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For the past week, Majority Leader McConnell experimented with an open amendment process in the Senate. Members offered amendments on everything from climate change, to federally protected land, to limiting the President’s ability to initiate and sign bilateral agreements with foreign countries. The broader question is can McConnell take a
Can decades of dysfunction reverse course in a single Congress? No. But despite the general pessimism surrounding Congress there are several reason to expect the 114th to be more productive than its recent predecessors, which were historically bad on several fronts. Now that divided congressional control is over a sense
The 113th Congress may very well go down in history as the least democratic in our nation’s history. Except it probably not in the way you are thinking. This has nothing to do with how much money was spent in campaigns, gerrymandering, voter suppression laws, or other things that distort
A lot is being said about the historic nature of Republicans flipping 8-9 Senate seats and beating four incumbent Democrats (and possibly as many as five by December) during the election of 2014. However, that’s not terribly unusual in the Senate. Of the current Members of the Senate, 48 won
New House Republican Conference rules prevent members seeking higher office to hold committee and subcommittee chairs. Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK) said, the “idea is not to have major committees, appropriations or subcommittees chaired by people who are running for the Senate. If you’re shuttling back and forth, that’s just a
There’s an old adage in American politics that campaigns boil down to a choice between one of two simple messages: “It’s time for a change,” or “Stay the course.” Democrats can blame President Obama’s unpopularity, their party’s boom-and-bust turnout, an extraordinarily challenging map of seats to defend in the Senate,
Democrats are searching for explanations to Tuesday’s thorough defeat. Aside from obvious considerations – low turnout, 6th year election, etc. – there are several arguments that the economy was a big reason Democrats lost so thoroughly. It was polled, once again, as the most important issue concerning voters this election.
With Republicans likely winning a Senate majority in today’s elections, it’s worth examining whether there are parallels to what happened in 2006 when Democrats reclaimed the majority in the House following 12 years of Republican rule. As you may recall, 2006 was, like 2014, a “six-year itch” cycle. That is,
“The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorating. There is no path that can guarantee success, but the prospects can be improved.” A select few foreign policy and Middle East experts will quickly recognize the origin of this sobering assessment, but for the most casual observers of world events this
Several Senate Democrats are running their campaigns as far away from the President as possible. Democrats are defending six states that Mitt Romney won in 2012. Three Democratic incumbents find themselves in toss-up races in states Mitt Romney won by landslide margins. The President’s approval numbers in those states are
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