Class Warfare: Framing the Debate

Hilzoy is tired of hearing about "socialism" and "class warfare" just because Barack Obama is raising the top marginal tax rate from 35 percent to 39.6 percent.  After all, we had much higher rates under John Kennedy and even Ronald Reagan, two legendary tax cutters.  And rates are higher in most of the developed world, too! There's much truth in that.  ...

Republican Party’s Future

My Palin Derangement Syndrome post got a number of thoughtful responses, especially for a weekend post. My fellow Jacksonville State alumnus Stacy McCain, a Palin fan, thinks the internal debate on her role in last week's defeat and her future as a Republican Party standard bearer is one we should have.  He objects strenuously, though, to the tone of some of ...

Obama Beats Clinton: Biggest Upset Ever?

Chris Cillizza compares Barack Obama's apparent victory over Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination to various "upsets" in sports and pop culture history and wonders if this is the biggest upset in American political history. He cites Harry Truman's win over Thomas Dewey in 1948, Jimmy Carter's come-from-nowhere win in 1976, and then-upstart Bill Clinton's capturing of the Democratic ...

Two Blogs that Pass in the Night

Yesterday's exchange with Thers over the state of conservatism reflects a major defect in the blogging medium. For the most part, we write blogs in serial fashion, as a conversation with our readers, and presume that recent posts on the same subject have been read. Most blog readers, on the other hand, parachute into posts based on links ...

Going to War with the Ideology You Have

Kevin Drum, responding to Jonah Goldberg's argument that George Packer's "The Fall of Conservatism" erroneously conflates conservatism with the Republican Party, retorts: No political ideology lives in isolation. We judge communism by how Mao and Stalin implemented it, we judge 60s-era liberalism by how LBJ and the Democratic Party implemented it, and we judge social democracy by how Western Europe has ...

Netflix Republicans?

David All argues that most of the talk about Rebuilding the Republican Brand is too focused on the past. Instead, the party should take its cues from Internet success stories like Netflix and iTunes. Gone are the days of Newt Gingrich's Contract for America, a plan which every Republican got behind and backed. A unified agenda back in 1994 ...

Rebuilding the Republican Brand

It's not exactly news that the Republican Party is in the doldrums at the moment. It lost control of both Houses of Congress in the 2006 elections, its president is at historic lows in the polls, it has lost a string of special elections and its incumbent Congressmen are retiring in droves, and the odds are better than even ...

Clear Card Holders Jump Airport Security Lines

Today's WaPo has a short feature on Clear Cards, whereby travelers get to bypass TSA security lines at select airports for a small fee. Fast-pass security lanes officially opened at Reagan National and Dulles airports Wednesday for travelers with special clearance. Heres how it works: Fliers undergo a Transportation Security Administration background check and have personal data, plus iris and fingerprint ...

Who Destroyed the Republican Party?

Billy Hollis joins Rush Limbaugh, Peggy Noonan, and other conservative commenters in trying to figure out who is responsible for destroying the Republican Party and which of the potential nominees would destroy it even more. He thinks that nominating Mike Huckabee would likely lead to "a loss of Goldwater-McGovern proportions." I'm inclined to agree, especially if Barack ...

Fred Thompson Loss Ends Republican Party

Steve Bainbridge is preparing to sit out the 2008 election rather than vote for anyone but Fred Thompson. If the choice is between choosing the lesser of 4 evils and teeing up a process by which the GOP reinvents itself for the 21st Century, I’m inclined to opt for the latter. Coupled with losing Congress in 2006, losing the presidency ...

Andrew Olmsted Killed in Iraq

Major Andrew Olmsted, a longtime blogger and Army Reservist, was killed in action yesterday when his unit was ambushed. His Obsidian Wings colleague Hilzoy had the sad honor of posting his final blog missive. Her lead-in: Andrew Olmsted, who also posted here as G'Kar, was killed yesterday in Iraq. Andy gave me a post to publish in the event of his ...

Best of OTB - May 27, 2003

RUMMY’S PLAN FOR IRAQ praises an op-ed by the former SECDEF outlining the way ahead in Iraq. Obviously, the plan didn't work. Interestingly, though, reading it reminds me that, contrary to current wisdom, Rumsfeld not only didn't promise fast results but he fully understood the basic principles of counter-insurgency. The principles outlined here come right out of ...

Best of OTB - May 23, 2003

As part of a continuing series, I'll be publishing excerpts and re-posts of material buried deep in the OTB archives. Some will be profound and some silly; some will demonstrate keen insights and others painful errors. Shockingly, we are now back to ORANGE. Question: Am I going to change how I conduct my life one scintilla of an iota? ...

Best of OTB - May 22, 2003

Two posts stand out from my stroll down memory lane of four years ago (a rather light posting day): "MUSICAL HANGING CHADS?" examines a scandal in the voting in the "American Idol" final, in which Ruben Studdard beat Clay Aiken by a slim margin. In "HANDICAPPING 2004," I rebut the extant conventional wisdom that President Bush was a "shoe-in" for re-election because ...

Best of OTB - May 21, 2003

As part of a continuing series, I'll be highlighting material buried deep in the OTB archives that I still find interesting. From four years ago, today: "RENO" joined in on the debate, "Was Janet Reno the worst AG we have ever had, or what?” Not much substance to it but it somehow strikes me as amusing these days. "PROBLEM? ...