Joe Conason from Creators Syndicate

Suddenly, A Trillion Dollars Is Too Expensive? for 07/02/2009

Thu, 02 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

If Americans hope to discuss health care, climate change, green economics or public infrastructure with any degree of realism, then the time has come to acknowledge that hearing someone say "a trillion dollars" is no reason to panic. Politicians and pundits cite that figure to argue that we cannot afford health care reform, following recent cost estimates by the Congressional Budget O ...

Updated: Thu Jul 02, 2009

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Party of Franken, Party of Palin for 07/09/2009

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The new senator from Minnesota is a comedian, writer and actor who lived on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and raised a lot of money from friends in Hollywood. The departing governor of Alaska is a hockey mom from a small backwoods town who likes to hunt and fish. Yet today, Al Franken looks wholesomely mainstream, while Sarah Palin seems headed for the tabloid fringe.

That unexpected ...

Updated: Thu Jul 09, 2009

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Pelosi's Toothless "Commission" for 07/16/2009

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Very soon, Congressional leaders are expected to announce the creation of a new commission to investigate the real causes of America's crippling financial disaster. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has reportedly told Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner that this investigative panel will be modeled on the legendary "Pecora Commission," which held a series of hearings on Capitol Hill in 1933 ...

Updated: Thu Jul 16, 2009

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Blue Dogs: The Special Interest Pets for 07/23/2009

Thu, 23 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

"Fiscal conservative" is one of those terms used by politicians of all sorts to describe themselves, without any real justification. Parroted mindlessly from one news cycle to the next by major media outlets, that phrase is often used to mislead the public about the priorities and policies favored by those who claim to embody budgetary prudence.

Consider the Democrats in the Bl ...

Updated: Thu Jul 23, 2009

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A Time, Again, for Bill Clinton for 07/30/2009

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

In his struggle to change the nation's health care system, Barack Obama again faces certain obstacles that almost stopped his amazing march to the presidency. Aside from the Washington chattering class and the right-wing media, which always oppose progressive reform, Mr. Obama is losing his grip on the middle class and working families in swing states. He is losing Democratic senators and membe ...

Updated: Thu Jul 30, 2009

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What Are the Birthers Really After? for 08/06/2009

Thu, 06 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

On Aug. 4, President Barack Obama celebrated the anniversary of his birth, an event that occurred 48 years ago in the state of Hawaii. This is an indisputable fact, as sane critics on the right, such as the editors of the National Review and the veteran pundit Patrick Buchanan, acknowledge. And yet there is a significant minority, especially within the Republican Party, that fervently insists o ...

Updated: Thu Aug 06, 2009

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The Real Death Panels for 08/13/2009

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

When Republican politicians and right-wing talking heads bemoan the fictitious "death panels" that they claim would arise from health-care reform, they are concealing a sinister reality from their followers. The ugly fact is that every year we fail to reform the existing system, that failure condemns tens of thousands of people to die — either because they have no insurance or b ...

Updated: Thu Aug 13, 2009

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Obama's Enforcer: Not Really Tough Enough for 08/20/2009

Thu, 20 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

If the Democrats fail to pass real changes in the health care system this year — rather than a sham that mimics and mocks reform — they will have nobody to blame but themselves. Or at least nobody to blame but other Democrats, notably those in the White House who have never been committed to this most venerable and fundamental aspect of party policy.

Of course, the right-wing ...

Updated: Thu Aug 20, 2009

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Law, Not Torture, Protects National Security for 08/27/2009

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Predictably as always, the Republicans in Congress and in the conservative media are berating Attorney General Eric Holder for deciding to investigate the CIA's use of abusive interrogation methods on terror suspects.

They warn that probing this sensitive history will compromise intelligence operations and endanger the nation. They insist that these techniques have, in the words of forme ...

Updated: Thu Aug 27, 2009

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A Perfect Storm of Idiocy for 09/10/2009

Thu, 10 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The wild furor over President Obama's speech to the nation's schoolchildren raises many questions, but there is only one that really matters. How did America surrender its political discourse — not to mention the news cycle — to the most unreasonable and unstable elements of the far right?

Not so many years ago, nobody would have imagined that a bland presidential address to ...

Updated: Thu Sep 10, 2009

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Joe Wilson's Dixie Partisans for 09/17/2009

Thu, 17 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The stupid misconduct of entertainer Kanye West and politician Joe Wilson demonstrated, if any fresh proof is necessary, that thoughtless rudeness isn't confined by ethnicity, ideology or background. With their highly public episodes of misconduct, both earned sharp public censure.

Yet while West has expressed real remorse for his misbehavior at the MTV Music Awards, Wilson has swiftly l ...

Updated: Thu Sep 17, 2009

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The Racist Truth About Beck and Limbaugh for 09/24/2009

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

With admirable calm, President Obama has sought to deflect the supercharged politics of race by expressing his optimism about American attitudes and ignoring the most extreme statements by his critics. For his own sake, as well as the nation's, he is wise to give a pass to the likes of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. That is not, however, what they deserve.

The behavior of those media prov ...

Updated: Thu Sep 24, 2009

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"Socialism" and Sham in the Senate for 10/01/2009

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Listening closely to the politicians with the most clout in the debate over health care, it is startling to discover how little they actually seem to know about the subject.

Ignorance rules, even among the bipartisan group of senators known as the "Gang of Six," who supposedly have immersed themselves in the details of this life-and-death issue for many months. If they understo ...

Updated: Thu Oct 01, 2009

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Why Obama Must Spend More for 10/08/2009

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The latest signals from the White House suggest that President Obama now realizes he must do more — and quickly — to ease the economic suffering of working families. He knows that most Americans believe his administration and Congress have so far provided more help to major banks and Wall Street investment firms than to workers and small companies, as a survey released by pollster P ...

Updated: Thu Oct 08, 2009

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A Nobel for Defeating Cheneyism for 10/15/2009

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Outraged babble and sanctimonious tut-tutting over President Obama's Nobel Peace Prize will pour forth until the very evening he accepts the prize in Oslo, and then for years afterward. His critics are infuriated, they say, because he didn't earn the prestigious award, or because he didn't refuse it — or just because those left-wing Norwegians have a lot of nerve. How dare they insult us ...

Updated: Thu Oct 15, 2009

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Playing Monopoly With America's Health for 10/22/2009

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Popular disgust over the fat premiums that financial executives bestow upon themselves is burgeoning, and rightly so. Those Wall Street piggy banks are filling up with billions upon billions of government-subsidized dollars.

But anyone infuriated by the grossly inflated compensation of the masters of finance should check out the incredible earnings of the top executives in the health ins ...

Updated: Thu Oct 22, 2009

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A Winning Compromise? for 10/29/2009

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The Senate leadership's decision to include the "public option" in its health care reform legislation seemed at first almost miraculous, especially to anyone who believed the hundreds of obituaries recited in the media over the past several months. But by acting on their convictions rather than their fears, the Democrats could ultimately find that the politics of consumer choice can b ...

Updated: Thu Oct 29, 2009

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The GOP's Toxic Tea Party for 11/05/2009

Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

When Newt Gingrich warned Republicans that they were making a grave "mistake" by driving out moderates and enforcing the angry orthodoxy of the far right, the sober tone of his remarks was stunning.

This is a politician who is no stranger himself to the wilder shores of extremism, a populist and a purist who rose to great power against the GOP establishment, and a demagogue who ...

Updated: Thu Nov 05, 2009

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Testing Next Year's Lies Today for 11/12/2009

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Within hours after the House of Representatives approved health care reform by a narrow margin, Republicans predicted retribution at the polls next fall. They promised to make every Democrat regret that historic vote as the first step toward the reversal of power in Washington. And as the current debate has proved, they aren't going to let honesty become an obstacle.

For a preview of com ...

Updated: Thu Nov 12, 2009

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What is So Patriotic About Fearmongering? for 11/19/2009

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

The loudest voices on the right never tire of telling us that they are the truest patriots. They claim to be the deepest believers in our system, the strongest defenders of our Constitution, the most upbeat, bold and courageous Americans anywhere. But now that the government is finally prepared to put the perpetrators of the Sept. 11 terror attacks on trial, these same patriots are the first to ...

Updated: Thu Nov 19, 2009

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