Political Crumbs
Chicken, Contaminated Dry Wall, and Tennis?
While the Tea Party Caucus, Congressional Black Caucus, and Blue Dog Coalition may have received a large share of the headlines in recent years, they represent but a small fraction of the officially recognized Congressional Member Organizations (CMOs) on Capitol…
Read MoreTerry Branstad: 11 Going on 14?
Iowa Republican Governor Terry Branstad, the longest-serving governor in the history of the country (excluding pre-U.S. Constitution governors), has served as chief executive of the Hawkeye State for 6,749 days through July 4th (18 years, 5 months, 24 days). That…
Read MoreThe 40 Percent Floor
Although Republicans have won 23 of 39 Indiana gubernatorial races since the first time a GOP candidate was on the ballot in 1860, Democrats have suffered few blow-out defeats during this span. In fact, the Democratic nominee has eclipsed the…
Read MoreCurse of the ‘4’?
Big-name Republicans are not coming out of the woodwork yet to challenge Al Franken in Minnesota’s 2014 U.S. Senate race, and there is not much chatter of the GOP picking off one of the five DFL-held U.S. House seats either….
Read MoreSeasoned Senators in Wisconsin
Of the 15 men and women that have served in the U.S. Senate from Wisconsin since popular vote elections were introduced a century ago, Ron Johnson and Tammy Baldwin rank among the oldest upon first entering the chamber. Johnson began…
Read MoreParty Like It’s 1986?
Tim Johnson’s retirement opens up an opportunity for Republicans to gain control of both U.S. Senate seats in South Dakota for the first time since the convening of the 100th Congress in January 1987 (Tom Daschle ousted incumbent GOPer James…
Read MoreFamiliar Faces
On Wednesday, Paul Ryan’s 2012 U.S. House challenger Rob Zerban announced he will seek a rematch in 2014 against the failed GOP VP nominee. Should Zerban win his party’s nomination next year, that would mean the Democratic Party will have…
Read MoreBachmann’s Low Profile Continues
Four-term Republican Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann continues to keep a relatively low profile now two months into the 113th Congress. The Gopher State’s 6th CD U.S. Representative has issued only nine press releases during this span – second lowest in…
Read More“We” Before “I”
In Barack Obama’s 2013 State of the Union address, the President only incorporated 56 first-person singular pronouns (e.g. I, I’d, I’ll, I’m, I’ve, me, mine, myself) into his speech, or 0.8 percent of the words he spoke Tuesday evening. That…
Read MoreBill Burton: Don’t Criticize Beyoncé!
During an event at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs Thursday afternoon, former Obama Deputy Press Secretary and Priorities USA senior strategist Bill Burton was asked what he thought of the Beyoncé lip synching scandal at the president’s inauguration event….
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