Negotiating Tactics in Cancun Right now an important meeting of trade ministers is happening in Cancun, Mexico, where they are discussing possible changes to WTO rules. I’ve been worried that the US was going to get taken advantage of in the negotiations, though. So I was glad to read this story from the BBC reporting […]

, and DC, Northern Virginia, and Shanksville, PA Since then, we’ve failed to capture Osama bin Laden, and the president now no longer mentions his name, invaded a country with no documented ties to bin Laden or the attacks, allowed bin Laden’s family members to vacate the country (apparently without first questioning them), lied to […]

Mike Allen: Noted in The Building? Thursday’s Washington Post has an article, Bush Cites 9/11 On All Manner Of Questions, sure to upset Karl Rove. The punchline of the story is that, regardless of what the topic is, Bush will almost invariably make reference to 9/11: …President Bush paused in his Labor Day remarks about […]

Thou Shalt Not Make Taxes Less Regressive Actually, that’s not one of the Ten Commandments, but based on the results of yesterday’s vote on Republican Governor Bob Riley’s tax package (67-33 against!), most Alabamans think it is. Riley cast his plan, which proposed to deal with the state’s $675 deficit by increasing taxes on the […]

Debut Byline Blogging’s loss is The American Prospect’s gain. Matt Yglesias leapt from writing his blog to being an intrepid (and paid) writer. Via CalPundit, I see that Matt has his first byline today, House Broken: The gutting of federal housing vouchers and the declining fortunes of renters. Check it out. While Matt’s blog endures, […]

Crucial or Negligible? Writing in Salon about the Ashcroft road show promoting the virtues of the PATRIOT Act, Michelle Goldberg makes a good point: In the face of such opposition, Ashcroft has taken to the road to try to convince America of two somewhat contradictory propositions. On the one hand, he argues that without the […]

The Spoils of War The Texas Republicans, with the aid of the cowardly John Whitmire, have won the battle in Texas. Governor Perry has called a third special session and redistricting (to give Republicans 5-7 more seats in the US House) will soon be underway. The one bright spot is that redistricting may not go […]

Foreign Policy? Or just a Visa commercial? National security adviser Condoleezza Rice defended the administration’s supplemental spending request. “Yes, the price tag may be very high,” she told Washington-based foreign reporters. But, she added: “Freedom is priceless.” In the same story, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Richard Meyers–apparently unaware that for a few years in […]

Since We Invaded Iraq… …a few other things have happened on the world stage North Korea announced that it would continue developing nuclear arms and the missiles to deliver them. The Middle East Peace Roadmap collapsed and the comparatively moderate Mahmoud Abbas resigned. Iran may have or be close to having actual nuclear weapons (in […]

Health Insurance Rates Up 13.9 Percent in 2003 Which is, of course, bad news for the job market–at least, it’s bad news in the market for jobs that come with benefits. Even for jobs that carry benefits, look for rising premiums, rising copayments, and higher deductibles. Apparently, prescription drug costs and rising prices for hospital […]