Help The Middle ClassNews and Information For The Heart Of America
WHITE HOUSE PROFILE: Rahm Emanuel On The ‘Hot Seat’. Is Obama Ready To Cut Him Off? (The New York Times)
AS A DOZEN or so top White House officials gathered in Rahm Emanuel’s corner West Wing office one morning in early January, the president’s political director, Patrick Gaspard, reported on the latest poll numbers in Massachusetts. With less than two weeks until a special Senate election, the Republican candidate was gaining momentum — just nine [...]
Key Moments From Health Care Summit (Yahoo! / Video)
President Obama and Democratic and Republican members of Congress spent most of the day Thursday debating the future of the American health care system: who it will cover, how it will do that, and how much it will cost. The historic bipartisan health care summit lasted almost seven hours. Though substantive and important, even President [...]
SENATOR EVAN BAYN / OPINION: Why I’m Leaving the Senate (The New York Times)
BASEBALL may be our national pastime, but the age-old tradition of taking a swing at Congress is a sport with even deeper historical roots in the American experience. Since the founding of our country, citizens from Ben Franklin to David Letterman have made fun of their elected officials. Milton Berle famously joked: “You can lead [...]
Alexander M. Haig Jr. Dies at 85, Military Hero, Commanding White House Aide (New York Times)
Alexander M. Haig Jr., the four-star general who served as a confrontational secretary of state under President Ronald Reagan and a commanding White House chief of staff as the Nixon administration crumbled, died Saturday at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, according to a hospital spokesman. He was 85.
Mr. Haig was a rare American breed: [...]
JOE CONASON/PROFILE: The Never Ending Quest Of Bill Clinton (Salon)
Often since his first heart surgery in 2004, Bill Clinton has alluded to an increased awareness of his own life’s limitations; it is a sense that must have enveloped him again on Thursday, when chest pains sent him into the operating room at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan for a new pair of stents in [...]
BILL CLINTON UPDATE: Former Pres. Hospitalized in New York, Receives Two Stents (Washington Post)
Former president Bill Clinton has been hospitalized in New York City, where doctors have inserted two stents into a coronary artery to help support it, his office said Thursday afternoon.
In a statement, Douglas Band, a longtime aide to the 63-year-old former president, said Clinton “was admitted to the Columbia Campus of New York Presbyterian Hospital [...]
John Murtha Dead: Congressman Died At Age 77 (Huffington Post)
Rep. John Murtha, the tall, gruff-mannered former Marine who became the de facto voice of veterans on Capitol Hill and later an outspoken and influential critic of the Iraq War, died Monday. He was 77.
The Pennsylvania Democrat had been suffering complications from gallbladder surgery. He died at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington, Va., spokesman Matthew [...]
OPINION/SALON: Liberals And Sara Palin Agree, Obama Must ‘Fire White House Chief Of Staff Rahm Emanuel’ (Salon)
President Obama promised he’d find a way to unite often-warring political factions. Finally, some concrete proof arrived Tuesday that he’s managed to do just that: Sarah Palin has joined some prominent liberal bloggers in calling for Obama to fire his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel.
Both Palin and the blogs were upset by comments reported in [...]
FACT CHECK: Obama And The ‘Hatchet’ Job (AP)
President Barack Obama, who once considered government spending freezes a hatchet job, told Americans on Wednesday it’s now part of his solution to the exploding deficit. He didn’t explain what had changed.
His State of the Union speech skipped over a variety of complex realities in laying out a “common-sense” call to action.
A look at some [...]
Obama Critics Say His Economic Vision Is Hazy (L.A. Times)
Reporting from Washington – With congressional support eroding, his popularity falling and his renomination of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke potentially in trouble, President Obama faces an even more daunting task to save his entire domestic agenda — convincing millions of angry Americans that his economic policies will bring them a brighter future.
Even as [...]
