The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld gay marriage bans in four states on Thursday, a pivotal point in the legal battle for marriage equality that makes the Supreme Court likelier to step in and settle the issue.
Quadruple amputee Michael Petrozzino sought as suspect in the murder of his parents.
GOP campaign chief thanks Dems for sidelining Obama "their best messenger."
This plays to my own basic beliefs about politics and what I've referred to as "policy literalism" so it's preaching to the choir. But TPM Reader TS responds to our Reflecting on Tuesday #2 ...
Apropos of the comment that Dems are reluctant to outline robust economic opportunity policies because they know they cannot fully retake the Congress for some years, that underlines a huge problem for Democratic politicians: they vastly underestimate the value of political signaling, communicating a direction they are fighting for to constituents.
TPM Reader NL on the roadblock in the House and the steep wall of inequality ...
Frank Rich, in his column, asks what Democrats stand for now? I'm probably as up to date on politics as any observer and I can't say that I can't say I have a clear answer to that question. I always vote, but my friends who are infrequent (but Democratic) voters didn't know what the Democrats want to do on the economy and ended up not voting on Tuesday. I think a part of the problem is that the Democratic leadership knows they can't retake the House for another 8 years, which means coming up with good policy prescriptions isn't going to make a difference anyway.
In light of yesterday's blowout, a group in Mississippi wants to institute an official "Confederate Heritage Month" via voter initiative. But don't worry it will include "history, heritage, achievements, and prominent people, including Mississippi's African American and Native American veterans."
TPM Reader AB reflects on the Colorado results ...
I'm sure you all are inundated right now with readers offering their unsolicited opinions on what happened Tuesday, so forgive me if I'm just adding to an unwanted deluge.But as a relative newbie to Colorado and its politics, I've been thinking a lot about newspaper endorsements ever since Cory Gardner's victory was called Tuesdaynight. There was an interesting piece over at Vox a couple weeks ago running down the political science on endorsements. The broad strokes are that there's reason to believe such endorsements can have an effect, particularly in close races.
Republican tells C-Span's Washington Journal "the Republicans hate that ni--er Obama" after saying that Republicans "please do not overreach" (a bit counterintuitive?). Watch.
For you old folks, no I'm not becoming a doctor. But join me tomorrow for my AMA at Reddit at 1pm eastern tomorrow. Ask me anything - about the midterms, about the midterms and even about the midterms. Actually, you really can ask me anything. And please, someone ask me about something other than the midterms.
Before the great era of bipartisan cooperation breaks out, there's this epic confrontation over Obama breaking the logjam on immigration by executive order.
"To prevent Obama from becoming the hero who fixed Washington, McConnell decided to break it. And it worked." That's from Matt Yglesias in a post he published yesterday evening before the scope of the GOP victory became fully clear. This is succinct and it is correct.
Indeed, in key respects it worked in 2010. By many measures Republicans should have won the Senate in 2010 and 2012. But each year they were hobbled by a raft of crazy and indisciplined senate candidates who squandered what should have been easy or at least odds-on wins. This year, the terrain was heavily weighted in their favor. And they kept their candidates on the straight and narrow.
But if this was the plan (and it was) and if it worked (which it did) we should ask, why?
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