The Role of Race: It Was Important
The exit polls suggest that race was a factor in a lot of voters' decisions -- and that, on balance, it worked to Barack Obama's advantage. In Ohio, for example, six percent of voters said that race...
View ArticleMore on the Role of Race
The race factor numbers are more striking in the Virginia exit polls. Six percent said race was the most important factor in their decision, and they went for Obama, 60 to 38. Twelve percent said...
View ArticleWhat Sank McCain
In January, a few days before the South Carolina Democratic primary, I went to a Barack Obama rally in Columbia with a Republican friend who had never before seen Obama in action. This friend’s...
View Article"A Sometimes Inappropriate Personal Sense of Victory"
The Washington Post's Tom Shales is not exactly the voice of the Media Research Center. Yet this is from his critique of election coverage:Network anchors and reporters vied for airtime in which to...
View ArticleHistoric Turnout?
How many times did you hear that voters believed this was the most important presidential election of their lifetime, and therefore that turnout would be through the roof? Voters waiting in line for...
View ArticleMcCain, the Base, and Turnout
On those vote totals again. At the moment, Obama has 62.4 million votes, while McCain has 55.4 million. In 2004, Bush won 62 million votes, and Kerry 59 million.So if there wasn't this vaunted...
View ArticleBlack Voters Save Proposition 8
In California, it looks like Prop 8 has a good chance of passing. With 92 percent of precincts reporting, the gay marriage ban is winning 52 percent to 48 percent. And if it does pass, it will be...
View ArticleLosers
There are a lot of things you can do when you finish a losing campaign. You can sleep for 30 hours straight. You can get drunk. Your can reflect on what went wrong and why your side lost. Or you...
View ArticleNow She Tells Us
From the Washington Post ombudsman, Deborah Howell, in an article headlined "An Obama Tilt in Campaign Coverage":The Post provided a lot of good campaign coverage, but readers have been consistently...
View ArticleWe'll Be Greeted As Liberators
The Washington Post reports that Barack Obama really, really wants to close Guantanamo:Announcing the closure of the controversial detention facility would be among the most potent signals the incoming...
View ArticlePalin's Newser
Greetings from Miami, where Sarah Palin has just finished a news conference. It wasn't much of one. She took four questions and spoke for a little under seven minutes, leaving everyone pretty amazed...
View ArticlePalin, the Governors, and the New Power in the Republican Party
Greetings again from Miami, where I have a new story up about Sarah Palin's appearance before the Republican governors:The theme of this meeting of the Republican Governors Association is that, after...
View ArticlePalin, the Governors, and the New Power in the Republican Party
Miami -- The theme of this meeting of the Republican Governors Association is that, after the GOP’s loss of the White House, the House, and the Senate, power in the party has now settled firmly among...
View ArticleRepublicans and the 1994 Scenario
More from the Republican governor's meeting in Miami. At the final dinner tonight, I spoke with one clued-in observer who suggested that there is the belief, among some in this group, that the party...
View ArticleThe Pence Prescription for Republican Ills
I have a new column up at The Hill based on my time at the Republican Governors Association meeting in Miami. The conference was, of course, all about governors, but the group did invite one lawmaker...
View ArticleJust Imagine Me Being Me In The White House
The New York Times magazine had a story yesterday by Ron Suskind which reconstructed the time in which Barack Obama decided to run for president. Obama was asked -- by his wife -- what he wanted to...
View ArticleLife After Lewinsky
One of the interesting sidelights of Obama's staff selection process is not just the echoes of the Clinton administration -- you'd expect Obama would draw from people who served in a Democratic...
View ArticleEric Holder and Seizing Elian
One of my favorite Eric Holder stories involves his role in the Justice Department's handling of the Elian Gonzalez case. In the period before armed agents seized the child, the Justice Department had...
View ArticleRomney: No Bailout
"I love cars, American cars," says Mitt Romney, and if you've ever watched him at an auto show, you know it's true. In today's New York Times, Romney, whose father ran a U.S. automaker that no longer...
View ArticleObama's Transition Priorities
From Obama transition world:Today, the Obama-Biden Transition Team announced leaders for a series of Policy Working Groups for the Presidential Transition. The focus of the Policy Working Groups will...
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