Top Dems: Obama Won't Get Health Care Bill in 2009 Catch a Clue Time: Obama on Oct. "I am absolutely confident that we are going to get health care done by the end of this year, and Nancy Pelosi is just as confident."
Ever since the left wing captured the universities and media, putative conservatives desiring media favor and intellectual respectability have been apologizing for conservatism's most popular and effective figures. These days, they want to distance themselves from the "anger" and "extremism" of such personalities as Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh.
Desperation grabs for revenue are nothing new in politics, but California is once again leading the way in creative financing. To help close yet another gaping budget deficit, now estimated to be $7 billion this year and reach as high as $20 billion next, Sacramento lawmakers have authorized a 10% increase in the amount of taxes withheld from worker paychecks starting November 1 and through 2010. The extra withholding tax will reduce Californians' take-home pay
RICHMOND, Va. — Eager to drain the 2009 elections of drama and import, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs claimed Tuesday night that President Barack Obama was “not watching returns.” You can be sure that he is studying them closely now: The off-year elections were in two big races an unmistakable rebuke of Democrats, reshuffling Obama’s political circumstances in ways likely to have severe near-term consequences for his policy agenda and larger governing strategy.
A team of Bulgarian archaeologists have discovered a new tomb of an aristocrat from Ancient Thrace near the southern town of Nova Zagora. The team led by archaeologist Veselin Ignatov found a burial tomb of 12 square meters date back to the end of 1st century and beginning of 2nd century AD. It is located outside of the village of Karanovo. The burial site of the Thracian aristocrat contains a number of interesting items including
CHRIS Christie’s gutsy win in New Jersey puts the arrogant big spender Jon Corzine in his place. But it is the election in Virginia that probably has more to say to marginal Democratic congressmen considering how to vote on health-care reform. Obviously, Christie’s victory is a body blow to Obama after Corzine outspent the Republican by five-to-one and the president put on a serious push for the incumbent. Corzine’s defeat sends a message
The elections today should send a simple message to the Obama administration and congressional Democrats: You lost the middle class, and you won’t get them back until you fundamentally change your legislative agenda. During last year’s campaign, President Barack Obama consistently stressed how his policies were going to help the middle class. He talked about his middle-class tax cut. He promised that any new spending would be paid by the rich.
Being an incumbent in a bad economy is, still, just about the worst gig in politics. With low voter turnout, the angrier side usually wins. And oh, yeah -- booting your candidate to satisfy the whims of Dick Armey, Sarah Palin and a bunch of Tea Party rowdies isn't necessarily the winning strategy it might look like at first glance. Those were the quick-and-dirty lessons Tuesday's elections --
My Wednesday Examiner column, written as the 2009 election returns were coming in, stands up pretty well. But let me add some observations written as the course of the elections became clearer. First, in the governor elections in Virginia and New Jersey, the Democratic candidate ran far behind Barack Obama’s percentages in 2008 and the Republican candidates ran ahead of George W. Bush’s percentages in 2004. The numbers are pretty daunting.
Bob McDonnell won big tonight in the Virginia gubernatorial race, as did the entire Virginia Republican party. The implications of the race will be sorted out soon enough. But one big loser is the Washington Post which may unwittingly have helped the Republican, despite their best efforts to put his opponent over the top. On the last weekend in August the Post ran the first of dozens of stories about McDonnell's 1989 masters' thesis,
Republicans aren't normally associated with the Age of Aquarius, but they may be forgiven if they are singing "Let the Sunshine In." The GOP has been flat on its back since the Obama ascendancy in last year's presidential election, but Republican Bob McDonnell's blowout victory over Democrat Creigh Deeds in the Virginia governor's race and Chris Christie's defeat of Jon Corzine in New Jersey should help dispel the party's gloom.
Warren Buffett, the second richest man in the world and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK.A), doesn't have much faith in the future of print media. In an interview on CNBC's Nov. 3 "Squawk Box," following the announcement of his purchase of Burlington Northern (NYSE:BNI), Buffett was asked to comment on the future of news media, in particular newspapers and business news by "Squawk Box" co-host Becky Quick.
All politics is local, they say, and Tuesday’s off-off-year elections certainly had their local angles. Jon Corzine has been a terrible governor even by the undemanding standards of terribly governed New Jersey. Creigh Deeds, though he looked good to Democratic Party recruiters not long ago, turned out to be an undistinguished campaigner, more driven by the concerns of Washington Post editorialists than of Virginia voters.
Well, it wasn't really a load of votes, but Kathryn Lopez is reporting that longtime national conservative activist Barbara Comstock won a very close and very important victory over a tough incumbent Democrat for a seat in the VA House of Delegates. Barbara is a true conservative, with experience on the Hill, and as communications director for the wonderful Ashcroft Justice Department,
Again. All the buzz before the voting was about Obama. Would this be a referendum on Obama’s first year? Not really. (Snip) But the GOP won big tonight because the voting was a referendum on the economy. On that top issue, voters let out a primal scream. Which will echo across Obama’s second year.
Actress Cate Blanchett, who has played Queen Elizabeth I, is performing here, portraying someone less than regal -- flurried, anxious Blanche DuBois, in Tennessee Williams's "A Streetcar Named Desire." If Obama administration officials involved in formulating Afghanistan policy see her, they should wince when she speaks DuBois's signature line: "I have always depended on the kindness of strangers."
We knew it was going to be a bad election night for the Democrats when former Obama campaign manager David Plouffe announced on NBC's "Today" program that "the results of these elections tend to be overread." Certainly that was not the prevailing opinion in Democratic circles in 2008, when giddiness over Barack Obama's election reached manic proportions. Virginia, which voted Democratic for president for the first time since 1964, was singled out
NEW YORK – Voters nervous about the economy and fed up with the political establishment dominated the off-year elections, sending a strong message to President Barack Obama, who won the White House as a change agent but has himself become the face of political power and incumbency. Independents who supported Obama broke heavily for Republicans Tuesday, helping the GOP win marquee governors' races in Virginia and New Jersey.
I enjoy a bit of adrenaline when I travel. I’ve paraglided off Andean cliffs and tracked forest elephants in wartime Liberia. So why not take a vacation in Colombia? My imagination awash with stereotypes—drug lord Pablo Escobar’s Medellín cartel assassinating politicians, Marxist FARC guerrillas kidnapping tourists—I booked my flight to Bogotá, heart pumping. But Bogotá didn’t square with my stereotypes.
GUANGZHOU, China – US President Barack Obama's half-brother Mark Ndesandjo Wednesday broke his silence to speak of their abusive father at the launch of his first novel. Ndesandjo, who has lived in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen for seven years, said he wrote "Nairobi to Shenzhen" after a string of extraordinary events -- including his brother being elected president -- made him come to terms with his past.
WASHINGTON – One year after his election, President Barack Obama is coaxing states across the country to rewrite education laws and cut deals with unions as they pursue his vision for school reform. Obama is visiting Wisconsin, where lawmakers are poised to change a law to boost their state's chances at $5 billion in education grants, the most money a president has ever had for overhauling schools. Nine other states have taken similar steps,
WASHINGTON – Get on the health overhaul bandwagon, or don't count on our help in your re-election. That's the hardball message liberal groups are hurling at moderate Democratic senators in a battle that is dividing their party. Their demands: Support a bill that offers optional government-run health coverage and oppose Republican attempts to derail the legislation.
Lessons from off-year elections tend to be overdrawn, as much a reflection of political reporters trying to justify their existence as any message that may have been sent by the electorate. But if there is one thing that Democratic candidates in next year's midterm congressional elections might want to take from the party's bad night on Tuesday, it is this: You are on your own.
CUBA has announced that it has had to defer payments to its international suppliers due to the harsh global economic and financial reality compounded by the US-unilateral embargo. (Snip) He said due to the complex circumstances arising from the global crisis compounded by the harsh US-imposed commercial, financial and economic blockade, Cuba was unable to pay its debts.
ABC’s Jordyn Phelps and Sunlen Miller report: President Obama will not travel to Germany to mark the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9. White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs said today that President Obama’s schedule will not allow for a visit to Germany. “Obviously, we have a lot to work on here and we have commitments for an upcoming Asia trip,” Gibbs said.
Havana -- The habanero peppers, oranges and peanuts cost more at Cuba's free-market "agros" -- farmers markets where vendors, not the government, set prices. But food stalls overflow with abundance not seen elsewhere on the shortage-plagued island. So when the Communist Party served notice that it plans to impose price controls at those agros -- ending one of Cuba's few capitalist experiments -- angry shoppers fearing yet more shortages turned on state inspectors
A Honduran legislative committee voted not to convene a special session of Congress to consider returning the country's ousted leader, in a move likely to dash chances of Manuel Zelaya's returning to power even temporarily under a deal brokered last week by the U.S. On Tuesday, a committee of 13 legislators voted to not convene the special session, opting instead to wait until Congress receives nonbinding legal opinions
