Joe Conason

Mike Huckabee's fatally bad judgment

Joe Conason — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 17:31:00 PST

If clemency for Maurice Clemmons were the only fatal error committed by Mike Huckabee as governor of Arkansas, he might be able to shift blame to the state's law enforcement system and even run for president again in 2012. Yet the Clemmons commutation that he granted nine years ago is only one among several cases that raise serious questions about Huckabee's judgment.

A wobbly Democrat's moment of truth

Joe Conason — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:20:00 PST

On the very same day that Blanche Lambert Lincoln will finally vote on whether to allow healthcare reform to reach the Senate floor, thousands of the dithering Arkansas Democrat's uninsured constituents will be lining up to see doctors at a free medical clinic in Little Rock. Anticipating this remarkable coincidence, Lincoln may even realize that conservative ideologues and insurance lobbyists are not the only voices that should command her attention during this debate.

Lou Dobbs for president!

Joe Conason — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 16:13:00 PST

The evening of Nov. 11, when Lou Dobbs formally ended his career in journalism, may mark the beginning of a political nightmare for conservatives. In his departing remarks, he surely hinted at bigger ambitions when he said that "some leaders in media, politics and business have been urging me to go beyond the role here at CNN and to engage in constructive problem solving as well as to contribute positively to the great understanding of the issues of our day."

Joe Lieberman undercuts his wife

Joe Conason — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:06:00 PST

When Joe Lieberman announced his threat to filibuster against any healthcare reform bill that includes a public option, it was natural to suspect the influence of his wife, Hadassah, and the insurance-pharmaceutical-lobbying complex that employed her for decades. But perhaps the problem is that the Connecticut senator isn't listening to her -- or the organization she now represents -- as attentively as he should.

Why does Joe Lieberman oppose healthcare reform? Ask his wife

Joe Conason — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 17:28:00 PDT

If Democrats are disappointed by Joe Lieberman’s threat to filibuster any healthcare reform bill that includes a public option, they shouldn't be. Despite all of his past promises to support universal healthcare, nothing was more predictable than the Connecticut senator's fealty to the insurance and pharmaceutical lobbyists.

Criticizing Fox News isn't "Nixonian." But Fox News is

Joe Conason — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 17:23:00 PDT

With outraged Washington journalists and Republican politicians crying "Nixonian!" over the public scuffle between the Obama White House and the Fox News Channel, what began as a mundane spat is turning into a cosmic jest. Somewhere, Nixon himself is enjoying a mordant laugh to hear this shrill defense of his old servant Roger Ailes, the television wizard whose deceptive campaigning ushered him into the presidency more than 40 years ago -- and who then became the living symbol of everything negative and nasty in American politics during the two decades that followed.

Nativism is dangerous to our health

Joe Conason — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:16:00 PDT

Of all the wingnut mythology surrounding healthcare reform, nothing has stirred greater fury or louder denials than the suggestion that government might somehow provide insurance to America's undocumented workers and their families. "You lie!" screamed Rep. Joe Wilson as the President told Congress that his plan would provide no coverage to them. "No, we don't!" replied the Democrats, who scrambled to make sure that the undocumented are excluded by statute.

In defense of ACORN

Joe Conason — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 03:18:00 PDT

For many years the combined forces of the far right and the Republican Party have sought to ruin ACORN, the largest organization of poor and working families in America. Owing to the idiocy of a few ACORN employees, notoriously caught in a videotape "sting" sponsored by a conservative Web site and publicized by Fox News, that campaign has scored significant victories on Capitol Hill and in the media.

Republican politicians have no empathy

Joe Conason — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 10:11:00 PDT

In the lyrical conclusion of President Obama's speech on healthcare, he talked about the emotions and experiences that drove his late friend Sen. Edward Kennedy to work so tirelessly and passionately for universal coverage. He tried to describe what Kennedy must have felt as two of his children suffered through bouts of cancer. Ordeals such as those, said the president, had helped Kennedy to understand the "sheer terror and helplessness" of parents whose children are stricken by serious disease, and lack the means to save them.

Healthcare didn't have to go this way

Joe Conason — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 08:05:00 PDT

Achieving humane and affordable healthcare in America was never going to be easy, even with an audacious new president and large majorities in both houses of Congress. Compromise between the Democratic Party’s diverse representatives -- let alone with the tiny handful of Republicans who actually care about the need for reform -- was always inevitable. And when the moment for compromise arrived, the result was certain to disappoint many of the president’s most ardent voters, who cherished his campaign’s promises of change. But the mundane grind of making legislation need not have been quite as painful as it is today, when progressives feel betrayed, and Democrats feel deflated.

Ted Kennedy wanted the public option

Joe Conason — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 03:27:00 PDT

The rise of Edward M. Kennedy to the greatness now so broadly acknowledged with his passing was a process of years and decades, a journey interrupted by family tragedy and personal failure, a story of focus, determination and principle that placed him in the pantheon of America's most influential statesmen.

Now more than ever, bipartisanship is for suckers

Joe Conason — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 03:21:00 PDT

From the earliest moments of Barack Obama's presidency, the most perplexing question was how he would fulfill his promise to change Washington's partisan standoff – and whether that promise was ever more than a rhetorical and political campaign gambit. More than once, observers have suggested that he always knew he couldn't rely on Republicans to act in good faith, to negotiate reasonable compromises, or even to speak honestly in debate. According to that theory, Obama's commitment to bipartisan solutions was and is theater aimed at persuading independent or centrist voters to trust him.

Winston Churchill was a Bolshevik

Joe Conason — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 14:14:00 PDT

Long before many of today’s frothing right-wing demagogues were born, American conservatives came to idolize Winston Churchill, the late Tory prime minister whose wartime leadership of the British people transformed into the living symbol of democracy armed. That reputation was cemented by his legendary Missouri speech in 1946 warning of the “Iron Curtain” drawn by the Soviet Communists across Eastern Europe. Indeed, journalists and bloggers on the right admire the old warhorse so much that he has even outpolled Ronald Reagan as their “Man of the Century.”

Clinton derangement syndrome, North Korean strain

Joe Conason — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 03:19:00 PDT

Like a seasonal flu, the verbal virus that is sometimes called Clinton derangement syndrome has struck again, beginning only moments after the 42nd president of the United States appeared on television screens around the world with the two journalists he had helped to rescue from prison in North Korea. And like certain viruses, the syndrome tends to hit hardest among a very specific segment of the population. Most Americans appear to be immune most of the time, as do the majority of human beings on the planet, so this pathology will probably never become a global pandemic.

Will Bill and Betsy kill again?

Joe Conason — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:31:00 PDT

If the current effort to reform American healthcare ends in frustration, much of the blame rests on our political culture's empowerment of deception and ignorance. Fake erudition is revered, every hoax is deemed brilliant, and prejudice is presented as knowledge -- while actual expertise is disregarded or devalued.

Blue Dogs heel when lobbyists whistle

Joe Conason — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 03:20:00 PDT

Nobody could be better positioned than the Democrats who call themselves "Blue Dogs" to sabotage healthcare reform, the primary objective of their president and the signature issue of their party for more than 60 years. Thanks to fawning publicity in the mainstream media that persistently describes them as fiscally conservative and ideologically moderate, the Blue Dogs enjoy an almost unassailable position in the middle of Washington's stunted political spectrum.

Bipartisanship is for suckers

Joe Conason — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 09:18:00 PDT

Whatever hopes the Democrats in Congress and the White House may still cherish about bipartisan cooperation on healthcare reform, the Republicans are sparing no effort to mock them. Rather than expend much energy on seeking compromise or creating solutions of their own, the minority party appears wholly preoccupied with spreading propaganda against reform through all their reliable stooges, outlets and devices.

The losers who gave us Sarah Palin

Joe Conason — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 03:18:00 PDT

Disaster is often followed by recrimination, a bitter aspect of human nature that can be observed among the Republicans as the Sarah Palin fiasco continues to unfold. The Alaska governor's surprise resignation, amid negative press coverage in Vanity Fair and elsewhere, suddenly revived dormant feuding among campaign operatives and conservative media figures -- notably between Steve Schmidt, the former campaign manager, and Bill Kristol, the Weekly Standard editor and Fox News commentator.

Rush Limbaugh is still a big fat idiot

Joe Conason — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:30:00 PDT

It wasn't surprising when, after seven months of legal wrangling, the Minnesota Supreme Court declared that Al Franken had won the 2008 Senate race against incumbent Norm Coleman. Still less surprising (although vastly more entertaining) was the simultaneous breakdown of nearly all of Franken's adversaries on the right, whose regurgitated insults, whining complaints and exploding noggins revealed nothing about him or his victory -- and everything about them.

Remind me: Which political party is "decadent" and "sick"?

Joe Conason — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 03:25:00 PDT

Whenever the latest Republican politician is caught with his zipper undone, a predictable moment of introspection on the right inevitably ensues. Pundits, bloggers and perplexed citizens ruminate over the lessons they have learned, again and again, about human frailty, false piety and the temptations of flesh and power. They express concern for the damaged family and lament the fall of yet another promising young hypocrite. They resolve to restore the purity of their movement and always remember to remind us that this is all Bill Clinton's fault. What they never do is face up to an increasingly embarrassing fact about themselves and their leaders.