Archives: Posts From March 2007
Jesse Jackson Denounces Black Caucus
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 30 Mar 2007 at 12:59 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: It's not every day that Jesse Jackson denounces the Congressional Black Caucus, but today is such a day.
At issue: the CBC's decision to co-sponsor two debates (one Republican, one Democratic) for the 2008 primaries with Fox News.
This, of course, ...
Rudy and the Flat Tax
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 29 Mar 2007 at 6:12 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Rudy Giuliani's endorsement by Steve Forbes yesterday, and his recent comments on taxes in a number of forums, have brought some attention to the former mayor's record on the issue. Today, the Sun's editorial page even dubbed Rudy "Supply-Side Giuliani." ...
The Rudy & Judy Show, Cont'd
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 29 Mar 2007 at 4:49 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: We here at NYSunPolitics.com were among the first to raise a red flag about Judith Giuliani, and the liability she is likely to be to her husband's campaign.
Well, part damage control (and part damage), it seems the happy couple has now taken to ABC's ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 29 Mar 2007 at 3:20 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: No contest. MC Rove:
Full story here. ...
Fred Thompson's Strength
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 29 Mar 2007 at 11:03 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: I've been remiss in not getting to this sooner, but the Zogby America Poll released Monday gives us a fairly interesting look into just from where Fred Thompson's support has been coming.
In the poll of 376 likely Republican primary voters, Mr. Thompson ...
Hillary and '1984'
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 29 Mar 2007 at 10:26 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Is there more than a little bit of truth to that Hillary Clinton "1984" ad that's gotten so much press in the last few weeks?
Over at TCS Daily, my old boss at the Cato Institute (not that he's old, of course, just that he hasn't been my boss for many ...
Sun-nis Around Town
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 28 Mar 2007 at 6:05 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Check out the Sun's own Eli Lake in this segment on Bloggingheads.tv, opposite Robert Wright.
In addition to tackling the question of just what is a neoconservative, there's a discussion of Senator Hagel of Nebraska and his chances in the 2008 ...
Gore's the One
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 28 Mar 2007 at 5:07 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Who knew Roger Stone had a blog?
Well, the veteran political strategist and Nixonite does, and he's put together a great little chart comparing Nixon's career path to that of former vice president (and, yes, former next president of the United States) ...
McCain on Hagel, Etc.
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 28 Mar 2007 at 5:00 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: So, I wanted to give you all a few more bites out of this morning's McCain blogger call. There were a couple of bits worth reporting, but particularly notable, I thought, was a fairly harsh attack on Senator Hagel of Nebraska, who has been the leading ...
McCain on Regulating Internet Politics: 'I'd be very reluctant'
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 28 Mar 2007 at 11:08 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: This morning, Senator McCain of Arizona held his first blogger conference call of the 2008 race. He says he expects to start holding them regularly.
And, so, on the topic of politicians making use of the Internet in their campaigns, I posed this ...
Steve Forbes Joins Team Giuliani
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 28 Mar 2007 at 10:47 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: This morning, the Giuliani campaign sends on this: "The Rudy Giuliani Presidential Exploratory Committee today announced that Steve Forbes, President and Chief Executive Officer of Forbes and Editor-in-Chief of Forbes magazine, has endorsed Rudy Giuliani ...
What Voters Know About Thompson
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 27 Mar 2007 at 1:01 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: I fear I've enraged a lot of the folks who have come here today from Drudge by declaring that voters "know precisely zero about Fred Thompson past what they know of him from 'Law & Order.'" So much for hyperbole.
But, ultimately, I stand by this ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 27 Mar 2007 at 11:18 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: While we're busy beating the tar out of John McCain over McCain-Feingold, it's only fair to remember that Mitt Romney, who has vowed to fight for the repeal of McCain-Feingold if elected, used to sing a very different tune on campaign finance:
Big ...
Thompson Takes Bites Out of Giuliani, Romney
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 26 Mar 2007 at 4:44 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: The latest USA Today/Gallup poll, conducted Friday through Sunday, on the presidential race is out, and it's a humdinger. It's hard to say what the headline even is. Here are a few tries, though:
* Romney's support drops to within the margin of error of ...
Romney Receding
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 26 Mar 2007 at 12:33 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: It has not been a good couple of days for the Romney campaign. The former senator from Tennessee, Fred Thompson, who isn't even running, overtakes Mr. Romney in Iowa, where there's a robust Romney campaign apparatus. Mr. Thompson ties Mr. Romney in Ohio. ...
The Rest of the World Comes Around, Part II
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 26 Mar 2007 at 11:53 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Following up on my post Friday, here's another indication that the CW has finally caught up with the facts. The Hotline has updated its presidential race rankings to put the former mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani, at the head of the Republican pack ...
Senator Obama's Constitution: Bending Time and Space
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 26 Mar 2007 at 9:35 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Today, my colleague Gary Shapiro, a brilliant legal mind in his own right, puts forward a story to which I've been looking forward ever since I first caught wind of it. Back in 1989, a year before he would become the first black president of the Harvard ...
Clinton Raises A Million in Norcal
By Josh Gerstein | Mon, 26 Mar 2007 at 1:31 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Senator Clinton crisscrossed the San Francisco Bay area Sunday, pocketing about $1 million for her campaign, according to a spokesman. That's on top of $2.6 million raised Saturday night at a gala in L.A. Those tallies will help Mrs. Clinton post an ...
Clinton to Make Amends for Snub of Chinese Americans
By Josh Gerstein | Sat, 24 Mar 2007 at 1:11 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: While visiting San Francisco on a fund-raising swing tomorrow, Senator Clinton is planning to make amends for a gaffe that caused a furor last month in the Asian-American community. At a February 23 fund-raiser in the same city, three reporters for ...
Thompson Overtakes Romney in Iowa
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 23 Mar 2007 at 2:14 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Well, the first round of Fred Thompson numbers continues to come in from state-level polls around the country. The latest numbers out from American Research Group show Mr. Thompson at 12% among likely Iowa caucus goers, beating Mitt Romney's 10%.
In New ...
The Rest of the World Comes Around
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 23 Mar 2007 at 1:29 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Kind reader, please forgive me this moment of gloating...
For the last year or so, Rudy Giuliani has been the clear frontrunner in virtually every national poll of Republicans, and he's been the clear frontrunner in most state polls, as well. ...
Judy, Judy, Judy
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 23 Mar 2007 at 9:55 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: So, yesterday Judith Giuliani made it known that Rudy Giuliani isn't her second husband, he's her third.
"Something I will share with you is that, since I haven't done [many] interviews ... Rudy and I have both been married three times," Mrs. Giuliani ...
Edwards To Soldier On
By Josh Gerstein | Thu, 22 Mar 2007 at 1:30 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: The proper way to begin any comment on the press conference John and Elizabeth Edwards just held would be to offer best wishes, thoughts and prayers to the couple as they struggle with the recurrence of her cancer. And, of course, we hope for the best ...
Edwards: Wife's Cancer Back, 'Campaign Goes On Strongly'
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 22 Mar 2007 at 12:32 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Contrary to the widely distributed report from The Politico, Senator Edwards of North Carolina is not suspending his campaign for president.
According to Edwards: "The campaign goes on. ... We have no intentions of cowering in the corner."
Mr. Edwards ...
Q-Poll: Thompson Ties Romney in Ohio
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 22 Mar 2007 at 8:58 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Well, that didn't take long...
According to a Quinnipiac poll out this morning (see Question 2) of registered Republicans in Ohio, Fred Thompson, only a few days after announcing on "Fox News Sunday" that he is "going to leave the door open" to a run ...
Is the Shine Wearing Off the Obama Apple?
By Josh Gerstein | Thu, 22 Mar 2007 at 1:04 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: It turns out tonight that YouTube video painting Senator Clinton as the Big Brother of the Democratic Party was produced by an employee of a technical firm contracted with Senator Obama's campaign. The Huffington Post broke the story. The AP has it here. ...
New York One Step Closer to Feb. 5 Primary
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 6:07 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: New York's legislature has moved the state one step closer to joining California in participating in a February 5, 2008, big-state primary.
Traditionally, small states Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina have an out-sized impact in the primary ...
Colorado Senate: McInnis McOuttis?
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 5:20 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: NYSP columnist Liz Mair notes the speculation that former Rep. Scott McInnis, who's been exploring a run for Senate to replace the retiring Senator Allard in Colorado, is about to drop his bid.
This seat is a top 2008 pick-up prospect for Democrats in a ...
Palestinian Arab Sympathizers for Obama
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 12:18 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Not to turn this into Obama Day here at NYSunPolitics.com, but Steve Clemons of the Washington Note has come across a letter from Palestinian Arab sympathizers urging Senator Obama to "stand his ground" as regards his statement that "Nobody is suffering ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 12:02 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Apropos of Josh's question earlier about whether it's smart for the Clinton camp to question Barack Obama's record of opposition to the Iraq war, here's the Obama campaign's push back:
That's what you get when you mess with Barry, I guess. ...
Check Out Our Q&A Today With George Marlin
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 9:56 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Today, NYSunPolitics.com brings you a Q&A with New York conservative activist George Marlin. Mr. Marlin recently distributed a 40-page dossier with every "liberal" quote by or about Mayor Giuliani, in an attempt to dissuade conservatives nationwide from ...
CNN's Dobbs Pushes the Envelope
By Josh Gerstein | Wed, 21 Mar 2007 at 12:27 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Viewers of Lou Dobbs's nightly CNN program are used to its regular diet of stories claiming that illegal immigration is out of control and that "corporate America" has hijacked the nation's trade policy. However, Tuesday night, Mr. Dobbs took his ...
Are Clintons Smart to Swing at Obama's War Talk?
By Josh Gerstein | Tue, 20 Mar 2007 at 5:59 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: From Harvard, Seth Gitell reported in the Sun this morning on Clinton adviser Mark Penn's effort to undermine Senator Obama's reputation as an unwavering critic of the Iraq War. This seems to be a concerted effort by the Clinton camp, as the Post ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 20 Mar 2007 at 12:10 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: The Club for Growth fires back against John McCain:
Ouch. The Club for Growth, famous for taking out -- or at least trying to take out -- Republicans it considers not to be sufficiently "pro-growth," wasn't around in 2000, the last time we had a ...
McCain's Mutually Exclusive '06 Analyses
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 19 Mar 2007 at 4:43 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Senator McCain of Arizona is offering two mutually exclusive analyses of why the Republican Party lost control of Congress in 2006. Now, of course, he can't offer the first important reason the Republicans lost: Iraq. He and his candidacy are too tightly ...
O'bama Does Oakland
By Josh Gerstein | Sun, 18 Mar 2007 at 2:27 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Green "O'bama" T-shirts and buttons were everywhere as Senator Obama of Illinois made a St. Patrick's Day visit to Oakland yesterday afternoon. It was an impressive turnout for a presidential campaign rally almost a year before the primaries. Crowd ...
Rudy Drop: 'Giuliani Life Long Liberal'
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 16 Mar 2007 at 4:10 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: A dossier under the title, "Rudy Giuliani Life Long Liberal," edited by New York conservative activist George Marlin, has just been circulated to a small circle of New York journalists. And, now, NYSunPolitics.com publishes it online in its entirety ...
Rangel: 'Dennis Miller is a born loser'
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 15 Mar 2007 at 7:51 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Well, ask and ye shall receive.
Earlier today our Josh Gerstein asked in this space whether there would be any fallout from Dennis Miller's opening act at last night's Giuliani fundraiser in midtown Manhattan, in which he called Speaker Pelosi and ...
More From the Rudy Fundraiser
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 15 Mar 2007 at 7:13 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: I wanted to post a few more clips from last night's Rudy Giuliani fundraiser in Midtown last night.
Specifically, I wanted to post some clips of the protest held outside, where families of firefighters killed on 9/11 denounced Mr. Giuliani for various ...
Rudy vs. Bloomy, Part II
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 15 Mar 2007 at 2:10 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Yesterday, I asked for your thoughts on Rudy Giuliani versus Michael Bloomberg for president, after a Quinnipiac poll was released in the morning showing Mr. Bloomberg beating the former mayor among New Yorkers.
Reader Tim weighs in with the thought ...
Rudy's Whoopi Goldberg Moment
By Josh Gerstein | Thu, 15 Mar 2007 at 1:16 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Any experienced reporter will tell you, when covering a political event, keep your eye on the warm-up acts. This was good advice last night as Mayor Giuliani held a fund-raiser at the Sheraton New York hotel. In addition to the arguably problematic ...
Political Video of the Day: Team Rudy & Judy
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 14 Mar 2007 at 11:20 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Politicians use their wives in campaigns. It's just how politics is played in the 21st century. Hell, even George Washington probably got some political mileage out of Martha.
However, to anyone in attendance at the Giuliani fundraiser at the Sheraton ...
NYC: Bloomberg Would Make Better Prez Than Rudy (What do you think?)
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 14 Mar 2007 at 12:21 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: More New York City voters would choose Mayor Bloomberg for president than would choose the city's former mayor, Rudy Giuliani.
In a Quinnipiac poll released this morning — conducted March 6-12 among 1,261 registered New York City voters — New Yorkers ...
A McCain Surge?
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 13 Mar 2007 at 6:12 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: According to the latest New York Times/CBS poll (PDF), Mayor Giuliani now leads Senator McCain by 9 points among Republican primary voters, 43%-34%, in a proposed head-to-head match-up. That's a much smaller gap than in last month's poll, which had Mr. ...
NYSunPolitics on the Air
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 13 Mar 2007 at 3:33 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: For those in the New York area, I'll be on Fox 5 News this evening (at 5 p.m. and 6 p.m.. I'm told) discussing Mayor Giuliani's chances in the Republican primary.
Those of you who have followed my writing on this topic won't be surprised to know that I ...
Club for Growth Gives McCain Poor Marks
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 13 Mar 2007 at 1:38 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Right after news comes out that Senator McCain will be staying away from the Club for Growth's winter pow-wow, the group has posted its white paper on the senator's fiscal record.
The bottom line: "Senator McCain's outspoken pursuit of anti-growth and ...
McCain Skips Fourth Conservative Outing in Two Months
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 12 Mar 2007 at 8:50 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: So reports The Hill. He's skipping the conservative Club for Growth's winter meeting at the end of this month. He's also recently skipped the Conservative Political Action Conference, the National Review Institute's conservative summit, and the Heritage ...
The 'Might Runs'
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 12 Mar 2007 at 1:01 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Is there any way someone could put a moratorium on presidential non-announcements? I realize it might raise some First Amendment concerns to bar senators and former senators — by all necessary physical force — from going on TV shows or holding press ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 12 Mar 2007 at 12:58 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Rudy Giuliani declaring (in 1989, while running for mayor against David Dinkins): "There must be public funding for abortion."
(via Drudge) ...
Romney: How Much Is That Party in the Window?
By Ryan Sager | Mon, 12 Mar 2007 at 1:02 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Here's one of many problems with campaign-finance regulation (a.k.a. "reform"): While designed to curb the influence of money in politics, it inevitably strengthens the hands of independently wealthy candidates while weakening everyone else's.
For an ...
Edwards: The Murdoch-Slayer
By Josh Gerstein | Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 11:38 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Score one for John Edwards as Nevada Democrats bail out on the August debate the state party planned under the auspices of Fox News. Party officials are citing a lame joke that Fox News president Roger Ailes made this week, alluding to the similarity ...
AFL-CIO to DNC: Jump!, Part II
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 4:58 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: So, I wanted to add some more to our earlier item about the AFL-CIO threatening to demand that the Democratic National Committee move the party's 2008 convention out of Denver, Colorado, if it doesn't get the easier-unionization legislation it wants in ...
Domenici Adds to GOP's Woes in West
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 1:26 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: The growing U.S. attorneys scandal, where eight former U.S. attorneys are claiming that resisting political pressure to go after Democrats led to their dismissals, is not just a problem for the Republican Party at the national level, adding to President ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 12:57 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Rep. David Obey (D-WI) lays into "idiot liberals" who don't think the Democratic Congress is doing enough to stop the war in Iraq:
He gets particularly mad when he has to explain that the House can't filibuster. ...
AFL-CIO to DNC: Jump!
By Ryan Sager | Fri, 9 Mar 2007 at 10:53 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: The Democratic National Committee's decision to hold its nominating convention in Denver in 2008 almost fell apart because of labor concerns before it was announced in January. Now, organized labor is making more trouble for the Democrats.
The AFL-CIO ...
I Am Edwards, Hear Me Roar
By Josh Gerstein | Thu, 8 Mar 2007 at 7:45 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: My story today about John Edwards's efforts to be as pro-woman as Senator Clinton has stirred up some hornets in the blogosphere and apparently even on the radio.
Media Matters sees the piece as part of a Right-wing conspiracy that involves questioning ...
The McCain Response
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 8 Mar 2007 at 3:30 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: I just got off the phone with a consultant to the McCain campaign — who was speaking on background — getting his take on the recent surge of Mayor Giuliani (and tanking of Senator McCain) in the polls.
"I look at it as, 'Who would you rather be at this ...
Political Video of the Day
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 8 Mar 2007 at 11:59 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Mayor Giuliani and his second wife in a 1993 campaign ad:
I'd expect to see a lot of videos like this popping up over the course of the year. That old marriage issue is going to be a big one.
And "gentle" isn't really the image the mayor is ...
Giuliani Beats Clinton in Two of Three Swing States; Beats Obama in All Three
By Ryan Sager | Thu, 8 Mar 2007 at 10:02 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: It's been a mixed media week for the Giuliani camp, between the stories about his troubled family life on the one hand and the good news out of CPAC and all the national polls on the other.
And, so, let's take a look at a new swing-state poll from ...
Libby Loose Ends
By Josh Gerstein | Wed, 7 Mar 2007 at 6:42 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: Lewis Libby's convictions yesterday generated an orgy of press coverage. Most of the print coverage was accurate, which is more than I can say for the cable-news coverage leading up to the verdict, during which outright falsehoods about the case were ...
The Marriage Issue
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 7 Mar 2007 at 5:38 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: No, not the gay-marriage issue. The multiple-marriage issue. How big a role will it play in the Republican primaries? In the general election?
The issue was brought to the fore this morning by comments made by the head of public policy for the Southern ...
A Republican Meltdown?
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 7 Mar 2007 at 12:17 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: One great rule of journalism is that any headline that ends in a question mark has as its answer: no. Such is the case, I believe, with recent talk of a Republican meltdown. Jonathan Martin over at Politico makes the case for Republican gloom here. I'm a ...
A Libby Roundup
By Ryan Sager | Wed, 7 Mar 2007 at 8:41 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Here's a roundup of today's Libby news/reaction:
First, of course, we have our own Josh Gerstein on the question of a Bush pardon.
Also at the Sun today we have an editorial on The Cost of Libby and John Coffee on the fallout from the verdict. Also, we ...
Video from CPAC
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 6 Mar 2007 at 1:45 PM | Permalink
Excerpt: At the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (March 1-3 in Washington, D.C.), I took a bit of video, filming the major candidates' speeches as well as some man-on-the-conservative-convention-floor interviews.
While conservatives certainly ...
Welcome to NYSunPolitics.com
By Ryan Sager | Tue, 6 Mar 2007 at 11:48 AM | Permalink
Excerpt: Welcome to NYSunPolitics.com and this, the NYSunPolitics blog, where the political staff of The New York Sun will offer breaking news, in-depth analysis, and running commentary on the world of politics — particularly, the race for the White House in 2008 ...
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