Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
As the candidates gather at the Reagan Library for the second 2016 presidential debate, a longtime conservative consultant says the Tea Party has morphed into the Troll Party—and it’s a fight for the soul of the GOP. All my life, the Republican Party has been my political home. Helping it succeed has been my work…
Don’t let the comb-over fool you. Donald Trump’s rhetorical style is straight out of middle school. “He’s like an eighth-grade girl,” Rosalind Wiseman told me. “As an educator who works with children, it’s an amazing thing to watch,” she said, “because you really wish the adults would be the adults and be able to check…
Expect to see this smile again on Wednesday. Donald Trump participates in the first prime-time presidential debate hosted by Fox News on August 6, 2015 in Cleveland, Ohio.Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Ding, ding: Round 2. The Republican presidential contenders are in Southern California on Wednesday for the second pair of primary debates. CNN’s…
At the 2011 White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, Trump’s humiliation in the face of Obama’s jibes seemed absolute, and very visible. Credit PHOTOGRAPH BY JOSHUA ROBERTS / BLOOMBERG VIA GETTY Barrier Status: ‘none’ Once, and only once, in 2011, have I attended the annual White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in Washington, D.C., on the grounds,…
There are many, many reasons to abhor Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, but there’s at least one reason to appreciate it, for now: his constant and merciless trolling of Jeb Bush that is currently tanking Bush’s shot at the presidency. In some sense, Trump is doing democracy a service by helping ensure we will not have…
If you’re a fan of good television, you know Lucille Bluth from Arrested Development. If you’re a fan of bad politics, you know Donald Trump. These two seem to have a lot in common. Who Said It: Donald Trump Or Lucille Bluth.
Scott Walker has told the world that the shooting deaths of police in the United States are a major problem and implied there is really only one cure: to return to the bygone era of his youth, when life was safer and more idyllic. His language was vague, incorrect, and most importantly stokes a fear…
Donald Trump in August. Credit: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg AD UNIT 1 /AD UNIT 1 CNN is asking 40 times its normal rate for commercial time in the next Republican debate. The cable news network is charging as much as $200,000 for a 30-second spot in the prime-time brawl taking place on Sept. 16, according to a…
Photo Credit Illustration by Jennifer Daniel. Cat: EEI_Tony/iStock. Wig: greg801/iStock. We begin, as many discussions about politics today should, with an analogy to pro wrestling. Consider the ‘‘foreign object’’ routine: One combatant produces a concealed item, usually from under his tights — a pointed stick or some hand-size tool of menace — and proceeds to…
It’s the morning of Friday, January 20, 2017, and it’s Inauguration Day. Donald John Trump Sr. has his hand on a Bible, and America looks on, agape, as he swears to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.” How we got to this point isn’t important. The question now is, what the…