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Political Commentary

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June 12, 2009

Back to the Future for Obama By Alan I. Abramowitz

Barack Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election represented one of the most dramatic shifts in political power in American history. In terms of both style and substance, the contrast between Obama and George W. Bush is perhaps as great as that between any incoming and outgoing presidents in the modern era. Yet the historic nature of this election should not blind us to the high degree of consistency between the results of the 2008 election and previous elections. New evidence on the results of the 2008 presidential election at the congressional district level reinforces this point.

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June 11, 2009

Inflation Looms: O's Deficit Dilemma By Dick Morris

It's increasingly looking like President Obama may be sunk by his own deficit.

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June 11, 2009

Obama's Centers of Excellence By Debra J. Saunders

Last week, White House chief economist Christina Romer told reporters that there are "billion-dollar bills lying on the sidewalk" in America's health care system -- apparently there for the taking if only Washington would show the will to pick them up.

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June 11, 2009

Qualms and Questions About Obama's Health Plan By Michael Barone

Barack Obama has said he wants to pass a national health care bill this year, with a government insurance policy option. Democratic congressional leaders have called for passage of such a bill before the beginning of the August congressional recess.

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June 11, 2009

Why So Scared of a Public Plan? By Joe Conason

Within the coming weeks, Americans will begin to consider critical issues concerning the future of health care for themselves and their children, including universal coverage, taxation of benefits, computerized records and the controlling of costs. But before the debate commences in Congress and the media, big insurance and pharmaceutical companies are lobbying frantically (and spending millions of dollars) to foreclose the possibility of the most promising aspect of health care reform: a public insurance option.

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June 10, 2009

Obama's Vulnerability By Dick Morris

At last there is convincing evidence that Obama’s poll numbers may be descending to earth. While his approval remains high – and his personal favorability is even higher – the underlying numbers suggest that a decline may be in the offing.

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June 10, 2009

Europe Asks, Does Tomorrow Belong to Us? By Tony Blankley

Last weekend's European Parliament and British local county council elections were not only a victory for the center-right over the center-left but also, more significantly, an indication of the growing rejection of the past 60 years of denationalized and consolidating European history.

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June 9, 2009

A Texas-Size Medical Lesson By Froma Harrop

McAllen, Texas, spends more per person on health care than any other metropolitan area in America, except for Miami. Why would this poor border town spend $15,000 a year per Medicare enrollee?

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June 8, 2009

Obama Needs to Brush up on Middle East History By Michael Barone

For a man of his impressive educational credentials, Barack Obama has sometimes shown a surprising ignorance of history.

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June 7, 2009

S .F. Students Earn Their Stripes By Debra J. Saunders

When the San Francisco school board voted last month to restore the Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps program, it seemed that sanity had prevailed -- three years after the board voted to kill the popular program. Finally, the board had put students' welfare ahead of its ruthless political correctness.

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June 7, 2009

Imperfect Moments by Susan Estrich

I have hated graduations for most of my life. High school was my best, and it wasn't great: I lost out as valedictorian by one-tenth of a point, and the guys who finished third and fourth behind me both got into Harvard and I didn't. I was heading off to my last choice college, the one that had given me the big scholarship. Still, I was healthy, and my parents were both alive and there. I didn't know yet that right there, that was enough, more than I would ever have again.

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June 6, 2009

Recall the Stimulus by Lawrence Kudlow

Testifying before the House Budget Committee this week, Ben Bernanke said that when the time comes, the Fed will raise interest rates in order to stop inflation from building in the next recovery. He also asked for "fiscal balance" to sustain financial stability. On the surface -- in terms of keeping prices stable and restoring value to the softening U.S. dollar -- this is positive. Surely Bernanke wants to do right for America, and he's giving it his best shot.

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June 5, 2009

Supremely Representative: Should the Nation's Highest Court Look Like America? By Barbara A. Perry

The U.S. Constitution is utterly silent on qualifications for members of the federal judiciary. Theoretically, a justice does not even have to be a lawyer, but, in practice, all 110 justices in the Supreme Court's 220-year history have been attorneys. With no constitutionally mandated selection criteria, presidents have been free to determine the standards by which they choose nominees. Professor Henry Abraham, the nation's leading Supreme Court expert, has identified four primary selection criteria that presidents have used in the appointment process: 1) merit, 2) ideology, 3) friendship, and 4) representation.

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June 5, 2009

Why Do We Talk About Judges This Way? By Dahlia Lithwick

Nobody in America believes the judicial confirmation system works. Not the senators who eat up precious questioning time with windy speeches about pet projects back home; not the interest groups who scour every sordid instant of a nominee's background for evidence that they are unfit for the bench; and not the American public, whose experiences of constitutional interpretation and judicial philosophy are reduced in a few days on C-SPAN to bumper-sticker claims and counter claims.

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June 5, 2009

Advancing Civil Rights By Overturning Old Laws By Michael Barone

Two cases likely to be decided this month by the Supreme Court -- one of them an appeal in a Connecticut case decided by a panel including Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor -- could result in significant changes in our civil rights laws.

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June 4, 2009

Headcount Follies By Debra J. Saunders

If you see the federal government as a benign force that seeks only to make your life better, then the questions in the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey may not bother you. But if you have a smidgen of doubt, or if you value your privacy, you probably aren't going to like some of Uncle Sam's invasive queries.

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June 4, 2009

Domestic Terrorism by Any Standard By Joe Conason

If right-wing broadcasters don't want to be blamed when someone murders a person they have demonized repeatedly -- as in the case of George Tiller, the doctor shot dead in his Wichita, Kan., church last Sunday by an anti-abortion zealot -- then they ought to moderate their rhetoric. No doubt they will choose their words more carefully for a while, and they will whine piteously about anyone who calls attention to their screaming extremism.

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June 4, 2009

Motown Wonders: Where Did Our Love Go? By Froma Harrop

The alternative to a government rescue of General Motors is the collapse of the industrial Midwest. Nonetheless, there's been a surprisingly large amount of dumping on the Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan. The government-sponsored deal seems to have stirred up resentments for every ideology.

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June 3, 2009

What's Keeping Obama Up? By Dick Morris

The Rasmussen poll conducted over the weekend of May 30-31 asked a key question designed to give us perspective on Obama's current popularity.

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June 3, 2009

It's Not About Ideology By Susan Estrich

"What I have no interest in doing is running GM," President Barack Obama said on Monday, as he assumed ownership of the beacon of free enterprise.

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