Has anyone among our mainstream political pundits noticed that however this presidential election turns out, the bankers can’t lose? The bankers I speak of are a strange pair of allies: former Sen. Phil Gramm, a right-wing Texas Republican, who remains an economic adviser for Sen. John McCain, and Robert Rubin, Treasury Secretary for Bill Clinton [...]

If I were still writing editorials, I would comment on, and condemn, Russia’s use of its military against Georgia. I would also have something to say about the Bush administration’s huffing and puffing about Russian aggression. The point I would make is that the U.S. set a terrible example for how nations should behave with [...]

One would think that the American press, of all institutions, would be on the front lines of the battle to protect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights against the Bush administration, which has become a law unto itself. It has given us close to an imperial presidency, countenancing torture, extreme rendition, internal spying, outrageous [...]

Following up on a piece by Gil Cranberg, I wonder if it isn’t time for the mainstream press to treat the president as it would any suspect of a crime, in this case, war crimes, which are punishable under American law. After all, we’ve seen endless stories about all sorts of crimes and suspects. The [...]

Jane Mayer, an experienced and reliable journalist, has written “The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How The War on Terror Turned Into a War on American Ideals,” a book that reports how the International Committee of the Red Cross found that the Central Intelligence Agency tortured people. How can that be? After all, President [...]

At the Knight-Ridder Washington Bureau, where I worked for a time, there was a photograph on the wall of my first bureau chief, the late and legendary newsman from Chicago, Ed Lahey, with his memorable words of advice: “Do not fawn upon the mighty.” That comes to mind when I read transcripts of presidential news [...]

I know, it’s a rule of the mainstream press. If the issue is not going anywhere, it’s not worth much of a story. Of course, if it’s not given much of a story, it’s not going anywhere. It’s like that old conundrum about the tree falling in the forest. Here are a couple of trees. [...]

Here is one difference between the generations of reporters. The older generation was (and is) skeptical of big business and trusted government more to provide protection from the cold blasts of laissez faire. The younger, Dow generation, while cynical of government and almost everything else, believed that stocks and property values will always go up. [...]

Conventional political wisdom keeps saying that people have lost interest in the Iraq war, that it’s no longer an issue. It’s the economy again, stupid. Well I know at least eight American families who would disagree. They are grieving for eight soldiers killed March 10 in separate incidents in the non-Iraq war. Another four were [...]

As I predicted here in July, George W. Bush, the president of all the people, is once again vetoing the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), despite its overwhelming (75 percent) support among Americans, health care professionals and members of Congress. The basic reason was and is ideological; he’s against government sponsored health care. White [...]