 | A cliffhanger in the White House Nov 21st 2012, 00:29 President Obama hosted a screening of Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln" at the White House the other day. He should do it again — and again and again. For the subsequent showings, though, the president ought to invite every member of Congress. Have them settle into the plush red seats of the White House theater and mull the possibilities, for landmark greatness or epic failure, available to a second-term president and lame-duck Congress. Read full article >>   | | What really caused Brauchli-Weymouth breakup? Nov 21st 2012, 00:19 All accounts of the departure of Marcus Brauchli as executive editor of The Washington Post concur on one element of the drama: Brauchli fought with his boss, Publisher Katharine Weymouth, over newsroom resources. In a now-deleted Facebook comment, Maggie Farleycommended Brauchli, her husband, wondering, "how has the Washington Post of Watergate fame become the place where you can't speak truth to power?" Read full article >>   | | Editorial Board: Marion Barry spoils a turkey giveaway Nov 20th 2012, 23:58 HUNDREDS OF FAMILIES in Ward 8 lined up Tuesday for free turkeys. The donations were arranged by D.C. Council member Marion Barry (D). Good for Mr. Barry in helping to serve the needs of residents, particularly in these hard-hit times. But did he really have to spoil the holiday spirit with gratuitous comments that insult the very people he aims to serve? Read full article >>   | | Jennifer Rubin: More misdirection on Libya Nov 20th 2012, 23:10 Each new revelation about the Benghazi debacle reinforces the idea we are either not hearing the truth or everyone in the administration was behaving irrationally. If you are waiting for someone to finally give a satisfactory explanation, I think it's going to be a long wait. Read full article >>   | | The safer way to bike through D.C. Nov 20th 2012, 22:43 I live on the corner of 16th and L streets NW in the District, and I've been watching the progress on the road improvements and installation of the bike lanes [letters, Nov. 13]. I want to thank the municipal workers for doing such a fine job. I've been very impressed with how long and hard they work, and I think this performance speaks well for the D.C. Department of Transportation. Read full article >> | | Nov 20th 2012, 22:43 ● Last Friday, to meet a friend for lunch, I walked along L Street NW from Connecticut Avenue to 19th Street. The route took me alongside the newly constructed L Street bike lane, which took away one auto traffic lane, and I counted the vehicles that passed me: 91 cars and three bicycles. Sorta makes you wonder about the wisdom of the District's allocation of transportation space. Read full article >> | | At highway rest stops, no respite for the weary driver Nov 20th 2012, 22:41 The Nov. 18 Travel article "The road ahead," quoted Lon Anderson of AAA Mid-Atlantic as saying, "Rest stops to the traveling public are a very valuable commodity." So true. One of the purposes of rest areas is to offer a place for tired drivers to pull over and rest. Who hasn't pulled into a rest area and taken a nap in the shade of big old trees? But, alas, the designers of the rest areas have cut down all those wonderful old trees, so you can't take a short nap in your car (try sleeping under the summer sun). I've seen this lack of trees in Maryland, Ohio, Pennsylvania and other states. Read full article >> | | BP settlement is a good start but we need more Nov 20th 2012, 22:41 The Nov. 17 news article "BP settlement a boon to conservation group" reported the good news that $2.4 billion of the settlement stemming from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill will go to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. While this historic sum may partially avenge the animals and ecosystems ravaged by the spill, it is not enough. Reparations for the damage will not be achieved unless we ensure that the same thing will not happen again. This involves directing money into renewable energy to work toward eliminating the need for fossil fuels. Read full article >> | | Defending Susan Rice for all the wrong reasons Nov 20th 2012, 22:41 Robert Kagan was wrong in his defense of U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice ["Stop scapegoating Susan Rice," op-ed, Nov. 18], given not only her statements in the days following the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, but, more important, her lack of fitness for office — as detailed by Dana Milbank in his Sunday Opinion column, "The wrong person to fight for," in the same edition of The Post. Read full article >> | | The never-ending war in the Middle East Nov 20th 2012, 22:03 An Israeli official was listening a few days ago to the familiar critique that Israel doesn't have any strategy in Gaza, just periodic tactical assaults on Hamas. The official finally exploded: "That is our strategy. Don't you understand? We don't have any other choice except to punch our adversary in the face every few years." Read full article >> | | Editorial Board: Maryland casts its lot with Big Ten money Nov 20th 2012, 21:39 IT'S BEEN ROUGHLY a year since the University of Maryland announced that declining athletic department revenue would force it to eliminate water polo, men's tennis and other "non-revenue" varsity sports. At the time, university President Wallace D. Loh lamented having to cut the low-profile programs, whose participants epitomized the student-athlete ideal. There was no choice, he said, because "the current business model of intercollegiate athletics nationwide is inequitable and unsustainable." He promised to "work with the ACC [the Atlantic Coast Conference], the NCAA . . . to reset the balance between academics and big-time athletics in higher education." Read full article >>   | | On entitlements, abstract aspirations meet concrete political reality [Updated] Nov 20th 2012, 17:34 Updated 2:32 p.m. The think tank Third Way has made an interesting contribution to those interpreting the implications of President Obama's reelection for his second-term agenda. Drawing from a recent survey of Obama voters conducted by the Benenson Strategy Group, the centrist group argues that these voters support a "balanced" approach to deficit-reduction, meaning they want tax increases and entitlement cuts. (Disclosure: My firm works for a client whose goal is to support and help enact a significant deal to reduce the debt.) Read full article >>   | | Joel Achenbach: Fiscal cliff: Over we go Nov 20th 2012, 17:33 Are we going to go over the fiscal cliff? Of course! Because it's a massive fiscal-trajectory reset that solves a lot of very difficult political problems for everyone. Obviously they'll claim they're not actually going over the cliff — they'll pretend to have some kind of deal (Ezra Klein outlines one possible arrangement), but it will really be a deal to have a deal later. It'll be a Potemkin Grand Bargain. The cornerstone will still be — oh God I'm in metaphor hell — the cliff. (Splat! Writer down!) Read full article >>   | | Jennifer Rubin: Where will the Dems go? Nov 20th 2012, 17:01 There has been much talk about the "lost" voters who backed Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) but who did not turn out for Mitt Romney in 2012. Well, there aren't that many of them, as it turns out. As of last Friday, Romney's popular vote total was 59,142,004, about 800,000 short of McCain's total. By contrast, President Obama's has reached 62,615,406. That is about 7 million fewer than he got in 2008. With that perspective, you can understand how a malfunctioning get-out-the-vote operation, misallocation of ad money (due to internal polling assumptions) and failure to define Romney early in the battleground states could be decisive. (Moreover, some of the lost vote may have been voters in deep-red states who saw no need to turn out, as well as Sandy-affected voters.) Read full article >>   | | Greg Sargent: Is White House prepared to go over fiscal cliff if necessary? Nov 20th 2012, 16:43 Some leading liberals and Dems are hoping the White House — if the fiscal talks break down — will prove willing to let us all go over the fiscal cliff and let all the Bush tax cuts expire. That way Dems could return in 2013 and pass the tax cuts for those under $250,000 again — the Obama tax cuts for the middle class! — while leaving taxes on the rich at Clinton-era levels. Read full article >>   | |
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