One the one hand, although I understand his point I can't go along Mike Konczal's quasi-defense of Drew Westen. Ignoring Westen's theory of politics is very much an "apart from that, Mrs. Lincoln" proposition -- his ignorance of American political history is so comprehensive, his...
Obama administration
Elias Isquith is very agitated about one of the points in this post, which may be due to a lack of clarity on my part. To provide said clarity, I.
Unless you're completely new to the blog, you know that I disagree with the two key premises underlying Matt Stoller's call for a primary challenge against Obama. First, I think.
Obviously, it's encouraging that the new chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers is the kind of economist for whom empirical evidence trumps models. Brad Plumer does us a very useful service by looking more broadly at his academic work.
I think this comment from David Mizner -- whose excellent novel you should check out -- gets to the heart of the issue: This argument — could President Obama have.
I find myself in an unusual position of arguing that someone is underestimating presidential power. Armando asserts that I argue that we shouldn't care who is president. So, working backward.
Scott of course is right about the Green Lantern theory of domestic politics. There's just no way Obama is going to will Ben Nelson or Olympia Snowe into supporting a given policy. Giving speeches aren't going to do anything to change that, and in fact...
I have more to say about what the presidency and what it can and can't accomplish based on Jeff Shessol's terrific book on FDR and the court-packing fight. But.
Because of both Senate obstructionism and the relatively low priority placed on them by the Obama administration, the pace of appointments to the federal judiciary has been regrettably low. But.
It won't surprise most readers to know that my reactions to some of the responses to Corey Robin's informal roundtable are pretty similar to Matt's. The idea that there's not really any difference between Obama and Bush is only true to the extent that it's...
A much, much better approach. Setting the precedent that hostage-taking over the debt ceiling can work is the kind of fraying of norms that will cause the system to become.
Here I do think Obama's unwillingness to consider the option reflects his preferences, or if not certainly reflects a serious misreading of what the Court is actually likely to do.