The Obama administration is helping negotiate the terms of Egyptian President Mubarak’s resignation. While we in this country might see this as advancing democracy in the Arab world, Israel is evidently under no such illusions. The Jewish State has witnessed the catastrophic result of so-called democratic elections in the Mideast with something less than joy. [...]

The Obama administration has been racing to catch up with events in Egypt for more that a week now. Cautiously non-commital at first, we then timidly asked Mubarak not to run again, and when that ploy didn’t work, we asking for a peaceful transition as soon as possible. That request  was ignored today with the [...]

I’ve always thought the official responses to the State of the Union address kind of silly. Few of the presidential speeches are substantive in any way–usually just generalities restating the philosophy and broad agenda of the president–with few if any specifics. Then the other party states its position, which inevitably (surprise!) is different than the [...]

I’m betting nobody yells “You Lie!” at the president tomorrow night. Civility is the word of the day, at least for a little while. Obama, bowing to the new reality of a divided Congress and a weakened Democratic Party, will present a centrist address, and both parties will make a show of togetherness for the [...]

Well, Obama was right after all. He kept reaching out to Republicans, no matter how intransigent and belligerent they were, in the belief that eventually Democrats and Republicans would find it in their best interests to come to an agreement. And finally, they did.

We now have two commissions recommending ways to trim the deficit. The one the president appointed made its preferred approach known last week, and now an independent commission has come up with an even stronger approach. Given the current state of affairs in washington, both approaches are dead on arrival. The GOP will have nothing [...]

I wonder if the sour, off-key comments by House Speaker-to-be John Boehner and still Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell after the election might have given the voters who placed renewed confidence in the Republican Party buyer’s remorse. Boehner gave no indication whatsoever that he was willing to work with Democrats, and McConnell repeated his claim [...]

Yesterday’s midterm election was nothing short of a catastrophe for the Democratic party. The combination of the worst economy since the Great Depression, a  jobless rate stuck at 10%, a president and a majority party unable to make a coherent case for their agenda or to articulate their vision, and the surprising uprising of the [...]

Well, Obama promised change. I don’t think this election is quite what he had in mind. It’s hard to read the polls as anything but a repudiation of the Democrats now in power. Republicans will read this as a rejection of Obama’s agenda. Democrats will read it as a rejection of Obama’s failure to execute [...]

Even if Republicans take back both houses of Congress this year, they should not cheer too loudly. They were soundly repudiated just two short years ago (how soon we forget), as the Democrats will be this time around. What does this tell us? It tells me that Congress, ever more beholden to special interests and [...]