It wouldn’t be surprising if you missed it, but the White House is refusing to allow a Congressional Committee access to a key witness in the ongoing probe into Operation Fast and Furious. Operation Fast and Furious is, of course, the incredibly stupid policy of letting automatic weapons find their way into the hands of Mexican drug cartels with the supposed purpose of arresting the | Read More »
After a long stretch of inactivity in terms of actually voting, the Republican nomination contest fires back up tonight with Michigan and Arizona going to the polls. Most of us won’t be able to turn anywhere tonight without seeing coverage of what happens, but here are five things we’ll be watching here at WPA that may not get a lot of reporting in the big-picture | Read More »
It is now less than 11 months until American voters will pick our next (and hopefully new) President. While most of the stories you’ll read are, rightly, about the Republican nominating contests, the fundamentals of the general elections are taking shape around us every day and worth an examination. So let’s take a look at a few key measures—some of which apply to any incumbent, | Read More »
The early November statewide elections in Kentucky and West Virginia were something of a yawn compared to the excitement of 2009 where big Republican wins in Virginia and New Jersey presaged the 2010 wave that swept Republicans into a dominant position in the House and in states nationwide. In Kentucky, Republican nominee David Williams was never really a threat to Steve Beshear. In West Virginia | Read More »
As was discussed in our WPA blog on Friday, the DCCC has released its first list of targeted races for 2012. The NRCC has also announced some seats targeted for pick-ups. One of the interesting things to me about these target lists is what they say about the beliefs of the smart people at the two about what the political dynamics of the 2012 cycle | Read More »
For those who missed it last week, Doug Schoen released a fascinating poll consisting of in-person interviews of n=200 Occupy Wall Street protesters. The topline report can be found here and is worth reading in its entirety. It provides a glimpse into some of the real lunatic fringe elements that are part of (but not the whole of) the Occupy Wall Street protests. That “part | Read More »
John Sides had an interesting piece in the New York Times’ FiveThirtyEight blog earlier this month. The full piece is well worth a read for anyone serious about understanding the latest political science research on campaign advertising. Here are links to part one and part two. Sides is a widely published political scientist and the co-founder of one of my daily must-read blogs, The Monkey | Read More »
President Obama is on the road again. Never missing an opportunity to waste taxpayer dollars in an increasingly desperate effort to get a second term, Obama will take his “pass this bill/it’s not my fault” tour to Virginia and North Carolina this week. That certainly makes sense as both are traditional swing states that Obama won in 2008 and where he is polling well below | Read More »
Almost any embattled President facing re-election is sure to stir rumors of a primary challenge. Of the past five Presidents before Obama we have seen two face either serious or at least rumored serious primary challenges. Jimmy Carter in 1979 saw Democratic legend Ted Kennedy launch a primary challenge that at least one commentator thinks came within one major event—either the Iran hostage crisis or | Read More »
Recent post debate polling shows Texas Governor Rick Perry maintaining his lead in the race to capture the Republican nomination for president. Despite attacks by opponents and Washington insiders, Governor Perry has not seen a significant drop in his numbers. Perry continues to lead the field with 28% of the vote while his closest competitor, Mitt Romney, trails by seven points with 21%. Since experiencing | Read More »
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