Washington Babylon

I know Hillary Clinton is hard up for dough, but should her campaign really have taken money from a suspected (and subsequently convicted) kickback conspirator? In June of 2007, attorney…

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The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports that Sheldon Adlelson, a major donor to the G.O.P., has been questioned by police as part of a corruption probe. S. Daniel Abraham of Slim-Fast,…

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The Washington Post reports today that Barack Obama and John McCain are both working to freeze out “527” groups—named after a provision in the tax code—which are not allowed to…

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Barack Obama recently severed all links with Robert Malley, an informal Middle East policy adviser, after the latter “confessed” that he had met with the Palestinian group Hamas. And in…

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Well, I may be soft on Hillary, but this is very funny. (Not safe for work or for the easily offended.)…

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Doug Goodyear, who had been picked by John McCain’s campaign to run the G.O.P. convention this summer, resigned over the weekend after Newsweek reported that a lobbying firm he heads…

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A number of readers emailed about yesterday’s post on why, for reasons I myself find baffling, I’ve started feeling sympathetic toward Hillary Clinton. None of the emails were friendly, but…

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I’ve received quite a few complaints in recent months from readers who think I’m pro–Hillary Clinton and anti–Barack Obama. In fact, I believe Obama has better politics than Clinton, is…

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The most honest and insightful piece yet on the media’s love affair with Obama: But of course, I don’t know many of those fierce Clinton supporters, because most of my…

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The situation in Zimbabwe is an outrage and I can understand why the Bush administration, and the entire Western world, is appalled by President Robert Mugabe’s anti-democratic depredations. As has…

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From Raw Story: Any job applicant knows that background checks are routine – especially for jobs involving authority or oversight of money. So why didn’t the San Diego Republican Party…

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From Politico: Sen. Hillary Clinton’s mailing attacking Sen. Barack Obama’s record on guns appears to include a striking visual gaffe: The image of the gun pictured on the face of…

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It’s always a mistake to read the Washington Post’s Jackson Diehl during breakfast (or at all for that matter), but his column today was particularly gag-inducing: Last Tuesday, Israel faced…

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So, the trial of Deborah Palfrey ends with her apparent suicide, the public outing and humiliation of a number of the women who worked for her, and her company’s list…

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From Gawker: When the New York Observer’s media blogger Matt Haber (the forgotten Gawker Alum!) devoted a post yesterday to basically announcing the existence of Goldberg’s blog and needling Goldberg…

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I mentioned the other day that I was taking part in a debate/conversation at TPM Book Club about Peter Scoblic’s new book, “U.S. Versus Them: How a Half-Century of Conservatism…

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From Facing South: Who’s behind the mysterious “robo-calls” that have spread misleading voter information and sown confusion and frustration among North Carolina residents over the last week? Facing South has…

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In his new blog, Jeffrey Goldberg complains that he recently was insulted by Matt Haber of the New York Observer. Haber cited an old item I wrote which said that…

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I don’t have a lot to add to the uproar over Barack Obama and his former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, other than to state that it’s clearly going to hurt…

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Peter Scoblic, executive editor of the New Republic, has written a provocative new book called “U.S. Versus Them: How a Half-Century of Conservatism Has Undermined America’s Security.” It’s the topic…

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Patricia Gossman is an independent consultant on human rights and rule of law issues in South Asia, Afghanistan in particular. She is currently a grantee of the United States Institute…

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From Thursday’s Politico, print version: “Pelosi Wants Stimulus Before Trade.” Still not as good as TPM Muckraker’s headline back in 2006 after then-House Speaker Denny Hastert voiced support for an…

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I missed this when I was traveling, but two weeks back The Week magazine invited journalists, think-tankers and politicos to a Georgetown hotel to hand out its Opinion Awards. For…

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A reader recently called to my attention to a 2005 Chicago Tribune story detailing a trip to Eastern Europe that Obama took early in his Senate career. At the time,…

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General Tommy Franks was complaining about his job one day, and said: “I have to deal with the fucking stupidest guy on the face of the earth almost every day.”…

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Remember all those how important political reforms Congress passed after the Democrats took over? Like the new rules meant to stamp out the influence of lobbyists and special interest groups…

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There are a lot of people who still think that presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama essentially can’t lose the November presidential election (or, more to the point, that John McCain…

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I was on NPR’s Talk of the Nation yesterday to discuss the recent New York Times story about the Pentagon’s use of retired military officials “to generate favorable news coverage…

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