Marco Rubio: I never meant I wanted to repeal all of Health Care Reform.
Political operatives have known since … oh, the late 1820s not to insult the poverty or humble upbringings of opponents as it almost always backfires on the attacker. But apparently no one told John Kasich’s spokesman Rob Nichols who recently sneered that Gov. Ted Strickland’s allegedly bad record on jobs is no surprise since he’d “grown up in a chicken shack.”
I was going to compare this to Sue Lowden’s ability to torpedo her own campaign through a series of completely unnecessary, unforced errors. Because this has really become a pattern of late — seemingly strong Republican candidates, in a Republican year, managing to trip themselves up through completely unnecessary goofs. But then it occurred to me that there might be a grand unifying chicken theory (GUCT) of the 2010 election since it seems to be a recurring theme.
At one level, probably most of us don’t care whether BP or another company most of us had never heard of before, Anadarko, has to pay for the damages from the Gulf Oil spill. But there’s one dimension of this that matters quite a lot in terms of finding out what really happened. Read More
House and Senate Democrats still appear to be at an impasse over the regulation of derivatives. Speaker Pelosi actually met with Sen. Lincoln to convince her to loosen the language in the bill. But Lincoln refused to budge.
This does leave us with the paradoxical situation of Lincoln standing firm on the more progressive position and Pelosi trying to get her to allow some softening of the language. Pelosi of course appears mainly to be responding to the demands of Democrats from New York.
I hear Rand Paul is up on Capitol Hill today, possibly interviewing potential consultants for his campaign. Have you seen Rand? Who was he talking to? Send us an email.
Rand Paul: Amend the constitution to make sure children of illegal immigrants don’t become citizens.
David Petraeus’ move from CENTCOM commander to battlefield commander in Afghanistan is akin to a sports team’s general manager taking on the coaching duties. It’s not uncommon in sports, but it may be an unprecedented move for a combatant commander, according to Derek Reveron, who edited the 2004 book America’s Viceroys, a study of the unique combination of political, diplomatic, and military power vested in combatant commanders. (Recall that George W. Bush and Donald Rumsfeld thought they had become too powerful and sought to rein them in, including changing their title from commander in chief, CINC, to combatant commander.)
In returning to a battlefield command — similar to the one he held in Iraq before being promoted to CENTCOM chief– Petraeus may be the only combatant commander to have made such a move, and certainly the only one in the post-Cold War period when combatant commanders achieved their singular influence, says Reveron, a professor of national security affairs at the Naval War College. Read More
No doubt you’ve heard about the sexual assault allegations against former Vice President Al Gore. Our Justin Elliott has reviewed all the documents, spoken to the parties who will talk and filed this story on what you need to know.
Trying to find the bright side of the Gulf Spill? Check out the BP blog.