When you enter the alternative universe of Politico, it’s always a good idea to steel yourself against infantile false equivalencies, stunningly obvious conventional wisdom, and drearily repeated Republican talking points. That way, you’ll suffer through far fewer poorly written articles that, like watching Fox News, will make you dumber than if you’d spent your time [...]
One of the presidential candidates came out today to argue for lower corporate tax rates, increased domestic drilling for fossil fuels, and less government regulations on business, following an earlier push to get rid of whole departments of the federal government. Rick Perry? Naw, everything was pronounced correctly. Mitt Romney? Nope, too straightforward. Gingrich? Much [...]
They’re everywhere – these little men. No tendentious description of the phenomenon is required, nor is a detailed and boring historical context necessary, since they (like the poor) “have always been with us.” But the sudden “surge” of poseurs, fakers, demagogues, deadbeats, and crooks stands out right now, as our vaunted world economy teeter-totters, [...]
Well, even though Condi is still patting herself on the back for Iraq and whatnot as she runs around hawking her hilariously titled book, No Higher Honor, it turns out that she does have a teensy regret or two, and Ferragamos and Hurricane Katrina are involved, not necessarily in that order. I remember those [...]
I’ve always had a particular loathing for Andrew Sullivan, at least partly because he reminded me, with everything he said, of all the self-hating gay Republicans (and they were shockingly and disappointingly numerous) I met and summarily dumped during my peak tart years. I’ve heard each such drearily unthinking arguments countless times before from someone [...]
Now, I’m not sure who will be singing “Happy Birthday” to the President tonight, but I’m willing to bet it won’t be like this. And it isn’t just sexpots, movie stars, and what have you that don’t feel like singing; heck, it’s Wall Street, too, although I don’t think Lloyd Blankfein would look very good [...]
I guess the bright spot in President Obama’s Afghanistan speech last night is that a great deal of Kabuki was devoted to making a meaningless, marginal drawdown of troops in an endless, decade-long fiasco into some sort of dawning of the Age of Aquarius. Establishment Republicans predictably howled about the errant perfidy of “playing politics [...]
Undaunted by his embarrassing “Let’s do Lunch” column, which was so offensively dumb that it drew a rare rebuke from his NYT colleague Paul Krugman, David Brooks wrote another unintentional howler today: Very few people have the luxury of being freely obnoxious. Most people have to watch what they say for fear of offending their [...]
What seems to define modern Republicanism as we approach the 2012 elections is a firm, Randian belief that the only acceptable model for governance be that of a particularly ruthless and avaricious corporation beset by a self-interested and narcissistic CEO bent on looting it. Like their corporate sponsors, Republicans have abandoned any sense of creating [...]
In a more than usually desperate excuse for a column, even for the WaPoo, chickenhawk David Ignatius thinks he’s come up with a genius idea for resolving the simmering dispute between the oft-allied military dictatorships of Pakistan and the US over the sticky wicket of mercenary Raymond Davis, whose “diplomatic immunity” led him to think [...]