(Mike Ilitch)  On the Friday before Christmas, I was interviewing 15 members of the AFSCME Local 98 Retirees Executive Board when one man became impatient with my questions. In less than 700 words, Mark Phillips described the winners and losers in a city controlled by an emergency manager who has turned pensioners into creditors in […]

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(The aftermath of the explosion in West, Texas) When we spoke at the Bullitt Foundation building in Seattle last fall, Denis Hayes sounded almost resentful of the Clinton and Obama administrations’ focus on health care. “In my ideal world, I would have preferred that they address climate change, because there you are dealing with something […]

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(Texas state Senator Wendy Davis | Source: Dallas Morning News) It’s been a rough week for the Wendy Davis campaign. What began with a critical examination of her bio by Dallas Morning News senior political reporter Wayne Slater has become the story, keeping the Democratic senator’s gubernatorial campaign off-message and on the defensive since January […]

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There can be little doubt that Hillary Clinton lost the 2008 nomination for president because she voted to authorize the Iraq War. If she had opposed it, there would have been no rationale for the Obama candidacy. It is likely that she, not President Obama, would now be in the White House. It seems crazy. […]

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(Source: White House) I was following the Republican presidential primaries in 1988 when Jack Kemp made an insightful comment to conclude a speech he was delivering to a Hispanic group in Corpus Christi: “Ladies and gentlemen, our future lies ahead of us!” The theme of Obama’s State of the Union address last night: “My future […]

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