Gregory Mankiw makes an analogy: To understand the challenge government economists have faced over the past year and a half, it is useful to imagine the case of a physician trying to treat an ill patient. The patient presents herself in terrible shape; the physician has never treated a condition with symptoms quite like hers before; and the causes of… Read more »
Hahahaha: Charlotte McCourt…who died July 8 [at age 84] after a long illness…was a homemaker, proud mother and grand mother and wife of 67 years to Patrick McCourt. And she was at one time a loyal supporter of Harry Reid. Her obituary, printed in Tuesday’s Review-Journal, reads in part, “We believe that Mom would say she was mortified to have… Read more »
[Bumped to top. -ed.] In preface, I think I’ve officially become a cranky old man… I don’t have any problem with the short form Census that was sent out earlier in the year. It is a Constitutionally mandated function of the government, and an accurate count of the population is necessary for a number of things. But all they really… Read more »
FiveThirtyEight’s updated Senate forecast is out, taking into account the results of various primaries — most significantly Nevada, where the victory of Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle has turned a likely GOP pickup into a tossup (and where “Harry Reid’s favorability/approval numbers have also improved some, and are now merely godawful rather than mind-bogglingly wretched”), and Arkansas, where choosing incumbent… Read more »
Forgive me for being crassly political in the immediate aftermath of the sad news of Robert Byrd’s death — but there is, of course, a significant electoral and political angle to this. At least two such angles, actually. The U.S. Senate now has 99 senators — 56 Democrats, 2 Dem-caucusing independents, and 41 Republicans — and the question of who… Read more »
Although I don’t find much value in his overarching thesis that Barack Obama is just like Vladimir Putin, except less effective at being a thug, Michael Barone makes some concerning points about the oil spill response. I’d love to hear convincing rebuttals, if they exist. Barone: Obama’s decision to impose a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf…penalizes… Read more »
Twitter: With 98.2% of precincts in, Boxes slips past 80% mark. @BrianQuintana 14.2% (250,313 votes), @kausmickey 5.3% (93,173). http://bit.ly/aIulWV
Say what you will about blogging pioneer / curmudgeonly Democratic gadfly / U.S. Senate candidate Mickey Kaus, but he sure knows how to set expectations low. Here’s his take, in Calbuzz, on his chances in today’s primary against Barbara Boxer: My friend Jill Stewart of L.A. Weekly bet a friend dinner that I wouldn’t top 5%. But I don’t want… Read more »
"Smug liberal?" HAHAHA.
[Kudos to Terry Corcoran for coming up with an alternative title for this blog post: Brendan’s Grand Unified Theory of PANIC!!!!!! Hahaha. Brilliant. -ed.] I had an interesting conversation with Melissa Clouthier (and, chiming in at one point, Doug Mataconis) on Twitter today. It started with me criticizing Melissa for, in my view, propagating patently unfair criticisms about President Obama,… Read more »