Hold Fast

No one could have predicted that a behind-closed-doors deal between the White House, Max Baucus, and the pharmaceutical industry to voluntarily cut their costs would not be honored by Big Pharma. But the drug makers have been proudly citing the agreement they reached with the White House and the Senate Finance Committee chairman to trim [...]

[Read more →]

My friend Josh Schrei has a powerful rebuttal to the Chinese government’s statements that Obama should support their position on Tibet because he is black and a fan of Abraham Lincoln. Here’s a good chunk: President Obama, we will not insult your intelligence — as your current hosts have –  by explaining to you why [...]

[Read more →]

I’m sure there’s  a lot of what follows that could be connected to cultural obtuseness and a simple lack of understanding that in America we don’t really talk or think the way the Chinese government is suggesting President Obama thinks. But then again, most of this is straight up racism. A spokesman for the Chinese [...]

[Read more →]

According to the BBC and Human Rights Watch, the Chinese government is running illegal, secret prisons to hold political dissidents and regular citizens who went to Beijing to file grievances about local problems. China is running a number of unlawful detention centres in which its citizens can be kept for months, according to Human Rights [...]

[Read more →]

Not too political, but a pretty great story.

[Read more →]

Twenty-three Democrats voted in favor of the Stupak amendment to dramatically ban the sale of insurance plans that offer coverage for abortion in the insurance exchanges that will be created in the health care reform bill, and subsequently voted against the House bill on final passage. That is, they made a move to make the [...]

[Read more →]

Manu Raju and Jonathan Allen of Politico have a piece that reflects quite perfectly how wrong Conventional Wisdom is. Going into Tuesday’s election, the CW was that (1) the election was a referendum on Obama and (2) New Jersey and Virginia gubernatorial races had federal implications for 2010, while actual federal races in NY-23 and [...]

[Read more →]

Prior to people going to vote yesterday, the national media narrative was focused on the New Jersey and Virginia governors races, as well as the race in New York’s 23rd Congressional district as loci for an assessment of the public’s support of President Obama. This was always absurd, as gubernatorial races are about local issues [...]

[Read more →]

Well isn’t this interesting: Sen. Joe Lieberman has reached a private understanding with Majority Leader Harry Reid that he will not block a final vote on healthcare reform, according to two sources briefed on the matter. Chris Bowers asks what people think the “private understanding” is.  Booman guesses that Reid threatened Lieberman with taking away [...]

[Read more →]

Alan Grayson is showing the American public, but particularly the Washington establishment, what a fighting Democrat looks like. He’s outspoken and bold, but he’s also what the Democratic Party needs. Naturally his willingness to speak forcefully about progressive principles has made him a target from Republicans, the press, and moderate Democratic wimps. I just donated [...]

[Read more →]