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Why Democrats Should Go on Fox
Tweet Share on Facebook October 29, 2009 Comment (59)By Julia Piscitelli, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Hi, my name is Julia, I am a Democrat, and I appear on Fox.
Dems, I hate to break it to you, but not only is Fox the No. 1 cable news station, they actually put more women on as experts during the day than MSNBC or CNN.
In a nation with more registered Democrats than Republicans, why is Fox still America's top-rated cable news network? Because America is captivated by conflict. Look at Jon and Kate. Their highest rated episode came after their marital problems went public. Nothing brings home the high ratings like conflict.
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Does Money Buy Access to the Obama White House?
Tweet Share on Facebook October 28, 2009 Comment (8)By Peter Roff, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
For a president who promised his inauguration was the beginnings of a period of post-partisanship, the level of Barack Obama's permanent campaign activities is somewhat surprising.
Obama was the victim of the perennial cheap-shot earlier in the week when bloggers pointed out he was playing more golf than his predecessor, George W. Bush—who gave up the game because he believed it was inappropriate for him to be seen on the links while U.S. troops were in the field. And, with healthcare reform moving forward and a string of otherwise favorable coverage in the bank, the White House political team was probably feeling pretty good.
So it must have been quite a shock Wednesday when the Washington Times gave its readers the insider's view of how the White House wines and dines its most prominent and lucrative supporters.
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2012 Fault Lines in NY-23 House Special Election
Tweet Share on Facebook October 28, 2009 Comment (8)By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
The special election race taking place in upstate New York has been described variably as a GOP civil war and a battle for the soul of the Republican Party. To the extent that those assertions are true (and they are, as I argue in my column), it may also be an early chance to see the contours of the 2012 presidential race. In one corner you've got Sarah "Going Rogue" Palin who has, of course, bucked the Republican establishment and endorsed Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate who seems poised to finish ahead of official GOP nominee Dede Scozzafava. No surprise there: Palin is aiming to inherit John McCain's "maverick" mantle—but as a conservative maverick (No compromises!), rather than as a centrist maverick like McCain (Let's make deals on climate change, campaign finance reform, etc).
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How the World Series Could Affect the New Jersey Governor's Race
Tweet Share on Facebook October 28, 2009 Comment (2)By Doug Heye, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
With the New Jersey gubernatorial race going down to the wire, anything can happen and anything can affect the outcome.
Even the World Series.
Had teams other than the New York Yankees and Philadelphia Phillies both advanced, the Series would be of no political consequence. But New York and Philadelphia are not merely cities close to New Jersey who happen to host the teams. The cities sandwich the Garden State and are its two largest media markets.
That certainly could affect paid advertisements on television, but the series, which puts the entire state in baseball overload, will make it harder for the candidates to gain earned media from newspapers and local television.
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No Soda Tax--Government Can't End Obesity in America
Tweet Share on Facebook October 28, 2009 Comment (23)By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Obesity is a public health crisis in the United States. There's no debating that it is caused by Americans' sedentary lifestyles and poor food choices. And, before we go any further, I should disclose that I am an active supporter of both the Obesity Institute and the Diabetes Care Complex at Children's National Medical Center. So I care very much about bringing down the rate of obesity in this country.
Having said that, controlling what we put into our mouths is not a job for the government. Ads are running on local TV here in Washington, D.C., urging Congress not to impose a tax on soda and juice drinks. Last month, in an interview, President Obama suggested that a soda tax was worth exploring. Currently a group in New York City supporting Gov. David Patterson's proposed soda tax is sponsoring an ad campaign in New York subways which, according to the Boston Herald, shows soft drinks morphing into yellow globs of human fat. (Actually I don't have a problem with the ads, just the tax.) Over the weekend, a Princeton University professor suggested a tax on red meat in the New York Daily News, since "high taxes on cigarettes have saved many lives." The difference is that cigarettes have been proven to kill people—I'm not sure the tax is what made people quit—while no one has proven that soda kills people.
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Virginia Democrat Deeds is Running Out of Time and Money
Tweet Share on Facebook October 27, 2009 Comment (3)By Doug Heye, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
With President Barack Obama campaigning for Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Creigh Deeds at Old Dominion University today, talk is swelling that Deeds's campaign is all but over.
A Washington Post poll released late yesterday shows Republican Bob McDonnell with a 55-44 lead over Deeds. Such a lead is, of course, tough to overcome. It's even tougher when polling data demonstrate there's little room to move upward:
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Children of Fallen Troops Find Solace in Snowball Express
Tweet Share on Facebook October 27, 2009 Comment (7)By Peter Roff, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
As de Tocqueville wrote nearly two centuries ago, America's greatness can be found in the spiritedness of its volunteers. It was the volunteer spirit that built this country and it is the volunteer spirit that has sustained it through some of its darkest hours, especially in times of war. And, where America's troops and their families are concerned, that spirit is alive and well.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, more than 8,000 children have lost a U.S. service-member parent as a result of the ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. To help these children succeed, to help them understand that they are valued and important, a group of folks founded an organization called Snowball Express, "a charity for the children of our fallen military heroes." Its mission is a simple one: to bring families experiencing the loss of a service-member parent together so that they can realize they are not alone.
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Will CNN go the Fox Route Like MSNBC?
Tweet Share on Facebook October 27, 2009 Comment (44)By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
CNN has slipped into last place among the 24 hour cable "news" networks, the New York Times reports. And that raises this question: Will CNN follow MSNBC down the Fox road to partisan glory? Since its debut, Fox has staked a place as the conservatives' home away from perceived bias of the so-called mainstream media. (Quick aside: Doesn't the fact that it has the most viewers ipso facto put Fox in the mainstream media?) MSNBC has gained traction in the last year or two by becoming the Fox of the left. So partisans on both sides now know where they can go to find out why they're right and the other side is evil.
Take the 8 o'clock hour. Conservatives can tune in to Fox to watch Bill O'Reilly skewer the left. Liberals can flip on Keith Olbermann and watch him lambaste O'Reilly. And CNN offers up the estimable Campbell Brown who it touts as "the only non-partisan cable news anchor at 8 pm, [offering] a common sense approach to reporting the day's news." The show used to be called No Bias, No Bull—but viewers seem to prefer both bias and bull, as CNN comes in fourth place at 8pm.
So the question is: When CNN decides to get partisan will they try to out-fox Fox or bigfoot MSNBC on the left? Stay tuned.
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Obama Not Comfortable With Women in Basketball, Golf ... or Anywhere Else
Tweet Share on Facebook October 27, 2009 Comment (188)By Bonnie Erbe, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
President Obama drew heat last week for a story that surfaced outing his private White House male-only b-ball games. The story was that even though two female members of his cabinet were members of their college basketball teams, they were excluded, as were all women, from this most private of male-only clubs. The story became a metaphor for how the president views women generally and threatened to reveal some inconvenient truths about the man.
Now we see reports that gender-insensitivity charges have resonated with the Obama White House. According to Politics Daily, the president dragged chief domestic policy adviser Melody Barnes to the golf course on Sunday, and she became the first female to join his golf foursome since he took office. The event produced a photo op of global proportions.
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Conservatives v. Republicans in New York 23 Race
Tweet Share on Facebook October 27, 2009 Comment (9)By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
Earth to the conservative movement: Don't use a defeated conservative to argue the winning value of conservatism at the ballot box.
I have been watching with great interest and some glee the Republican civil war being fought in and around the Adirondack Mountains in next week's special election to succeed Rep. John McHugh, who is now the secretary of the Army. It's the only U.S. House election that will be held next week, but rather than being a referendum on President Obama, it's become an illustration of the battle for the soul of the GOP. Conservatives—including very high profile pols like Sarah Palin—don't like the Republican nominee (who is, as GOPers go, rather liberal) and have lined up behind an independent candidate. I argued in my column in our digital edition last week that the GOP can't achieve majority status if they can't get on the same page in what should be a winnable district. Today's New York Times has a passage that perfectly sums up the GOP's problem:
