump & Co. to question whether that really was bin Laden’s corpse? I was struck by…
Read MoreThe Binary Budget Choice
Every now and then you read a sentence that hits you like a hammer. So it was the other day when I thumbed through the April 17 Newsweek, which I hadn’t picked up in many moons. I chanced upon an essay by Niall Ferguson, “Doing the Right Thing: America finally comes to its senses…
Read MoreBirthers and Shariah Law
The N&O front page today showed how Republicans are frittering away their once-in-a-blue-moon political advantage. The more they talk about Obama’s birth certificate and the threat of Shariah law in America, the less they can take advantage of his real vulnerability, which was captured in an inside-page story: Americans are losing confidence in his…
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