Eugene Robinson's Blog, page 134

Romney is no economic savior

Republicans say they’re eager for the presidential campaign to turn away from “distractions” and focus instead on the economy. Someone should warn them that if they’re not careful, they might get their wish.

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In Obama’s stance on gay marriage, a return to hope

President Obama’s evolutionary leap on same-sex marriage is a historic advance in the nation’s long march toward equality and justice. It is also a bold political gambit that sacrifices some votes in exchange for potentially renewing his image as a leader of vision and hope.

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Austerity as a bridge to nowhere

Economic austerity is a dangerous, self-defeating intellectual fad. Perhaps I should say that’s what it was, given Sunday’s election results in Europe. Perhaps I should also say good riddance.

Voters in France, Greece and even Germany — a hotbed of the austerity cult — told their political leaders, in no uncertain terms, that boosting economic growth is more important than cutting government spending. Here in the United States, I hope that Democrats, at least, were paying attention; I fear that the addled ideologues who control the Republican Party will never get the message.

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Why are we in Afghanistan for the long haul?

Show of hands: Does anybody really understand the U.S. policy in Afghanistan? Can anyone figure out how we’re supposed to stay the course and bring home the troops at the same time?

I’m at a loss, even after President Obama’s surprise trip to the war zone. The president’s televised address from Bagram air base raised more questions than it answered. Let’s start with the big one: Why?

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A GOP witch hunt for the zombie voter

Republicans are waging the most concerted campaign to prevent or discourage citizens from exercising their legitimate voting rights since the Jim Crow days of poll taxes and literacy tests.

Four years ago, Democrats expanded American democracy by registering millions of new voters — mostly young people and minorities — and persuading them to show up at the polls. Apparently, the GOP is determined not to let any such thing happen again.

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Immigration turnaround offers chance for real solutions

Now that the immigration “crisis” has solved itself, this is the perfect time for Congress and the president to agree on a package of sensible, real-world reforms.

Yeah, right, and it’s also the perfect time for pigs to grow wings and take flight.

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Could overseas events drive the 2012 election?

It may not be the economy, stupid.

Then again, James Carville’s famous maxim about the 1992 presidential campaign might well be valid in 2012. But it’s quite possible that on Election Day, voters’ most urgent concerns — economic or not — will be driven by overseas events that neither President Obama nor his Republican opponent can predict or control.

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Republican rhetoric over the top

Not all overheated political rhetoric is alike. Delusional right-wing crazy talk — the kind of ranting we’ve heard recently from washed-up rock star Ted Nugent and Tea Party-backed Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) — is a special kind of poison that cannot be safely ignored.

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Which Mitt will we get?

It’s all over but the shouting — or, in this case, the polite applause: Mitt Romney is going to be the Republican presidential nominee. But which Mitt Romney? Will it be Mitt One or Mitt Two?

This is not an inconsequential question. Mitt One is a fiscally conservative, socially moderate, Wall Street-style Republican who believes in compromise to get things done. Mitt Two is a far-right zealot who accuses Democrats of trying to impose godless socialism and claims that what hangs in the balance this fall is nothing less than liberty itself.

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