On Thursday, the Commerce Department announced that the U.S. economy expanded at a surprisingly strong 3.5% rate. But despite Q3 GDP growth which exceeded consensus estimates, the outsized impact of one-time programs including the Cash for Clunkers incentives and the tax credit for first-time home buyers suggests the pace of economic expansion will slow in […]

Seemingly with each passing day, General Stanley McChrystal grows in the esteem of President Obama's conservative foes. After having savaged General Eric Shinseki for his pre-Iraq war testimony that the occupation would require "several hundreds of thousands" of American troops, Republicans have seized on McChrystal's public demands for more forces in Afghanistan as their latest […]

Among the rarely acknowledged truths of American politics is that the U.S. economy in general and the stock market in particular almost always do better under Democratic presidents. Of course, that oversight is no accident, but instead the predictable result of successful mythmaking by the Party of Hoover and its media allies. And so it […]

That Barack Obama has changed the trajectory of American foreign policy and U.S. global standing is hard to dispute. In just one year, as the recent survey by the Pew Research Center revealed, Obama has dramatically reversed world opinion of the U.S. from the dismal lows of the Bush administration. But for President Obama to […]

To be sure, the growing tensions - and stakes - over the Iranian nuclear program are different in kind and degree from the brinksmanship of the Cuban Missile Crisis 47 years ago. But events of the past week have stirred the echoes of that confrontation with the Soviet Union. In each case, an international gathering […]

Among the most discussed if least enlightening polls in recent months is the PPP survey revealing that Republican "birthers" far outnumber Democratic "truthers." That is, there are many more delusional right-wingers who doubt President Obama was born in the United States than confused left-wingers who believe President Bush allowed the 9/11 attacks to happen. But […]

One day after the Washington Post's Bob Woodward published the confidential McChrystal report on Afghanistan, the Politico asked, "Who leaked and why?" But while the article speculates on the identity and motivation of the leaker, one issue - the punishment of Woodward's source for revealing national security documents -remains off the table. Which is a […]

With his seriously compromised and deeply flawed legislation, Senator Max Baucus has achieved rare bipartisan consensus on health care: virtually everyone from both parties hates his bill. But with his feeble acknowledgement that despite all of his kowtowing to his GOP colleagues on the Senate Finance Committee "no Republican has offered his or her support […]

As President Obama's make-or-break health care speech to Congress approaches, the focus of media tea leaf readers is on what specifically he will say. Will the President overcome his marketing failures to date and commit his political capital to a reform plan? Will he draw a line in the sand on the public option, viewed […]

On Monday, the AP portrayed President Obama's struggle to pass health care reform as the second coming of George W. Bush's unpopular and ultimately disastrous attempt to privatize Social Security. But while man each left the bill crafting to Congress and faced a growing backlash from frightened American seniors, the parallels end there. Democratic health […]