I tend to agree with Kevin Drum over at the Washington Monthly that the Dubai port deal is not necessarily the grave and gathering security risk its opponents decry. (The shocking political tone-deafness is another matter altogether.) But it certainly smells bad, in no small part because of the cronyism and close ties the Bush […]

On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear a case that brings together three simmering Republican scandals. The GOP's unprecedented Congressional gerrymandering, Tom Delay's ethical failings and the Department of Justice's gutting of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 will be among the story lines as the Roberts Court takes on the 2003 Texas redistricting cases. […]

Two years ago, I wrote about the "Payback Principle" as one of the hallmarks of the Bush presidency. As it turns out, declaring total war to smear, intimidate, defame and destroy political opponents is common practice within the Texas GOP. That's what Texans for Public Justice (TPJ) found out when a Tom Delay ally in […]

Things just keep going from bad to worse for Katherine Harris. The GOP's 2000 Florida recount heroine is facing almost certain defeat in her upcoming 2006 Senate race, a campaign her one-time Republican backers in DC pulled out all the stops to prevent. Now comes the news that Harris accepted $32,000 in illegal campaign contributions […]

Larry Summers may be out at Harvard, but it appears Perrspectives is in. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that my recent piece, "GM and the War on Labor," was on the required reading list for Economics 1812, a class on the U.S. labor market. The class, not surprisingly called "The U.S. Labor Market," also […]

When it comes to President Bush's illegal domestic spying program, his Republican allies over the last several days have shown that discretion is indeed the better part of valor. From the beginning, the administration's amen corner has aggressive claimed that the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) and the wartime Commander-in-Chief powers […]

On this Presidents' Day, Washington and Lincoln must be spinning in their graves. While the government enjoys a day off, the Republican scandals enveloping the capitol continue to mushroom out of control. Among the lowlights: President Bush's allies in Congress are trying to block an inquiry into the illegal NSA domestic wiretapping program. Even as […]

Rarely is a precise price tag put on bigotry. But that's just what happened this week, when a University of California commission totaled the costs associated with the Pentagon's indefensible and staggeringly counterproductive "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy regarding gays in the American military. That cost, according to the commission, is $369 million over 10 […]

In Trenton on Wednesday, the New Jersey Supreme Court heard arguments in the latest legal challenge to state prohibitions on same-sex marriage. Coming just weeks after a Baltimore Circuit Court struck down a 1973 Maryland statute barring same-sex couples from wedding, the New Jersey case reflects what may be the best strategy for pursuing equal […]

It's been a busy few days for the Avenging Angel, smiter of right-wing miscreants. First, Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele found out the hard way that you shouldn't get caught pretending to be a moderate. The African-American Senate hopeful angered Jewish voters with his comparison of stem cell research to the Holocaust. As the Baltimore […]