http://www.realclearpolitics.com/ en Copyright 2008 Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:48:23 -0600 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=3.33 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Sat, 21 Nov 2009 20:48:07 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/senate_votes_to_open_health_care_debate_225040.html 225040 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:49:42 -0600 It's simply not true that America is ambivalent about everything when it comes to the Obama health plan.The day after the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) gave its qualified blessing to the version of health reform produced by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Quinnipiac University poll of a national cross section of voters reported its latest results.This poll may not be as famous as some others, but I know the care and professionalism of the people who run it, and one question was particularly interesting to me.It read: "President Obama has pledged that health insurance reform...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/a_budget-buster_in_the_making_225010.html 225010 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:45:49 -0600 President Barack Obama took office promising to lead from the center and solve big problems. He has exerted enormous political energy attempting to reform the nation's health-care system. But the biggest economic problem facing the nation is not health care. It's the deficit. Recently, the White House signaled that it will get serious about reducing the deficit next year"”after it locks into place massive new health-care entitlements. This is a recipe for disaster, as it will create a new appetite for increased spending and yet another powerful interest group to...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/the_coming_deficit_disaster_224996.html 224996 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 18:28:32 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/why_not_tax_wall_street_225033.html 225033 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 06:59:01 -0600 Increase Font SizePrinter-FriendlyEmail a FriendRespond to this article Back in February, President Obama met with a group of CEOs in the White House, seeking their support for his economic stimulus package. One of his chief targets was Jim Owens, the head of Caterpillar in Peoria, Illinois. The day after the session in Washington, the president flew to Peoria to speak at the Caterpillar factory and took Owens and newly elected Republican representative Aaron Schock, the youngest member of Congress at 28, with him.Aboard Air Force One, Obama chatted amiably with Owens and Schock. Owens...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/obamanomics_101_no_need_for_capitalism_225014.html 225014 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:38:37 -0600 CEDAR CREEK, Texas -- As Barack Obama began crafting his administration last year, the term "competence over ideology" was often used to describe the incoming president's approach. Fast forward past another election: as the top Democrat's job approval rating dipped below 50 percent and his signature first-year initiatives face increasing doubts, a bullish group of Republican governors emphasized results over rhetoric as they predicted continued success in 2010.In Washington, Republicans have been branded as the party of no for achieving near-constant unanimity on major...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/21/gop_governors_emphasize_results_over_rhetoric__99260.html 225035 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:21:18 -0600 On Wednesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee met to question Attorney General Eric Holder about his decision to prosecute Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others in criminal courts rather than military tribunals. As the father of Todd Beamer, who died on United Airlines Flight 93, I was able to attend that hearing. What transpired caused me great concern and shook my confidence in our current administration.The committee, chaired by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.), displayed the division in our country not only visually—the Democrats were seated on the left and the Republicans on the...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/eric_holder039s_baffling_ksm_decision_225034.html 225034 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 09:20:27 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/21/civilian_trials_help_win_war_of_ideas.html 225019 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:42:43 -0600 Increase Font SizePrinter-FriendlyEmail a FriendRespond to this articleAttorney General Eric Holder spoke with confidence and authority before the Senate Judiciary Committee last Wednesday when asked how he would prevent another attack like the one committed by Nidal Malik Hasan at Fort Hood. I think what we have to do is understand exactly what happened that led to that tragedy. Were there flags that were missed? Were there miscommunications or was there a lack of communication? Holder promised a "sound investigation" of the shooting. It was a nice try, but Holder's tone did...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/political_correctness_amp_institutional_stupidity_225013.html 225013 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:18:15 -0600 Carly Fiorina's Cancer Warning by Dana GoldsteinHot Topics: Galleries, Sarah Palin, Big Fat Story, Giving Beast, Hungry Beast, Art BeastEnter your email address:Enter the recipients' email addresses, separated by commas:Message: Feng Li / Getty Images The president's approach to the 9/11 trials offers something for everyone"”and decisions on nothing. Obama may be the anti-Bush, Lee Siegel argues"”but he's failing to govern. Lord Acton once wrote that in a political system's success lie...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/obama_the_un-decider_225004.html 225004 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:14:56 -0600 As Obama's surprise (and reluctant) pick for Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton brings her star power and stamina to the global stage.Jonathan Van Meter reports. Photographed by Annie Leibovitz.Truth or Dare: Cate Blanchett storms the stage in A Streetcar Named DesireAnd The Winner Is: Watch our behind-the-scenes video from the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund AwardsLittle Girl and Boy Lost: Lady Gaga, Lily Cole, and Andrew Garfield star in Vogue's haute Hansel and GretelVogue editors pick and style their favorite fall wardrobe staplesMenswear-inspired hats and mid-calf boots are the...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/how_clinton_came_to_be_secretary_of_state_225003.html 225003 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:37:17 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/iran039s_dangerous_game_enters_next_round_225022.html 225022 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:14:42 -0600 Oh, how the international community loves Barack Obama - loves to stiff him, play him along, and manipulate him. He's the world's celebrity ingenue, the slender naïf perpetually undone by the recalcitrance of foreign leaders.Earlier this year, in a touching exercise in diplomatic and civilizational outreach, he sent two letters to Iran's mullahs and a new year's message to the Iranian people. How mannerly, how unthreatening. When the Iranian government beat protesters in the streets after it stole the election for Pres. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June, Obama kept his...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/21/obamas_chump_diplomacy_99259.html 225026 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:40:04 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/going_green_matters_more_than_ever_225023.html 225023 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 07:42:27 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/scientific_scandal_rocks_climate_change_promoters_225024.html 225024 AM Update Sat, 21 Nov 2009 06:50:01 -0600 It’s one of those hideous little episodes making minor headlines this week that will be forgotten by the media next week. 15-year-old Vada Vasquez of the Bronx is in a coma with a bullet in her brain, after being caught in the crossfire when a group of Bloods took aim at 19-year-old Tyrone Creighton (and succeeding; he’s in the hospital, too).The Bloods went after Creighton at the behest of friends of a man in Rikers who suffered a beatdown by Creighton’s two brothers in Rikers with him. The shooter was allegedly little 16-year-old Carvett Gentles,...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/suggestion_for_obama_end_the_drug_war_225012.html 225012 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 23:49:16 -0600 The "reformers" in the White House and the House of Representatives have made all too plain their vision of the federal government's power to coerce individual Americans to make the "right" health-care choices. The highly partisan bill the House just passed includes severe penalties for individuals who do not purchase insurance approved by the federal government. By neatly tucking these penalties into the IRS code, the so-called reformers have brought them under the tax-enforcement power of the federal government.The Congressional Budget Office stated on October 29...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/21/criminalizing_health_care_freedom_99258.html 224999 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 14:16:55 -0600 "˜The mood of America is glum. Two-thirds of the public is dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country" and voters' anti-incumbent mood is approaching 1994 and 2006 levels, when control of Congress changed hands.So reported the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press on Nov. 11, summarizing its latest poll. Receive news alertsI think there's reason to believe that the public's anger is even deeper than Pew's estimate because voters believe - correctly - that "the way things are going" is not getting better.If so, and with...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/20/economy_is_weak_voters_are_angry__time_for_third_party_99222.html 224979 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 13:58:56 -0600 Barack Obama has fallen below 50 percent in the Gallup Poll, an expected but no less significant historical marker.The public's view of this president ranks him in the lower third of modern American politics. He has fallen below the majority threshold at the fourth fastest rate, of the twelve presidents since World War II.Obama was nearly number three. But he escaped Ronald Reagan's fall-point by about a week. That Reagan has been here as well, and languished below 50 for two years in his first term, illustrates that Obama's new reality is notable but not determinative. Still,...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/gallup_obama_drops_below_50_224980.html 224980 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 09:10:15 -0600 Slate magazine is just one of the countless media outlets convulsing with St. Vitus' Dance over that demonic succubus Sarah Palin. In its reader forum, The Fray, one supposed Palinophobe took dead aim at the former Alaska governor's writing chops, excerpting the following sentence from her book:"The apartment was small, with slanting floors and irregular heat and a buzzer downstairs that didn't work, so that visitors had to call ahead from a pay phone at the corner gas station, where a black Doberman the size of a wolf paced through the night in vigilant patrol, its jaws...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/20/palinophobes_hate_first_ask_questions_later_99240.html 224972 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 11:07:59 -0600 YOU HAVE to hand it to Sarah Palin. I don't mean you have to hand her the 2012 nomination. Nor do you have to hand her the $24.64 I overpaid for "Going Rogue.''But let us give credit where credit card is due. Remember back in the 1990s when Hillary Clinton described herself as the Rorschach test for how people felt about the women's movement? Palin has become the latest test for shifting common ground and fault lines between sisterhood and sibling rivalry.It's been like this since the Palintologists discovered her in Alaska and put her on the national ticket...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/lipstick_on_a_rogue_224954.html 224954 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 13:58:22 -0600 The media is stirring up drama regarding tomorrow's vote - namely, they are speculating whether Landrieu and Lincoln will vote with Reid to start debate.Of course they will. Three big reasons:(a) "Keep the Ball Rolling". Tomorrow's vote - like all of the votes to date - is a process vote, meaning that Obama and the leadership can argue, "Vote yea to keep the process going. We can improve the bill later if you stick with us." Every vote they have won to date has, I think, been won based on this argument - and it should carry the day tomorrow. The problem...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/horseraceblog/2009/11/tomorrows_anticlimax.html 224982 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:15:01 -0600 Reasonable minds can disagree about Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to prosecute Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four other alleged Sept. 11 perpetrators in a Manhattan federal court. But some prominent criticisms are exaggerated, and others place undue faith in military commissions as an alternative to civilian trials.Mohammed is many things: an enemy combatant in a war against the United States whom the government can detain without trial until the conflict ends; a war criminal subject to trial by military commission under the laws of war; and someone answerable in federal court for...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/holder039s_decision_is_reasonable_224965.html 224965 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:15:50 -0600 Attorney General Eric Holder adopted a tough guy pose when he announced that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others will be tried in federal court for the most heinous terror attack on Americans in history. "After eight years of delay," he intoned, "those allegedly responsible for the attacks of September 11 will finally face justice. It is past time to finally act."Where to begin? The claim that the Bush administration was somehow dilatory sets a new standard for gall, particularly coming from Eric Holder. As former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy points out, "The...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/20/holders_true_motive_99239.html 224966 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 13:56:55 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/gop_govs_want_kinder_gentler_2010_224981.html 224981 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 14:08:34 -0600 Sign in or registerFriday 20 November 2009 | Blog Feed | All feedsBy James Delingpole Politics Last updated: November 20th, 200988 Comments Comment on this article If you own any shares in alternative energy companies I should start dumping them NOW. The conspiracy behind the Anthropogenic Global Warming myth (aka AGW; aka ManBearPig) has been suddenly, brutally and quite deliciously exposed after a hacker broke into the computers at the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (aka Hadley CRU) and released 61 megabites of confidential files onto the...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/global_warming_conspiracy_exposed_224984.html 224984 PM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:39:23 -0600 For late-19th-century anarchists, terrorism was the "propaganda of the deed." And the most successful propaganda-by-deed in history was 9/11 -- not just the most destructive, but the most spectacular and telegenic.]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/20/travesty_in_new_york_99224.html 224936 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:39:46 -0600 The heated second-guessing by conservatives of Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to hold a civilian trial in Manhattan for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and four others charged as co-conspirators in the 9/11 mass murders is to some extent understandable.Of course, it's fatuous to rant, as some Republicans do, that a law enforcement response to terrorist war crimes is some kind of illegitimate Democratic invention. The Bush administration combined war-on-terrorism rhetoric with civilian criminal prosecutions of would-be shoe-bomber Richard Reid, would-be hijacker Zacarias Moussaoui,...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/no_need_to_fear_a_nyc_terrorist_trial_224956.html 224956 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:20:25 -0600 WASHINGTON "” Now it is Senator Harry Reid's health care bill.Senator Harry Reid, left, the majority leader, on Thursday with Senator Christopher J. Dodd at a Capitol Hill news conference. The majority leader's deep personal involvement in assembling the overhaul of the health care system "” now on the brink of a historic Senate debate "” has, for better or worse, conferred ownership of the legislation on Mr. Reid, Democrat of Nevada.Should Mr. Reid shepherd the measure successfully through the Senate and meld it with the...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/reid_takes_ownership_of_heath_care_overhaul_224968.html 224968 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:40:57 -0600 Majority Leader Harry Reid is touting the Senate's latest health-care bill as costing $849 billion over 10 years. But this uses the same accounting trick as past versions: 99 percent of the costs don't kick in until the fifth year of that "10-year" period. The true 10-year costs are well over twice what Reid's advertising: $1.8 trillion.                     SENATE Majority Leader...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/democrats_cook_the_books_on_health_bill_224943.html 224943 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:41:08 -0600 The nation stands on the verge of achieving fundamental health-care reform. For the first time in history, the House of Representatives has enacted comprehensive health-reform legislation, and the Senate has begun its own debate. These bills will provide a bedrock sense of security and stability for Americans who have health insurance, and quality, affordable options for Americans without it.But health reform has an economic and fiscal dimension, too. For more than 30 years, health-care costs have risen much more rapidly than either inflation or the growth of the economy -- yet these higher...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/a_leap_forward_to_better_care_224942.html 224942 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:23:53 -0600 With the introduction of Harry Reid's health care bill - talk will inevitably focus on whether the public option or the Stupak amendment will undermine the legislation. Yet, if the bill dies, I do not think either of these will be the primary cause of death.I think this will be the culprit:This is the CBO's analysis of how the Reid bill will cut Medicare. The total reductions come out to $491 billion over 10 years when everything is factored in.The following has been said by other commentators, but I have to add my voice to the chorus: This is insanity, Democratic leaders. Why...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/horseraceblog/2009/11/have_democratic_leaders_gone_m.html 224946 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:21:48 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/why_i_voted_039no039_on_health_care_reform_224947.html 224947 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:34:52 -0600 Earlier this week, the inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, a k a, the bank bailout fund, released his report on the 2008 rescue of the American International Group, the insurer. The gist of the report is that government officials made no serious attempt to extract concessions from bankers, even though these bankers received huge benefits from the rescue. And more than money was lost. By making what was in effect a multibillion-dollar gift to Wall Street, policy makers undermined their own credibility "” and put the broader economy at risk.Paul Krugman...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/geithner039s_big_squander_224960.html 224960 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 07:36:29 -0600 Palin Pile-On: Has the Left Gone Too Far in Attacking Her This Week?Hot Topics: Galleries, Sarah Palin, Big Fat Story, Giving Beast, Hungry Beast, Art BeastEnter your email address:Enter the recipients' email addresses, separated by commas:Message:If the economy does not bounce back, Obama will have to consider a change. When crisis descended, other ineffectual Treasury secretaries did not last. Reagan replaced the befuddled Don Regan, former head of Merrill Lynch, with his trusted and intelligent adviser, James Baker, who immediately engineered a devaluation of the dollar to restart...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/the_quotcave_inquot_to_goldman_sachs_a_big_problem_224939.html 224939 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:27:04 -0600 Counting to 60 in the Senate is only the beginning of the tough math that bedevils Democrats these days as they try to pass health reform, survive a bad economy and appeal more to the middle-class voters whose support they’ll need in the 2010 elections. The giant health care bill rolled out Wednesday night by Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is laced with puts-and-takes aimed at easing the burden on families in the $60,000-to-$80,000 income range. But just around the corner next month, Reid’s Democrats face immediate new challenges, including a $925 billion debt ceiling...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/hard_math_for_democrats_middle_class_224948.html 224948 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:01:22 -0600 WSJ.com is available in the following editions and languages: Thank you for registering.We sent an email to: Please click on the link inside the email to complete your registrationPlease register to gain free access to WSJ tools.An account already exists for the email address entered.Forgot your username or password?This service is temporary unavailable due to system maintenance. Please try again later.The username entered is already associated withanother account. Please enter a different usernameThe email address you have entered is already in use.Please re-enter the...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/why_no_one_expects_a_strong_recovery_224940.html 224940 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:30:07 -0600 Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius did a marvelous job this week of undermining the move toward evidence-based medicine with her hasty and cowardly disavowal of a recommendation from her department's own task force that women under 50 are probably better off not getting routine annual mammograms.This is an old issue that has not only sharply divided the medical community for more than 20 years, but also taps into deep resentments among women who, over the years, have felt neglected by a male-dominated medical establishment. And there's no doubt that the advisory...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/mammogram_cave-in_set_back_for_hc_224963.html 224963 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:58:37 -0600 Sorry, we're not cool enough to support your browser. Please keep it real with one of the following browsers:]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/rational_advice_or_rationed_care_224961.html 224961 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 04:59:41 -0600 LOST PINES, Tex. — After two bleak years, Republican governors gathered here on Thursday to assess their political future — and they liked what they saw. With 37 governors’ seats open in 2010, the party is looking to topple some big-name Democrats. Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi warned against attacking President Obama. The latest on President Obama, his administration and other news from Washington and around the nation. Join the discussion.What was most striking about the Republican governors was not simply their sense of optimism — a sentiment...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/a_tilt_away_from_social_issues_for_gop_224941.html 224941 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 09:41:45 -0600 ]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/treasury_yield_plunge_sends_bulls_a_warning_224977.html 224977 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:44:13 -0600 WASHINGTON -- In the beginning, the Obama administration directed a spotlight toward its careful, thoughtful decision-making process on Afghanistan. National security meetings were announced, photographed and highlighted in background briefings to the media. President Obama would apply the methods of the academy to the art of war -- the University of Chicago meets West Point -- thus assuring a skittish public that deliberation had preceded decision.Now the president and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates are desperately trying to jerk the spotlight away from a dysfunctional Afghan...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/11/20/obamas_dysfunctional_decision_making_99223.html 224958 AM Update Fri, 20 Nov 2009 05:54:59 -0600 President Barack Obama is returning from his trek to Asia Thursday to a capital that is a considerably more dangerous place for him than when he departed. While he was abroad, there was a palpable sense at home of something gone wrong. A critical mass of influential people who once held big hopes for his presidency began to wonder whether they had misjudged the man. Most significant, these doubters now find themselves with a new reluctance to defend Obama at a phase of his presidency when he needs defenders more urgently than ever. This is the price Obama has paid with his complicity...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/20/why_the_greg_craig_debacle_matters_224953.html 224953 AM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:49:17 -0600 President ObamaAs a professor of constitutional law, Barack Obama gave his students eight hours to complete his exam"”even though the exam was designed, he wrote in the instructions, "to be completed in three hours." Now that he's president, Obama could use that kind of cushion. Upon taking office, the president promised that the prison at Guantanamo Bay would close in a year. He now says it will not. He demanded that Congress pass a health care bill by August. It still hasn't. The president's promise to sign a health care bill this year has now...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/obama_keeps_missing_deadlines_does_it_matter_224902.html 224902 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:33:31 -0600 There's nothing fun about reading legislative language. But spend enough time reading legislative language and it makes reading other things seem fun, like CBO reports. And so it was last night, where after hours spent digging through the legislative text the cool language of the budget analysis seemed as clear and crystalline as a Joan Didion essay.There's not much in the CBO report (pdf) that surprises, at this point. The public option will serve three or four million people and have slightly higher premiums than private insurance. The co-ops will have such an insignificant effect...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/health_care_reform039s_grand_bargain_224922.html 224922 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:14:24 -0600 NH REAL ESTATEsearch by town or realtor All words Any words Phrase Exact  Similar Results in pop-up window...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/the_new_health_care_bureaucracy_224913.html 224913 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:50:35 -0600 The battle to pass health care legislation has entered one of its final and most difficult phases. Late Wednesday evening, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., unveiled the 2,074-page bill that will be debated in the Senate -- one of the biggest and most expensive bills to ever come to Congress. Reid will need all party members to support the bill if he wants to break the first Republican attempt at a filibuster. And what does it take to get a wavering senator to vote for health care legislation? Here's a case study: On page 432 of the Senate bill, there is a section increasing...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/harry_reid_woos_skeptical_democrats_224923.html 224923 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:44:27 -0600 (CNN) -- America's national debt cannot grow beyond a limit imposed by Congress known as the "debt ceiling."]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/we_must_tame_the_ballooning_national_deficit_224918.html 224918 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:49:49 -0600 The Sarbanes-Oxley Law was rushed through Congress in the wake of an enormous corporate accounting scandal that shook Wall Street and investors across the country. CEO's and officers at several large companies were found to have "cooked the books"; i.e. knowingly falsified earnings statements to maintain stock prices or propel them higher. The practice came to be known as, Enron-Style Accounting.The new law had many provisions, but one of its more sweeping was the requirement that corporate officers and executives assume personal responsibility for the accuracy and...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/obama_stimulus_enron-style_accounting_is_back_224914.html 224914 PM Update Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:54:22 -0600 Palin Pile-On: Has the Left Gone Too Far in Attacking Her This Week?Hot Topics: Galleries, Sarah Palin, Big Fat Story, Giving Beast, Hungry Beast, Art BeastEnter your email address:Enter the recipients' email addresses, separated by commas:Message: Jim Watson, AFP / Getty Images Does Sarah Palin suffer from narcissistic personality disorder? Michelle Goldberg puts America’s hottest author on the couch.All politicians may lie, but not all politicians lie like Sarah Palin. Many people in public life lie to avoid getting caught...]]>http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/19/palin039s_ego_trip_224924.html 224924 PM Update http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/the_day_global_warming_stood_still_225036.html http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/the_day_global_warming_stood_still_225036.html Editorials Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:51:14 -0600 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/assessing_obama039s_china_trip_225037.html http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/assessing_obama039s_china_trip_225037.html Editorials Sat, 21 Nov 2009 08:52:53 -0600 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/dislocated_in_america_225005.html http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/dislocated_in_america_225005.html Editorials Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:21:51 -0600 http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/why_we039re_not_039post-racial039_225011.html http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2009/11/21/why_we039re_not_039post-racial039_225011.html Editorials Sat, 21 Nov 2009 06:44:49 -0600