As others have asked, how, exactly, do these emails shed new light on the situation? They merely confirm everything. The only reason there's technically no quid-pro-quo here is that Payne is not a government employee, so he can't personally deliver. What he did was suggest that the Bushies -- including Cheney and Rice -- would be willing to do a quid-pro-quo: a hefty contribution to the library would show they're "serious," and with that would come enthusiasm from government officials to restore good relations with this idiot pol. That is precisely a quid-pro-quo.

Posted at July 15, 2008 3:36 PM in response to Homeland Security Advisor Provides Emails To Back Up Claims That He Was Conned

Another thing: one of the things that was really stoking bitterness in Hillary's supporters was the sense that the coverage wasn't just biased, but sexist. Of course, there's nothing to suggest that coverage of Hillary's cackle and tears were was any more sex-based than the coverage of Al Gore's boring demeanor and overdramatic 1996 convention speech. I realize you didn't mention sex here, but it's an unspoken subtext to this whole debate. And it's a big part of what's making a some women reluctant to support Obama.

Right now, Barack Obama is in the fight of his life, and ours. Let's focus on drawing attention to the unfair coverage he's gotten. Let's not stoke more bitterness within the party.

Oh, and Greg: don't flatter yourself about being Olbermann's "worst person in the world" over this.

Posted at June 16, 2008 3:33 PM in response to Was The Media Unfair To Hillary? Here's Our Rundown.

Greg, the plural of "anecdote" is not "data." It's good that you acknowledge that you have identified no overarching trend -- just a series of examples -- but the fact that you acknowledge it doesn't make it OK. The question is whether Hillary got a raw deal, and that is an entirely RELATIVE question. So fine; you acknowledge that you have no idea whether other candidates got it worse. But that's just another way of saying this post is meaningless.

Posted at June 16, 2008 3:28 PM in response to Was The Media Unfair To Hillary? Here's Our Rundown.

I've been saying Webb for a while, but not just for the reasons of "balancing" that everyone else mentions. The most important thing is the VP has to AMPLIFY the presidential candidate's message; mititgating disadvantages is secondary. And Webb amplifies Obama's main messages:

1) Change (he hasn't been in the Senate long and he was a maverick in the Reagan admin),

2) Bringing country together (he's a former Republican), and

3) Anti-war (obvious).

In addition, as others mention, he mitigates Obama's disadvantages among blue-collar whites, has national security cred, and could win us VA. Not bad.

Posted at May 20, 2008 4:12 PM in response to Jim Webb's Veep Tour Comes To Manhattan

Dr. Loury -- I have tons of respect for you, and have been reading your work for the last eight years or so. But there is a fundamental problem in the assumptions of this post, and it's crystallized here:

'Throughout this campaign [Obama] has avoided the responsibility -- and he did it again in his ‘race’ speech -- of saying directly and explicitly what (beyond "the old ways of Washington politics") are the nature and dimensions of the failure, and how will what has gone so horribly wrong ever be remedied. Instead, he simply calls for "change."'

That is false. In the speech he laid out several ways in which former discrimination still impacts black Americans today, and -- crucially -- how those problems can be overcome. The entire end of the speech lays out how the federal government's priorities should change in order to remedy many of the socio-economic that Americans of all races face. I'm getting pretty tired of hearing people say that Obama's call for change has no substance behind it; he has a litany of policy prescriptions and he talks about them all the time.

Now, the question of whether these prescriptions are any different from standard Democratic boilerplate is another matter. For the most part, they're not. On policies, he's a run-of-the-mill liberal Democrat. The issue is whether his style will do a superior job of moving the country toward actually effecting these changes. That's a fine debate, and frankly I'm not sure of the answer. But to say he calls "simply" for change is, frankly, disingenuous.

Posted at March 31, 2008 4:38 PM in response to Losing the Narrative

OK, I get it now. Here's your internal logic: (a) I, Ellen, don't believe in God, (b) I like
Martin Luther King Jr., (c) therefore, there's no proof MLK believed in God or was a Christian. Whether he was a practicing minister in Christianity is besides the point. You're both pathetic and comical.

Posted at March 19, 2008 12:39 PM in response to Obama and His Church

Ellen -- why is it incumbent on others to prove MLK was a Christian, when he himself claimed to be? What's your evidence that he's lying? The guy was an ordained Baptist minister who preached Sunday sermons and discussed Jesus all the time, as in his letter from Birmingham jail and in his final speech, as just two examples. You seem to know next to nothing about one of the most prominent figures in American history.

Posted at March 19, 2008 12:35 PM in response to Obama and His Church

I'm from Chicago. I went to a fundraiser of his in May, 2003. He said the exact same stuff. It's not like he started singing a different tune a few months later. So he WAS saying those things "in the midst" of the U.S. Senate campaign, even if that exact speech came a few months before it -- while, of course, he was trying to consolidate support for his run. In any event, he made his anti-war stance a major plank in his campaign, so who cares whether he also opposed it before he announced?

Also, Barack was the ONLY major candidate for U.S. Senate that year in Illinois to strongly oppose the war. And there were a bunch of candidates -- Blair Hull, Gery Chico, Dan Hynes, and others. Everyone else gave the Hillary line.

Whether that took political courage or not is another story; if I were his advisor at the time, I would have said, "No one is seizing this mantle; you should." But that doesn't mean he somehow didn't.

Posted at March 1, 2008 7:50 PM in response to Why Can't Obama Get His Facts Right on Iraq?

I think we're confusing terms, here. An endorsement is an official announcement of support for a candidate over others. You can't endorse both Hillary and Edwards.

Moreover, I never said that Krugman is the reason Hillary came out with a health care plan. Indeed, I've never heard anyone make that claim. So I'm not sure whose argument you're finding laughable.

Posted at January 5, 2008 9:31 PM in response to From Concord, NH: Obama's Music

You're both wrong. New York Times columnists aren't allowed to endorse anyone; Krugman has endorsed neither Hillary nor Edwards.

At the beginning, he was writing favorable things about Edwards because Edwards was the only major candidate with a decent health care plan. He warmed to Hillary after she came out with a comparable plan.

He has said in the past that he liked Bill Clinton's policies but not his triangulating politics -- which is consistent with his recent criticism of Barack Obama for thinking that reconciliation with the right-wing is possible.

In other words, there's nuance here. Don't go around making claims based on nothing.

Posted at January 4, 2008 3:58 PM in response to From Concord, NH: Obama's Music