THERE IS ONE NUMBER TO KEEP IN MIND as Congressional Republicans drone on with their protest of the “Democrat” majority’s decision to fast-track a final vote on health care reform. Zero. That’s how many House Republicans voted for the Obama administration’s budget on April 29, the day after Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter announced he was […]

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CONGRESSMAN HENRY B. GONZÁLEZ once asked me if I could name the largest transfer of wealth in our country’s history. I stumbled through a couple of New Deal acronyms and had moved on to the defense budget when González stopped me. “Mortgage lending,” he said. González was a liberal Democrat from San Antonio who chaired […]

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The Contraception Lottery—Just in time for Fetal Containers Day on May 10, the Republican fringe comes unhinged over President Obama’s appointment of Dawn Johnsen to direct the Office of Legal Counsel—the Department of Justice office that advises the president on the law and the Constitution. Johnsen is a Yale Law School graduate who served five […]

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IT’S NO SECRET that Defense Secretary Robert Gates wants to close out production of the F-22. Gates has been a critic of the bells-and-whistles guys in the Pentagon, has argued against Cold War weapons systems, and in June fired the fighter jet’s most outspoken advocates—Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne and Chief of Staff T. Michael […]

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Watchdog Bites—Since 2007, Harvard Law School professor Elizabeth Warren has been making the case for a Financial Products Safety Commission that would evaluate financial instruments before bankers or brokers sell them to the public. Considering the wealth lost since the economy began to slide into a recession, a commission protecting individuals from high-risk securities and […]

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