Last month, the North Carolina Board of Elections unanimously refused to certify the election of Republican Congressman-elect Mark Harris, who beat his Democratic opponent, Dan McCready, by about 900 votes. Harris, the only representative not to be seated when the new Congress ...read more
Since he became the Republican nominee for governor of Florida last month, Ron DeSantis has made no secret of his racism, from his "monkey it up" crack regarding his opponent, African-American Andrew Gillum, on Fox News, to suggesting that immigrants are child molesters. In ...read more
Donald Trump had 62,979,879 Americans on his side for the 2016 Presidential election. While a seemingly large number, it was only 46.1 percent of the vote, with Hillary Clinton leading with 48.2 percent. Trump, of course, cleaned up the Electoral College and became our 45th ...read more
(WARNING: SATIRE!) Early Tuesday morning Republicans Senate leaders convened a hasty vote on their new “Just Trust Us” bill. Although details of the bill are still sketchy Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell assured the American public that “this is what’s best for everyone. ...read more
(Image via Getty Images) The Banter Long Read: KABC commentator Leeann Tweeden accused Senator Al Franken of groping her in a photograph during a 2006 USO tour. The photograph depicts her asleep in a cargo plane while Franken, smiling to the camera, is seen with his hands on ...read more
One of the things that drives me nuts about the Left is that, more often than not, we allow GOP operatives to run roughshod over us with their stupid, unsourced arguments and talking points. Back in January, Chuck Todd (not a liberal but a good example of the phenomena) got ...read more
I've written many times about HA Goodman, the gadfly on the progressive movement. Before he became Bagdad Bob for Bernie (as Bob Cesca so aptly put it), Goodman supported Rand Paul, Jim Webb and Martin O'Malley, all the while insisting that Clinton couldn't win the primary ...read more
In a Daily Beast article this week, Emilie Plesset reveals that Indiana is removing voters from the lists without telling them, thanks to a new law that violates the National Voter Registration Act (aka the Motor Voter Act.) Back in 2014, Indiana, under then-governor Mike Pence, ...read more
For many years now, we've talked about how Fox News viewers and conservative talk radio listeners are hopelessly brainwashed -- trapped in a marketing and propaganda bubble designed to exploit the kneejerk rage of upper-middle-aged white men who resent that it's not 1957 any ...read more
The debate over the government shutdown over Obamacare has provoked some pretty serious debate on these pages, with readers weighing in with their thoughts on the gigantic clusterfuck in Washington. We get some great insights from readers in the comments section here at the ...read more
TPM has put together a fantastic mashup of the best bits of Ted Cruz's awesomely cringeworthy 21 hour filibuster that has made him quite literally the laughing stock of the nation. Anyone speaking for 21 hours is going to have to do some serious winging it, but when you get a ...read more
Wisconsin’s Republican Senator Ron Johnson is worth well over $23 Million, so certainly knows a thing or two about the high life. Using standard Republican logic, it stands to reason that he would also know how not to be poor. In a speech at a Rotary Club in Madison, ...read more
If you lie to Congress, it is a crime. It’s called perjury. You may remember that when Roger Clemens did it, he barely escaped two counts of it. And you should remember that the official reason President Bill Clinton was impeached was because of perjury (you know, it had ...read more
The House of Representatives voted this morning on Congressman Paul Ryan's budget proposal. It passed by a vote of 221 to 207. The 221 yeahs were all Republican, 197 Democrats and 10 Republicans voted no. You can read the official vote count here. You can read the official ...read more
The Republicans have the upper hand in dealing with the sequester. If 2012 had not happened and their ability to be as incompetent as Democrats not been so clear (or if I were a fan of conspiracy theories, which I am NOT), I might think they planned this. They lost the first few ...read more
Elections have consequences, Chuck Hagel deserves an up or down vote on his nomination. Republicans in the Senate have never been thrilled by President Obama’s decision to nominate former Senator Chuck Hagel as his new Secretary of Defense. Their reasons have varied from his ...read more
Defense SecretaryLeon Panetta’s recent decision to lift the ban on women in combat has sparked some heated debate, it seems mostly on Twitter. My personal account has been besieged by people who don’t object to the new policy because women cannot handle the role but who think it ...read more
If you are interested in politics, you know that former senator from Nebraska, Chuck Hagel, was pretty much cannibalized by Congress. This is the problem with absolutism. You might agree with Barry Goldwater when he said, “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of ...read more
By now you probably have heard that President Obama signed 23 executive orders on gun safety. You might also have heard Senator Rand Paul’s (R-KY) comments that by signing them, President Obama morphed himself into King Obama and that he plans to introduce legislation to nullify ...read more
In what was ostensibly the launch of 'Republicanism 2.0' young guns Paul Ryan and Marco Rubio both gave 'vision' speeches at the Jack Kemp Foundation dinner last week, spelling out their revamped conservatism they hope to sell the American public. Michael Tomasky was not ...read more
If anyone could legitimately tell me what purpose Dick Morris serves, I'd gladly turn The Daily Banter into a propaganda wing of the Republican Party and join Dick in the fight against evil socialism in America. Apparently, Morris is a political pollster, consultant, and media ...read more
By Ben Cohen: I've received quite a few emails and comments about my piece on Glenn Greenwald's rant on the progressive media last week. Some readers took exception to my position that Greenwald's rhetoric is unhelpful and counter productive, claiming my attack on him was ...read more
It seems even Fox News is becoming concerned with reality - at least for now, that is: Karl Rove's familiar 2012 presence on Fox News appears to be coming to a halt. New York Magazine reports that President Roger Ailes is limiting Rove and fellow contributor Dick Morris' ...read more
In response to President Obama's offer last week to hike taxes by $1.6 trillion and to exempt Medicare and Social Security from cuts to beneficiaries, the Republicans have finally presented a counter offer. From Buzz Feed: House Republicans put their criticisms of President ...read more
This is probably not the best line of attack from the Republicans on Susan Rice. From Buzzfeed: Republicans aimed criticism at U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice Thursday for having modest stakes in companies that did business with Iran. And while the revelation has driven new ...read more
By Ben Cohen: We discuss the topic of Republican voter suppression in this weeks mailbag, but I thought it was worth expanding on a little given how serious the issue is. A reader asked whether we thought that the Republican's admission that they tried to stop minorities from ...read more
Michael Cohen in the Guardian makes a persuasive argument that Republicans don't have much to gain by holding the economy to ransom again during the 'fiscal cliff' negotiations: In the end, neither side has all that much to gain from dragging the fiscal cliff argument out. Now ...read more
By Ben Cohen: It's fairly clear that the Republican Party is in a state of serious disarray after getting hammered in the general election. The once unified party has begun to crack at the seams, fracturing over issues that were once untouchable cornerstones of Republican ...read more
It's too early to claim victory, but the GOP's unified front in regards to taxation appears to be breaking. From the Guardian: Cracks in Republican opposition to tax rises for the wealthy grew bigger on Wednesday as Barack Obama increased pressure on the party to accept a deal to ...read more
Gawker's mysteriously anonymous 'Mobutu Sese Seko' reminds jubilant Democrats and the liberal media not to proclaim the GOP dead just yet: There's a time for champagne, though, and that's election night. After that, reality sticks its head in the tent, and there's no bigger or ...read more
By Ben Cohen: The best way to know whether a theory works or not is to test it in the field. In economics we get to see this happen whenever a new government comes into power and implements their particular ideology. There are two major economic theories industrialized nations ...read more
Why never raising taxes has become rigid doctrine in Republican ideology is anyone's guess, but it continues to look like the orthodoxy is finally beginning to crack. Senators Lindsey Graham and Saxby Chambliss have both come out against Grover Norquist's pledge to never raise ...read more
By Ben Cohen: It is hard to watch group of elderly white conservative men attacking a black woman for political purposes and not believe race or gender has something to do with it. Susan Rice, the US Ambassador to the UN and next inline for Secretary of State after Hillary ...read more
Are we finally seeing a ray of light for the future of the Republican Party? From the Guardian: Senator Lindsey Graham has become the second senior Republican in days to publicly disavow a pledge that handcuffs the party to a policy of no tax rises, raising hopes of a deal ...read more
By Ben Cohen: Oliver Willis posted a short but insightful piece on his blog over the weekend outlining the Republicans strategy for getting elected. Titled: 'Conservatives Realize They Have To Lie About Conservatism To Be Elected', Willis argued that the only way they can get ...read more
By Ben Cohen: I've been having a series of arguments with a friend of mine about the competing economic theories in mainstream American politics. My friend takes the view that government is not the answer to America's economic or social problems, and I take the view that in ...read more
The looming fight over the 'fiscal cliff' promises to be another gigantic sellout of the middle classes and poor. President Obama has talked about a 'Grand Bargain' he intends to make with the Republicans in order to stop a set of $1.2 trillion spending cuts and tax hikes that ...read more
By Ben Cohen: Listening to the Right wing fallout after President Obama was re-elected has been absolutely fascinating to say the least. From Karl Rove's extraordinary meltdown live on election night to Sean Hannity's one-eighty on immigration, it's fair to say that the GOP is ...read more
During a 2011 Republican debate Mitt Romney outlined his steadfast belief that the function of government should be outsourced to the for profit industry whenever possible. When asked about FEMA, the organization that disastrously handled Hurricane Katrina after the Bush ...read more
Politicians today could learn a thing or two from JFK. In this excellent speech, the 35th President of the United States lays out a forceful defense of government and its positive role in society: This is what we need to hear from Obama in the next debate. The poll numbers are ...read more
Michael Tomasky at The Daily Beast encapsulates what most on the left have been thinking over the past two weeks: What a fantastic last two weeks these have been. I don’t even mean Barack Obama solidifying his lead over Mitt Romney, although that’s perfectly fine. No, I mean the ...read more
You've got to give it to Gingrich - the man's ability to leap from astute political timing to disastrous miscalculation is nothing short of astonishing. Gingrich was once the Republican front runner until his fantasies about moon colonies and the enormity of his intellect ...read more
By Ben Cohen: I met Vanity Fair's contributing editor Craig Unger over a year ago in his apartment New York City while he was researching his recently published book Boss Rove: Inside Karl Rove’s Secret Kingdom of Power. Unger outlined the premise of the book to me and ...read more
Yes, Herman Cain, the man who's main claim to fame was his proposal to slash all taxes to 9% and a series of seedy sexual harassment cases believes he would be beating President Obama right now if he was running on the Republican ticket. From the Gainsville Sun: “Stupid people ...read more
Andrew Sullivan responds to being labelled a parasite by Mitt Romney: He's describing half the country as parasites, bleeding the productive half dry. Half the country. He includes me, an Obama supporter, who pays three times the tax on my income that Romney does, who immigrated ...read more
As Senator Lindsey Graham stated about the GOP's appeal to minorities, "We're not generating enough angry white guys to stay in business for the long term." This couldn't be more true, as Gary Younge reports, minorities are running away from the GOP in droves. Black support for ...read more
Yes, Bill Clinton gave a phenomenal speech at the Democratic Convention last week, and yes, he fired up the base and provided immeasurable help to Barack Obama's campaign. But the theme of Clinton's speech was "Republicans created the mess we're in, and only Democrats can fix ...read more
My friend Abby Martin at the excellent RT network has a great new show 'Breaking the Set' that airs every night at 6pm. She's an excellent journalist and completely fearless. Check out the half hour edition of her show below for some great interviews with retired Colonel Douglas ...read more
As much as Glenn Greenwald irritates me, his scathing break down of the US Presidential elections is right on the money: The reason I write so little about the presidential election is that it's the ultimate expression of the CNN-ization of American politics: a tawdry, ...read more
Aaron Carol at The Incidental Economist asks why Republicans cannot understand the simple fact that government is better at doing some things than private companies: There are plenty of things that government does poorly. Or, at least you can make that argument, and find some ...read more
