For a president who proclaimed proudly in his annual speech that his policies have made the state of the union good, Joe Biden betrayed a certain insecurity when, just two days before, he caused the Democratic National Committee to change its presidential primary schedule for 2024.
— President Biden’s successful State of the Union address suggested he’s full speed ahead on running for a second term.
— Despite polls showing that even many Democrats would prefer Biden not to run again, he has no real opposition within his own party — and the State of the Union is unlikely to help generate any.
— Biden’s best friend is weakness within the Republican Party, which was on display once again on Tuesday night.
Former CIA Director and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will probably run for president.
The Twitter hashtag #DiedSuddenly has been trending based on the plethora of sudden and unexplained deaths among the young and healthy over the past two years. Stories abound and here are a few found at the time of this writing.
The ordinarily fluent and unperturbed Justice Elena Kagan seemed, judging from the transcript, to be sputtering a bit in the oral argument of the Supreme Court's case challenging the racial quotas and preferences used in admissions by the University of North Carolina.
— Senate races are increasingly converging with presidential partisanship, to the point where the huge overperformances that were so common a decade or two ago have become much less common.
— Since 2000, the number of senators who have run more than 10 points ahead of their party’s presidential nominee has decreased sharply.
— This trend helps explain why we currently rate Democratic-held West Virginia as Leans Republican and started off Montana and Ohio as Toss-ups.
If you want to see a classic case of how President Joe Biden's regulatory tendencies are strangling the U.S. economy and raising prices, look no further than the latest Justice Department efforts to kill an airline merger that is pro-consumer.
How did it come to pass that public employee unions, which scarcely existed 60 years ago, have come to run public schools and myriad state and local government agencies?
Have you heard? The world is about to end!
"60 Minutes" recently featured Paul Ehrlich, author of the bestseller, "The Population Bomb." "Humanity is not sustainable," he said.
How many times have you heard President Joe Biden or Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) berate the Trump tax cuts as "a giveaway to the rich"?
What are "the major problems this country faces"? Writing in The Atlantic, New York Times columnist David Brooks leads off his list with "inequality, political polarization, social mistrust" before concluding with the inevitable "climate change." Today's "inequality," he notes, is as "savage" as the inequality in the 1890s.
— North Carolina’s open-seat race is clearly the marquee contest of 2024’s gubernatorial races. It starts as a Toss-up.
— The other contests start with clear favorites despite several open seats.
— If popular Republican incumbents run for another term, the GOP should be in great shape to hold New Hampshire and Vermont. But they would be great Democratic opportunities as open seats.
— Mississippi moves to Likely Republican following the entry of a credible Democratic candidate after our initial 2023 rating release last week.
For decades, we've been told: recycle!
"If we're not using recycled paper, we're cutting down more trees!" says Lynn Hoffman, co-president of Eureka Recycling.
Recycling paper (or cardboard) does save trees. Recycling aluminum does save energy. But that's about it.
President Joe Biden's Labor Department recently announced a new rule that will permit money managers to play politics with trillions of dollars of people's retirement savings.
America has just exited a biennium of Democratic trifecta -- control by the nation's and the world's oldest political party of the White House and majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives. It is only the third such biennium in the last 40 years, since 1993-95 and 2009-11, the first two years of the Clinton and Obama administrations.
— While it’s easy to begin looking towards the 2024 election cycle, 3 states will have gubernatorial contests this year.
— In Kentucky, Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear remains personally popular, but he will be running in a red state with a large GOP bench.
— Louisiana and Mississippi should be easier contests for Republicans. Term-limited Gov. John Bel Edwards (D-LA) will be hard for Democrats to replace, while Mississippi, where Democrats have not won a gubernatorial contest this century, will also be an uphill fight for them.
— The initial ratings for these 3 races are Leans Democratic for Kentucky, Safe Republican for Mississippi, and Likely Republican for Louisiana.
I grew up in a household with parents who were of the Greatest Generation. They lived and shouldered through the Great Depression, and then their lives and families were thrown into turmoil on Dec. 7, 1941. My grandfather worked for the War Department in Washington, D.C., and during World War II, my father served in the Pacific Theater.
From all those lists of best books of 2022, here's one with the potential to change public policy debate and discourse for the better.
