Ignatius on what the admonsteration needs to do in the wake of the Hamdan decision to ensure a "broad legal foundation" for counter-terrorism programs:The Bush administration's press-bashing campaign may be good election-year politics, but it is adding a poisonous new element to the national security debate at the very time the administration ought ( Read more... )

Another op-ed about Hastert and the earmarked highway deal that netted him millions:"I owned land and I sold it, like millions of people do every day," Mr. Hastert said. But millions of people aren't the speaker; they don't help control millions in federal funding.
Even if I did believe Hastert's cover story -- the price for the land deal was set ( Read more... )

But this WaPo piece on why Dems probably aren't going to pull DeLay-style mid-decade redistricting shenanigans doesn't make it sound that way. In no particular order, it sounds like Dems aren't going to do it because either they don't have sufficient control in most states, or it would look bad politically ( Read more... )

The GOP, once again demonstrating their profound lack of commitment to one of their central principles.

Op-ed on how the federal government -- run by the party of states' rights, remember -- is screwing states' efforts to ensure health and safetyOf course, none of this is a surprise. Whenever a fundamental conservative principle comes into ( Read more... )

The Student Tax Hike
On July 1, interest rates on student loans experienced the greatest jump in history, with the variable rate on common Stafford loans shooting up almost two percent for students and graduates. The rate hike comes as a result of the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, which was signed into law by President Bush on Feb. 8, 2006 as ( Read more... )

A history professor on spinning the Founding Fathers into folk heroes.

(Because let's face it: the Founders were a bunch of lawyers and politicians. Who would listen to them today?)

Lieberman is gtting a lot of press today. (I hadn't planned on voicing, or even linking, anything, mainly because Joe pisses me off, and I'm working really hard at staying calm today.)

WaPo: Joe plans to run as an independent if Lamont beats him out of the primary.

NYT: Joe makes it hard for Democrats to make Iraq Dubya's problemOK, it's no ( Read more... )

Right wingnuts: NYT would have turned in Anne Frank.

I'm fucking speechless.

Scholars from the New America Foundation this morning: Tax inheritance, not death:A far better approach would be to tax people equivalently on all the income they receive, whether it be from earned or inherited income, by replacing the estate tax with an income tax on inheritances. Under such a tax, inheritances would be treated the same as other ( Read more... )

Richard Cohen on judicial audacity, specifically that which Scalia, Thomas, and Alito accused the majority in Hamdan of having in second-guessing the Current Occupant. But Cohen goes much further than that:If ever there was a president who begged to be second-guessed, it is the one we unaccountably now have. History will record him as the ( Read more... )