Posts by David Weigel

Flush off of the upset Democratic victory in NY-23, which he had a big hand in, Rep. Steve Israel (D-N.Y.), who is Jewish, is demanding that Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) apologize for sponsoring Thursday’s anti-health care reform rally, which brought to the hill signs comparing health reform to the Holocaust.

Add another conservative activist to the ranks of people blaming the Ft. Hood massacre on Islam. Here’s Gary Bauer, in his end-of-day email sent to supporters, arguing that while some Muslims are all well and good, “there are also ’sleeper cells’ or ’sleeper individuals’ who are jihadist ticking time bombs inside our own ranks.”
Whole letter [...]

Erick Erickson of RedState, whose stature in the conservative movement has risen with the Doug Hoffman insurrection, blasts out an announcement of a second anti-health care bill protest on the steps of Congress. Whole e-mail after the jump:

Spencer blogged about Florida congressional candidate Allen West’s eye-popping statement on the Ft. Hood tragedy; I spoke to West for a story about black Republicans running for Congress in 2010. West is well liked and well known in the Tea Party movement, and described himself, to me, as the “worst nightmare” of black liberals in [...]

Maggie Gallagher argues that the Dede Scozzafava debacle in NY-23 could scare New York Republicans out of supporting gay marriage in the state Senate. (New York’s upper house does not offer the minority party the right to filibuster, but the Democratic majority includes conservatives who will vote against gay marriage.) Certainly, State Senate President Malcolm [...]

As former Rep. Tom Reynolds (R-N.Y.) could tell you, a challenge in your own district is a heck of a thing to deal with while you’re running the NRCC.

This rundown of why a vote on unemployment insurance benefits was delayed by five weeks seems like a nadir in the War on ACORN. According to Ryan Grim, the GOP objected to an early vote because they “were trying to introduce unrelated amendments attacking ACORN and the financial-industry bailout, among other things.”
There are two echoes [...]

In Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele’s statement on  the new unemployment rate of 10.2 percent, he argues that “it is time the Obama administration stop spreading their phony ‘saved or created’ talking points and start creating the dependable jobs America needs”:
President Obama promised jobs during his campaign for president, and the elections in Virginia [...]

There are a few telling details about yesterday’s rally against the House’s health care reform bill that got lost in the coverage. The rally was not planned by the GOP leadership, which was focusing on a 12-hour online health care “town hall.” Rather, the rally was initiated by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), the loose-tongued rising [...]

From the conservative Committee for Justice, a key player in judicial nomination fights, comes this reaction to the nominations of one Hispanic and one African-American judge to circuit court slots.
Does President Obama or his advisors believe that southern white men are likely to be bigoted, making them unfit to serve on the second most powerful [...]