A theme has emerged, in recent years, of America as a nation almost hopelessly divided, politically. This theme is most often reinforced by such superlative declarations (by "journalists" who really should know better) as "America is more politically divided than ever," or "this is the most politically polarized Washington has ever been," or similar such alarmist rhetoric. It has even gotten to the point where many see such statements as truisms -- statements so obviously true that they are seen as irrefutable. This is a gross error, born of the fact that most "journalists" simply have no concept of their own country's history. Because while we are indeed currently politically divided and somewhat polarized, this is actually our normal state as a nation -- and on the polarization scale, we're nowhere near the "most divided" we've ever been. Far from it.

Read Complete Article »

When ex-actor Ronald Reagan won the presidency for the first time, I became convinced that American politics had become indistinguishable from show business. Nothing that has happened in the intervening years has caused me to change my mind on the subject. But the phenomenon of television personalities throwing their own pseudo-political "rallies" on the National Mall in Washington certainly breaks new ground in both the political arena and the entertainment world, I have to admit.

Read Complete Article »

I'm going to (mostly) resist the urge to take advantage of this column's volume number in order to write a really gross column. Numerically, and inventory-wise, a "gross" is (of course) one dozen dozen. Twelve squared.

Read Complete Article »

I have to admit that I still have no answer to the question last week's article asked in its title. At this point, nothing more than sheer speculation can answer how President Obama and the White House would react to Proposition 19 passing.

Read Complete Article »

Democrats, and President Obama in particular, have two opportunities to show some leadership right now, which come conveniently right before an election. The first of these opportunities is on the growing foreclosure crisis. The second is on the recent federal judge's ruling that will end the military's ability to enforce the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) policy of excluding openly gay people from serving in the military. Democrats should use both of these opportunities as a chance to show some real leadership, and President Obama should be out in front leading this effort.

Read Complete Article »

Frank Zappa was recently honored by the city of Baltimore (where he spent the first years of his life) by the erection of a bust in front of a public library. And, yes, I like to think Frank is up there somewhere smiling down on my usage of the words "erection" and "bust" in that sentence. More on that in a bit.

Read Complete Article »

Augusts, to be frank, are not President Obama's friend. The past month was no different, at least as measured by public opinion polling. Obama was on a downswing heading into the month, and his numbers reflect this in a stark way. In other words, it was a bad month for Obama.

Read Complete Article »

The answer, as with all things Tea Party, is (once again): "it's hard to be sure." We won't really know until after the midterm elections, and at that point so much "spin" will be on the airwaves one might (if one grew up in Kansas, for the sake of argument) be excused the immediate impulse to run for the tornado shelter in the backyard. In other words, even after the elections, the answer is going to depend on who is doing the answering.

Read Complete Article »

Since it's Monday, meaning this column will appear in Huffington Post as well as on my own website, I thought I'd do the courtesy of actually asking a fairly large, fairly Lefty audience what they thought, instead of just offering up my own explanations for the phenomenon. So, what do you think? I promise I'll tally everyone's comments in an effort to try to qualify what the Left (or at least, the portion of it reading this) really thinks about their disappointment with the president.

Read Complete Article »

The media, quite obviously, has lost any capacity it once may have had for self-examination, to say nothing of its sense of irony. Every so often, this is proven beyond doubt by a single story. This, sadly, is one of those times.

Read Complete Article »